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I would actually like life to be shorter like the old days. It removes the old ideals and into new. I, myself, would enjoy dieing at 50 or sooner if possible.
Wait until you're 50 and see if you still feel the same way.
wonder why its not as popular here as other places?
Right on and thanks again for this thread Crystalblue as those of us who have studied this over the years are fired up over the coming prospect of extending the lifespan do to genetic science etc..
What the heck would people do with themselves for 1,000 years? With no kids around to boot? How boring! I'll be happy if I live to my mid-80s.
Well living for a 1,000 years i doubt that but nothing wrong with living to 150 and having our bodies being in physical well being. I admit if i was JUST alive and in a nursing home then forget it but i thrive on activity and exercise like one of my i2 dols Jack Lalanne who at 96 still worksout out 6 days a week and as long as i'm active just like in my youth then life to me is GREAT!!
While being able to live 1000 years, much less indefinitely, sounds great, it also presents a lot of issues that would have to be resolved. If you think the world population is starting to get a bit crowded now, imagine how many people there would be if aging could be eliminated? The population is already increasing at a rapid pace that is mind-staggering.
Even if the aging process could be eliminated, people will still die from accident, diseases, wars, murder, suicide, etc. However, that still wouldn't offset the increase in population. Someone suggested it would be pretty dull to live 500 or 1000 years or so without any kids around. If you could live that long and still be healthy and active, there's no reason why you couldn't still have kids at the age of 350 or 700 years of age, etc. It could result in a much more rapid increase in the population on Earth. There are already over 6 billion people alive right now. Imagine the future with 25 billion or 50 billion. How do you feed that many people, assuming there are any resources and land space left?
The solution would be to be able to leave the planet. If we find that we can realistically migrate, survive and thrive off this planet, that would likely be one way, perhaps the only way, to handle the ever-growing increase in the number of people on the planet.
Who would be allowed extreme longevity? Who would be allowed to move out into the cosmos? You can bet such privileges would not be available to everyone. There are already debates about what to do if there were a disaster capable of rendering the extinction of human life on the planet. There are plans to establish a seed bank on the moon. If the worst case scenario came about, assuming if is feasible, a small select number of people with significant specialties would be chosen to relocated into space to wait out the disaster. The rest of us would be left behind to perish.
And even if extreme longevity can be achieved, it would most likely be available to only the few who could afford it. I imagine it would be an extremely long time, if ever, before it would be available and affordable to anyone who wants extreme life extension.
The point is that there are many issues that would have to be resolved first in order to avoid some very serious and disasterous consequences in the future. And those problems need solutions even without being able to live for 500 or 1000 years or longer.
Well firstly just because someone wants to live to 150 or 200 etc...doesn't mean they still want to have kids. Been there and done that as that will never be a interest for me again no matter how old i live. Maybe we (society,gov etc.) should instead focus on poor populations and/or undeveloped nations having mega amounts of children instead of just one or two kids as that and not extreme longevity in humans currently is our population problem.
Secondly to say that we need to leave the earth for population control may or may not be correct as 71% of the earth's surface is ocean and so in the future as longevity science improves then ''possibly'' so does all other sciences (nano, materials etc) also advance and so for an ''example'' .....why couldn't humans live on the ocean in possible floating cities etc. Yeap i know now in 2009 that sounds far fetched and wacko-ish but again who knows what the future will bring us in those ''star trek'' type technologies and other idea's about where and how to live on other surfaces will advance in the future.
Thirdly i know i personally don't feel guilty about wanting to live to 150 or 200 etc. whether the population increases or not as that's too defeatest for me. If that's the case then lets ''all kill ourselves to lower the population now'' which of course i do not espouse to do for myself or others on this planet.
6/3
Last edited by Six Foot Three; 04-28-2009 at 02:22 PM..
Reason: Change - 6/3
Well firstly just because someone wants to live to 150 or 200 etc...doesn't mean they still want to have kids. Been there and done that as that will never be a interest for me again no matter how old i live. Maybe we (society,gov etc.) should instead focus on poor populations and/or undeveloped nations having mega amounts of children instead of just one or two kids as that and not extreme longevity in humans currently is our population problem.
The point you are making is quite understandable. If we are simply talking about being given one of two choices. One is to have children but your life expectancy will be no longer than anyone else. Or two, be given immortality, or more realistically, a life span of hundreds of years, but you will have no children. Which would you choose? If you have already had children, then your choice has already been made. So why should you be eligible to be given extreme longevity? Would it be reasonable to deny others from the same opportunity?
