[unimpossible]

Longer does not always equal better. The quality of the extended lifespan is key. But, if you could guarantee quality of life, there is still a bimodal distribution I find among my peers - "Why would you want to live forever?" and "Why wouldn't you want to live forever?"

FWIW, I'm in the "Why wouldn't you want to live forever?". Think of all the things to do and learn and experience and relearn. Ask me again in 10,000 years though.

[gilbetron]

I was of the "live forever" ilk for a long time, but now I don't think I would. If you think about it when people say they would want to live forever, there are some disclaimers there. Such as: assuming society remains generally decent. Imagine being stuck in some horror show of a society where you are a heavily abused slave for centuries. Or maybe someone decides to imprison you in isolation for a really long time. Then there's the fact of seeing everyone you care about die, which would seem to get really old after a while.

Plus, I'm kinda developing an intense curiosity about what's after death. Maybe just the void. Maybe wakeup in a simulation to some dreary existence. Maybe float around on clouds with a harp. I have no idea and it drives me crazy sometimes! (not to curious, because what if the afterlife is awful!)

[Baeocystin]

Genuine belief: I think we already have an excellent example of what the afterlife is like- try remembering what your experiences were like in the 14-odd billion years the universe existed before you were born.

[gilbetron]

Definitely have thought about exactly that numerous times! I find it kind of comforting when I get freaked out about the "no longer exist" path.

[Matumio]

And this person that was you, a decade ago. Does it still fully exist? Should it?

[gilbetron]

Lots of fascinating thoughts and philosophy and experimentation and readings on all this stuff. I was deep into it during college and a lot of my 20s. I got back into it a bit during the pandemic year (I'm 50 now), mostly spurred by reading "Consciousness and the Brain" by Stanislas Dehaene (a fantastic, science-based look into what we have figured out about consciousness). Plus turning 50 makes you realize the 20 year old version of yourself really is a whole different person. Not to mention parenting, and how your 12 year old is absolutely a different human than when he was 5, and seeing them realize it. Life is weird.

[toss1]

I wish I could remember the book or author, but I remember reading a scifi story some years ago in which a main part of the world was indefinitely extended lifespans and health-spans.

A couple of items that shifted the readers' perspective were the 28 year old character who misstated her age as 104 to make herself seem more interesting, and that many people in the 400-500 year-old range picked up high risk sports as out of growing boredom with multiple careers and pursuits...

(if anyone recognizes and remembers the story, it'd be great to know what it is!)

[sam_lowry_]

Futu.re by Dmitry Glukhovsky?

[sleepydog]

I’m also in the “why wouldn’t you want to live forever” camp, but for selfish reasons. I’m of the opinion that for our species and society, a limited lifespan is a net benefit, as a motivator and as a way for popular opinion to change. Generally I do not think people are good at changing their stances, especially as they age.

[didgeoridoo]

Or, people are not good at changing their stances as they approach death. In game-theoretic “explore vs exploit” terms, the closer you get to the end of the game, the less value there is in exploration. If people lived to 200, would we see 150 years of “young and reckless” or 150 years of “old and stodgy”? I tend to lean toward the former, but of course nobody knows for sure.

[godelski]

I fall under this belief too. I think people also over estimate the lack of exploration done in older years. Culture changes too fast for a lack of exploration strategy to exist in older populations. In developed nations it is far more acceptable to be gay, an ethnic minority, etc than it was 50 years ago. While this still takes longer than we'd like it is faster than what you'd expect if we required people to die off for culture to change (we've all but forgotten discrimination of Caucasian minorities, like the Irish and Polish, that was so prevalent even in the 60's and 70's). Things have drastically changed since the 90's even.

I'd also argue that another factor in the "explore vs exploit" strategy is fear (which encompasses fear of death). If you view your world as dangerous then it makes sense that you should focus on an exploitation strategy over an exploration strategy. The world is becoming far safer (despite American perception) and I think this is helping accelerate this cultural change too. I'd expect that if we lived to 200 we'd treat people in their 50's/60's like we do people in their 20's now, and I'd expect them to act similarly too (under the premise that health degrades in this new age system as our current age system).

Though honestly we'll never know until we do it. I do think fear of trying it is dangerous though. One of our advantages as humans is the fact that we tend to use an exploration strategy more than many other species. We've also gotten pretty good at mitigating risk while exploring dangerous territories. But that's how we push forward technological advancements.

[roguesupport]

"Ask me again in 10,000 years though" - PERFECT response.

I figure it'd take 10,000 years to gain enough knowledge to know what all your options are!

If the DO ask in 10,000 years, you should ask them what they are doing there and tell them not to bother you for a few hundred thousand years while you try a few things out.

