The Consequences of Physical Immortality
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Author: Bruce J. Klein
Added: 07/25/2003
Type: Interview
Viewed: 14465 time(s)
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Page 6
QUESTION 7. John Wyndham suggested that short term lifespans lead to short-term perspectives - how would we expect our conception of the world and ourselves to change with expanded lifespans? One consequence of immortality might well be stasis, that it is the waxing and waning of the generations that brings change and progress, for example. Wouldn't even Einstein or Shakespeare run out of ideas eventually?
I don’t think Einstein could have ever run out of ideas. Did you know, Einstein was still working on a unified theory in the last day so of his life in 1955? We still haven’t found a unified theory nearly 50 years later. So, would we expect Einstein, if he were still alive, to simply stop asking questions? Let’s say he succeeded in solving all the problems of the universe. Wouldn’t this lack of problems to solve be a problem itself? And would Einstein just give up at this point and cease in finding an answer? Maybe if he was physically tired, that'd be plausible, but if he had solved all problems, he would have also solved the problem of being tired as well.
Fittingly, Hans Moravec writes in his prelude to his book ‘Mind Children’ [4]:
A mind would require many modifications to operate effectively after being rescued from the limitations of a mortal body. Natural human mentality is tuned for a life span's progression from impressionable plasticity to self-assured rigidity, and thus is unpromising material for immortality. It would have to be reprogrammed for continual adaptability to be long viable. Whereas a transient mortal organism can leave the task of adaptation to the external process of mutation and natural selection, a mind that aspired to immortality, whether it traces its beginnings to a mortal human being or is a completely artificial creation, must be prepared to adapt constantly from the inside. [H. Moravec 'Mind Children' 1988]
I agree with Moravec to some degree. Biological minds are at a huge disadvantage to change and self-improvement. It takes 10 to 26 years of expensive education for humans to become informed enough to be of benefit to our society. While, a computer can learn (download) a new skill in minutes.
Will a biological mind be incapable of living forever? I don’t know for sure, it doesn’t seem impossible though. I could envision some people feeling more comfortable keeping their biological bodies. Yet they'd probably need nanobots residing within them and their brains to fix oxidation damage and averting Alzheimer’s disease and cancer and a tone of other problems. And there's also the risk associated with walking around in a delicate biologic bag. I certainly wouldn't opt for biological immortality especially if given a chance to live in more durable substrate.
Steven Pinker was once asked about the possible number of sentences that could be structured. He said:
I think they're literally infinite, in the mathematicians' sense that there is an infinite number of numbers. Of course, there isn't any room in the universe to store an infinite number of numbers, or an infinite number of sentences, but we can infer that in principle the number is infinite. [5]
While Pinker may not exactly satisfy the question of running out of ideas, the fact that there are an infinite number of potentialities is a promising fact.
John Harris at a 2002 lecture for the International Longevity Center once said:
“many people, perhaps most, would be prepared to endure the long, dark teatime of the soul, or its equivalent, in exchange for permanent remission of the death sentence that we are currently forced to live with. Indeed, there is much evidence both from literature and in the literature, the scientific literature, that suggests that many people are willing to trade off quality of life for longevity. From the pact of Faust, celebrated by writers from Marlowe to Goethe, to Bram Stoker's vampires, to choices made by cancer patients with terminal diagnoses, the evidence is very strong that people want extra lifetime even at substantial cost in terms of pain, quality of life and even when the outcomes are highly uncertain.” [6] |
Article Comments
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Poster: kleblanc
Added: -0/8-/2003
When the ancient egyptians mummified themselves, they were aware of both the immortality of the soul and the immortality of the body. They considered both as possibilities. Current day spiritualists are going on a premise that was devised from the ancient egyptian texts, except it is only part of the story due to over-simplification and re-wording in Christian texts. There is no proof of an afterlife. We are wise to consider both possibilities.
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Poster: Eric
Added: -0/7-/2003
If we would spend more time
reading our creators life
instructions we would be more
able to accept the death
penalty that satan decived us
into. But by our acceptance of
Jesus and what he did for us
at the cross we can avoid the
second death and live in heaven
for eternity. The World made new
without any pain or suffering.
The major problem highly intelligent
people like yourself have a hard time
seperating the natural mind
from the spiritual mind.
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Poster: Deb K.
Added: -0/7-/2003
What if we are already immortal: which I happen to have reality on the fact that we are. The key here is new bodies while retaining memory/previous knowledge. Ethics has to be encouraged so that this knowledge is used for the good of all mankind. Bodies are "just a hunk of meat", who you really are is the area to be examined.
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