But perhaps you mean that you would have no desire to have children after being given a life extension. If everyone else followed the same pattern, the planet would still eventually become swarmed with a sea of people. The population would also become even more magnified in numbers than now because people would live longer.
There is the ideal - and then there is the real. Ideally, it would be fantastic to live for hundreds of years or longer. People could inhabit the oceans if there's not enough space on the land surfaces.
That may be something that will have to be considered, but realistically, in the long run it would still only be a temporary measure. What happens when you run out of living space in the oceans? To be honest, if we reached that point, much of life in the oceans would be depleted or dead. The entire ecosystem would collapse on land and sea. While it's certainly possible to recycle human waste products, people still need to eat.
You're right. Just because someone wants to live for 150 or 200 years doesn't mean they would still want to have children. But the reverse of that is equally true. More people than not will still continue having children, and with extreme longevity, they may well continue producing children longer than ever.
I also agree with you that we need to focus on poor and underdeveloped nations with the idea of producing only one or two children rather than eight or ten. Governments don't seem to be greatly effective at making such changes that would help balance equality. I'm not saying we should do nothing. Just the opposite, we should indeed try to do something. Most of the developed nations give massive amounts of food to help reduce starvation. But it hasn't made a dent. Massive numbers of people only have water that is polluted to drink. We've provided programs to teach people how to be self-sufficient, but little has changed. How do you grow crops to feed your family on barren land? How would you propose such a daunting tasks be successfully accomplished?
As I previously stated, there are many issues that need solutions regardless of whether or not extreme longevity becomes a reality. If extreme longevity becomes available, and we have NOT solved critical problems,such problems will only increase in magnitude making it even more difficult to resolve.
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Originally Posted by 6 FOOT 3
Secondly to say that we need to leave the earth for population control may or may not be correct as 71% of the earth's surface is ocean and so in the future as longevity science improves then ''possibly'' so does all other sciences (nano, materials etc) also advance and so for an ''example'' .....why couldn't humans live on the ocean in possible floating cities etc. Yeap i know now in 2009 that sounds far fetched and wacko-ish but again who knows what the future will bring us in those ''star trek'' type technologies and other idea's about where and how to live on other surfaces will advance in the future.
I don't think ideas are far fetched or wacko. It's through ideas that innovation and change comes about. And you're right, who knows what technologies the future will bring? But regardless of how far in the future it may be, at some point the population will have to be controlled in some way, either voluntarily, or by incentives, or by requirement. At the present time though, the population is still growing. Eventually, even the oceans would provide no refuge. And THAT'S why I said we'll eventually need to find a way to get off this planet. Admittedly though, that may be a very long way off in the future. Yeah, I know I'm sounding rather Star Trekish too, but I think that would probably be the ultimate destiny for the human race, although it may be a long way off in the future.
Quote:
Originally Posted by 6 FOOT 3
Thirdly i know i personally don't feel guilty about wanting to live to 150 or 200 etc. whether the population increases or not as that's too defeatest for me. If that's the case then lets ''all kill ourselves to lower the population now'' which of course i do not espouse to do for myself or others on this planet.
Why should you feel guilty about wanting to live to 150 or 200 years or longer. I would, although I doubt that'll be likely for me. As it is now, people are already living longer lives than ever before. The number of people reaching 100 years is increasing. A few have reached close to 115 or 120. I suspect we will likely continue to increase longevity. But with it humanity still faces the responsibility to solve our own problems. As negative as I may sound about the future, I'm optimistic that we will somehow find workable solutions that won't require dining on Soylent Green.
Why should you feel guilty about wanting to live to 150 or 200 years or longer....... I would
LOL, you would feel guilty about living a long life..... Why?? I could see if you were in a nursing home and sucking money from family or the system as i myself have said that i would not want to be in a nursing home as it's either being active like 96 y/o Jack Lalanne or adios.
One other thing i was thinking about as far as food goes and that is maybe in the future they'll create food that can grow with little amount of water in arid locatiions and crop seeds might be created to produce huge amounts of food crops. Remember the couple of episode's in Star Trek when Kirk would eat in his quarter's and he had 3 pieces of 1''x1'' square food cubes and so he put them in a microwave looking contraption and pressed the button and 3 seconds later there was a plate of chicken with mash potatoes, gravy, vege's etc..on a plate and a glass of red wine ....lol.....
Anyway i think in the future they will solve our food and water shortages for the planet.
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