Immortality?

[UnknownGunslinger]

You know I've always considered the subject of physical immortality impossible and just a bad science fiction idea.
Until I stumbled onto some articles on Turriptosis Nutricula; A jellyfish with no natural limits to its life span!

It is considered to be the world's only biologically immortal animal!
Not only that, but we've already partially sequenced their RNA: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/183228429

The critter can basically self regenerate itself through something called transdifferentiation - It is able to turn different types of cells into whatever other cells it needs to regenerate it's tissues.
Kinda like a tiny, naturally evolved, Synthetic biology lab!

This basically made me shut the hell up with all my negativism on the possibilities that we can ever achieve biological immortality.
If nature can and has done it, then it's only a matter of time, money and technology until we replicate the process.
Micro biology and Synthetic biology are booming sciences right now and will probably be the next paradigm shift for our generation!

So basically if immortality becomes possible in the future...
Well should we?

I don't know, but I'm starting to think it will be useful for us to start asking ourselves those questions.
Personally I think that achieving immortality will be the doom of our species, it will stall progress and innovation, which as embarrassing as it is to point out: Relies mostly on waiting the previous generation to finally die out and leave the young guys to do their thing

Isaac Asimov has written extensively in his Robot series on the possibility that a culture with un-naturally prolonged life cycle will only stagnate and wont innovate beyond creature comforts and essentials. And in the end will be replaced by other more energetic and innovative civilisations.
Why do you think Mordin Solus (The brilliant scientist) from Mass Effect 2, who was from of a race heralded by the galaxy to be it's best scientists, were with high metabolic rate which meant they would be lucky to live beyond 40!?

Short life-span means an accelerated rate of creativity and ingenuity!
Even if we do not achieve immortality what would a civilisation where people live to be in their hundreds be like?
And if you had dozens of decades ahead of you, would you ever take any risks in your life?

 

[Sam Warrior]

Immortality is theoretically possible from a biological point of view at least, its all to do with the renewal of cells and the degradation of the genome. Theres the slight issue of how much information your brain can store as well but I'm not a neuroscientist. I agree with you though I think immortality would be a bad idea at least any time in the immediate future. Neil Asher's polity books have most of the population immortal but the human race is governed by AI so research etc continues. If humans achieved immortality any time soon the shit would hit the fan more so that in is already, my guess would be that births would be stopped by government law, hopefully, to stop overpopulation and the surviving people would as you said stagnate and all would become very boring.

 

[SckizoBoy]

Theres the slight issue of how much information your brain can store as well but I'm not a neuroscientist.

Four terrabytes... apparently, though you'd never guess it judging from some of the mooks that one sees about one...

OT: It's perfectly possible, if you factor all the necessary requirements of biochemistry and microbiology that prevent DNA degradation, cell cycle corruption etc.

I personally don't see it happening, nor would I want to... life is already bad enough as it is without wanting it to go on forever...(!)

 

[C. Cain]

Logan's Run will become a true story, or we'll all become Borg because organs don't last. Jellyfish aren't exactly the most complex organisms so they don't have to deal with issues like organ failure.

Do jellyfish get cancer?

All multi-celled organisms should be able to get cancer. In theory at least.

 

[Jonluw]

There are few things I want less than immortality.
I might like an increased life-span, or maybe to stay young throughout my life; but living forever?
Hell no.

 

[UnknownGunslinger]

Logan's Run will become a true story, or we'll all become Borg because organs don't last. Jellyfish aren't exactly the most complex organisms so they don't have to deal with issues like organ failure.

Do jellyfish get cancer?

All living things or at least the ones on the Phylogenetic tree can get cancer, in theory at least!
But to be honest I'm not averse to a Logans Run society
Once you get past the freaky 70's hair it looks like a pretty fun place to live in
Death machines and all, it still looked pretty cool

 

[C. Cain]

There are few things I want less than immortality.
I might like an increaed life-span, or maybe to stay young throughout my life; but living forever?
Hell no.

Don't worry, you can still be killed. And then there's the inevitable heat death of the universe. So it won't be forever. Hope that cheers you up.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

If I could live forever I'd forget to live.

 

[Jonluw]

There are few things I want less than immortality.
I might like an increaed life-span, or maybe to stay young throughout my life; but living forever?
Hell no.

