[dekhn]

This sort of leaves out the reality that decomposing bodies are a critical part of the ecosystem, and that eliminating death in humans would have huge ecological consequences beyond just the nutrients of decomposing bodies. If/when you have reasonable solutions for overpopulation, massive resource consumption by advanced societies, and pollution, then we can talk about longevity.

[JoshTriplett]

> This sort of leaves out the reality that decomposing bodies are a critical part of the ecosystem

Buy fertilizer. Of all the possible attempts at arguments that could possibly be raised in support of letting people continue to die, the last one I'd expect is "those human lives are more valuable as rotting corpses to fertilize plants".

> If/when you have reasonable solutions for overpopulation, massive resource consumption by advanced societies, and pollution, then we can talk about longevity.

1) There are documented studies that people have less children and do so less quickly when they feel safer. And in any case, it's a very big universe and this is not a reason to let 150000 people die every day.

2) We can and have built more efficient ways to make use of resources, and we will continue to do so. Killing off humans is not a reasonable way to solve resource consumption problems. The primary problem of excessive resource consumption is that it threatens human lives, which makes it utterly self-defeating to argue that humans should die so we use less resources.

3) Pollution is a serious problem. We've only got the one planet (for now), and we need to take care of it and make sure it continues to support life and help life flourish. So by all means let's solve that problem. Fortunately, we've got billions of people, and we're capable of working on multiple massive problems at once. (You might also recognize that one of the biggest problems with pollution is people not acknowledging it as a problem; there's a parallel here.)

4) People will continue to talk about longevity, and more importantly actually work towards fixing the problem. Once people understand that we can actually do something about it, consciously choosing to not do something about it is a choice measured in lives lost, and inaction becomes far less excusable. Trying to stop other people from doing something about it is tantamount to murder, in much the same way as trying to stop a doctor from treating a patient.

[majkinetor]

We should fix health span first, not life span. I would rather live 80 like a champ to the last day and then just drop dead, then few more years on ibuprofen and friends.

[JoshTriplett]

They're heavily correlated, and nobody is talking about just increasing the length of life without also inherently making people healthier. People talking about working on longevity are talking about giving you more years where you feel 30 or 40, not just more years where you feel 90.

[ksdale]

Quite some time ago, I remember scrolling Imgur and there was a short video of some people in jeeps watching a lion (or a couple lions?) chase a young hippo across the road. Several people in the comments remarked that they couldn't believe no one tried to help the hippo, and I thought it was interesting that they didn't consider that helping the hippo meant starving the lion.

I feel the same way about organizations that rescue injured wild animals that aren't endangered. It's certainly nice for the injured animal, but there's some creature out there that doesn't eat as a result.

I haven't thought much at all beyond the usual sci-fi tropes regarding human immortality, but I think it's very difficult to fully appreciate what circle of life means.

Edit: I also think it's perfectly plausible that technological advances could indefinitely offset the environmental impact of human immortality or greatly increased longevity, I just wanted to point out my observation that in most of nature, death is very important for continued life.

[realbarack]

> decomposing bodies are a critical part of the ecosystem

Is this true? Most human bodies (at least in the US) decompose in cemeteries (not exactly verdant ecosystems) or are burned. Plenty of other organisms will continue to die, there's plenty of carbon to recycle without human contribution.

> If/when you have reasonable solutions for overpopulation, massive resource consumption by advanced societies, and pollution, then we can talk about longevity.

We already have to solve these problems (well, except overpopulation, I don't think this is a real problem). I think it's reasonable for us to work on longevity in parallel, just as we work on curing cancer in parallel.

[jniedrauer]

A relatively simple solution is that the price of admission for biological immortality is voluntary sterilization. No doubt this would be circumvented by the elite, but it probably wouldn't lead to runaway population growth.

[dekhn]

"A relatively simple solution.... is voluntary sterlization". We're discussing what would be one of the most consequential technological changes in the existence of humanity. There are no "relatively simple solutions".