[MathematicalArt]

Interesting take. However, consider that if one could learn multiple lifetimes of knowledge in one, it might achieve the same result. I’ve been developing a mindset called omnidisciplinary thinking (or “Thinking OMNI”) which encourages us to Engage with the Root of ideas and thought patterns in order to recognize and leverage their interconnectedness. The Root assumptions we make influence heavily how we can express and explore ideas. One can only express in a given language what that language allows. Right now, we have a boundary- and disciplinary-driven engagement with both knowledge and organizational structures which while a valid way to see the world isn’t the only way. The Thinking OMNI thought pattern is being made rigorous as we speak, yet even an intuitive understanding of it can help you today to manage complexity and reduce uncertainty.

Check us out on YouTube—“Omni Artisans”. If one could reduce the amount of effort it takes to accrue knowledge and drive powerful experiences, would one need to live forever per se?

[bobmaxup]

Only if you assume that you can (re)learn things and remember those experiences during that whole span of time.

https://jnnp.bmj.com/content/76/suppl_5/v2

[lordnacho]

There are still jobs for COBOL devs.

[BitwiseFool]

Sounds like a Twilight Zone / Black Mirror writing prompt.

[true_religion]

I want humanity to love forever simply because I don’t want anyone to have to experience their parents dying, and everyone older than them slowly fading and passing away in pain.

It’s a shame that so many people think about death in a personal way, forgetting that before you die, you will have to watch the last generation whom you know and love go to the grave.

[lordnacho]

I read an article a few weeks ago, a guy said that past 75 he wouldn't seek treatment for cancer. I thought that was a nice medium between getting enough time to see the grandkids and not letting it drag on in pain and suffering for everyone. So basically as many healthy years past 75 as you're lucky enough to get, and no more.

[andi999]

I think you shd differentiate on the cancer. I know somebody got a light skin cancer at ard 75, did minor surgery and lived until 96.

[mod]

I expect in the guy's mind he was thinking more like "after 75 I won't do chemotherapy"

[lordnacho]

Yeah I think the point was not to do any of the drastic treatments that you might if you were younger. Some of them end up prolonging agony, and that's not worth it unless you are younger.

[vmception]

For representative democracy though I think we can experiment with assigning voting weights to age ranges, in a way that allows fresh ideas to exist from people that have a different level of collaborative society in their formative years

Several parliamentary democracies have weighted voting, but thats usually in favor of corporations ie. City of London and Hong Kong

[xienze]

> For representative democracy though I think we can experiment with assigning voting weights to age ranges, in a way that allows fresh ideas to exist

The problem here is that you would be brushing off the concerns of an older group by simply asserting that "they're old and holding us back" without considering that perhaps someone who had been around for 500 years might have far more insight and quite literally had already lived through whatever political experiment some twenty-somethings want to vote for. Not criticizing you specifically but I've seen this mentality before w.r.t. old people and voting.

[WalterBright]

Us older folks have also seen a lot of "new" ideas from the younger ones that have been repeatedly tried and failed. No need to try them again.

A healthy democracy needs the young for new ideas, and the old to warn them about the experience with those "new" ideas.

It's like software. The new guy just gets 'er done. The old guy says "your quadratic algorithm won't scale. did you encrypt the password database? did you make a backup? did you set aside money for the tax bill?"

[vmception]

They still get a vote and if there wind up being many more 500 year olds it'll still let them keep society comfortable and familiar for themselves

[gaoshan]

Bingo. Quantity is worthless without sufficient quality. I would rather be healthy and strong and die at 80 than sickly and bedridden for the remaining decades and die at 120.

[JoshTriplett]

Any improvement to lifespan will necessarily improve healthy lifespan.

(And for my part, I'll always take those extra 40 years, no matter the condition, because that's 40 more years for medical science to advance and solve more of those problems.)

[fooperdupes]

In my experience this reflexive "more is better" attitude only leads to unhappiness. the more I've abandoned this kind of thinking, the better my quality of life has become.

[AnimalMuppet]

> Any improvement to lifespan will necessarily improve healthy lifespan.

Will it? I don't see why it necessarily will do so.

And even if it does... if it gives you 10 more healthy years, and then 20 more bedridden years, for a net gain of 30 years, is that really a gain? Or do the 20 bedridden years make the 10 healthy years not worth it?

[JoshTriplett]

Many of the same things affecting lifespan are the same things that cause age-related degeneration. Any medical improvement to lifespan will almost certainly be an improvement to health. (There are non-medical things that could improve average lifespan without substantially improving average health, such as reducing causes of fatal accidents, but those wouldn't improve maximum lifespan, only average lifespan.)

And yes, of course it's a gain. You could always choose not to take those extra years, if you really don't want them. It's good to have that possibility available.