Don't worry, you can still be killed. And then there's the inevitable heat death of the universe. So it won't be forever. Hope that cheers you up.

Oh hooray.

 

[Spectral Dragon]

I already knew about these, the oldest they've found is something like... A thousand years old, I think. DNA splicing is a bad idea since, given longer lifespans, we'll stagnate. As preciously stated, and I agree. How would you like to apply for a job, only to realise someone has had it for a century and will have it for another? We'd just... Be alive. The shorter the life, the more we live. I'd never want immortality for anyone.

 

[ShindoL Shill]

cancer cells are technically immortal. there's a woman who died of cancer, but if still biologically alive because of it apparently.

tbf i'd love to live forever. preferably as as an trans-dimensional, omnipresent, time-traveling reaper.

 

[Macgyvercas]

Immortal, maybe. But invulnerable is another story. In short, even if we can't die from age or disease, we still suck against bullets to the head

 

[winginson]

The main problem I see with immortality is how your perception of time changes. The older you become the faster time appears to pass for you. Imagine what would happen if you lived for thousands of years.

 

[DEAD34345]

Immortality is nothing special really. Supposedly, the only reason we never evolved immortality naturally is that we tended to die of other things far more often than we did of old age. Using extra resources in order to extend our lifespan isn't worthwhile when we all die of disease or predators before then anyway.

OT: I won't lie, I would love to be immortal (in the no dying of old age way I mean). Life is just too short for me to do everything I want to do.

 

[Princess Rose]

**snip**

Technically, the only thing that prevents humans from having the same thing is that our bodies intentionally have a self-destruct mechanism built in - these little bits of extra material on the ends of our chromosomes that slowly wear out as we age - causing us to age, in fact.

That's why, when they cloned that sheep, it aged faster than it should have - because it's chromosomes had already shortened (in it's progenitor).

Of course, this particular genetic flaw exists in all animal life above a certain complexity. The theory goes that either it was A) a mistake in one of our common ancestors or B) that they are required for more complex lifeforms, hence forcing the issue.

That said, if one could find a way to regenerate those little tabs on the end of our chromosomes... it is possible that aging could be slowed significantly.

 

[INeedAName]

Nothing unending has value, including life.

That said would I want to stop aging and to die on my own terms? Hell yes!

 

[Camaranth]

I agree with you though I think immortality would be a bad idea at least any time in the immediate future. Neil Asher's polity books have most of the population immortal but the human race is governed by AI so research etc continues.

Except that no amount of research on the candle would have produce the lightbulb. We need new generations who are taught to question the status quo and can look at things from a slightly different context than the last generation.

More OT: I don't think it's a good idea, we cause enough trouble with our 80 years or so, extend it maybe, use the technology to cure anything really nasty, but give us time to grow and take risks, with eternity before you why bother with today?

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

Never got why so many people view immortality has a negative, well the boredom argument anyway, the overpopulation and morality arguments do have some valid points. To me being immortal would mean I could do absolutely everything I could possibly think of, and probably many times more things I never thought of doing. I mean you could properly use up a couple dozen lifetimes just to explore and see every country of this planet alone.

Another positive for me is if everyone was immortal no one would ever again have the deal with the pain of someone they love growing old, getting sick and dying.

 

[Esotera]

Short life-span means an accelerated rate of creativity and ingenuity!

Which is why all the major advances in the sciences occurred in prehistory.

Having longer lifespans means that people can delay stuff they'd normally do at a young age, such as have a family, etc., and work on their career. Also there are lots of scientists who literally live for their job and will do nothing else until they die, so I don't think it'd cause stagnation as such, especially as the birth rate would probably remain similar to the current one, creating new people.

It'd be cool, but the transitional period where the death rate decreases wouldn't be fun. Then again, we're headed for a similar period in the next few decades due to the lowered birth rate, so that'll be fun.

 

[Sam Warrior]

cancer cells are technically immortal. there's a woman who died of cancer, but if still biologically alive because of it apparently.

tbf i'd love to live forever. preferably as as an trans-dimensional, omnipresent, time-traveling reaper.

Ahha good ole HeLa cells, Henrietta Lax, done so many "fun" experiments with her cells Another interesting fact about that is there is now more of her than before she died, biomass wise at least.