Immortality: 20 years away? (without spelling or theological errors!)

[Torm]

Yeah, your solution is cool, but knowing my Everquest character will continue to level up after I'm dead and gone doesn't make me feel that much better.

They'll be more than just video game characters, but, yeah, I know what you mean. The neat part of the whole thing is that if they can take some full subatomic scans of some people NOW - contemporary historians and such, maybe, or important artists - even if they can't run them in real time yet, they might be able to eventually.

 

[Carnifex]

They'll be more than just video game characters, but, yeah, I know what you mean. The neat part of the whole thing is that if they can take some full subatomic scans of some people NOW - contemporary historians and such, maybe, or important artists - even if they can't run them in real time yet, they might be able to eventually.

Unfortunately scanning a person into a computer doesn't actually generate a 'living' being. For all this talk of immortality we still don't fully understand a number of things about the human body and how, for instance, the brain works, so translating that across into some sort of computer-generated version is made even *more* difficult when you consider the immense amount of stuff we don't fully understand about the physical side of it, and how you would go about programming things you don't understand into a computer.

You put the data, down to a subatomic level, of someone's composition into a computer. Then you need to instruct it to make those bits of data actually work to the normal systems of a human body, most specifically the brain. And even *then* you might not get any form of sentience.

Then you've got to generate an entire 'real' environment for them to 'live' in; truly real. That means physics and everything - and again, given all the holes in our knowledge on such matters, how can we hope to create a real world just for the folly of making a few beings of debatable existence and watching them like animals in a zoo? The real world will carry on, with far more pressing problems in it.

 

[Torm]

You put the data, down to a subatomic level, of someone's composition into a computer. Then you need to instruct it to make those bits of data actually work to the normal systems of a human body, most specifically the brain. And even *then* you might not get any form of sentience.

It seems to me that with correct virtual physics, and all of the subatomic data in place, including all vectors, you neatly sidestep any need to actually understand the biological processes. (Well, other than the need to put oxygen and such in the virtual environment.) If the physics results in a living organism with those particles in the real world, it should result in one in the virtual environment as well. Even if you still don't understand what everything in the brain DOES, as long as it is all there, it will do its thing.

Okay, so maybe I'm speculating all over the place. But that's what all these "in 20 years" guys do. Think I should write a book and sell it fer $24.95?

 

[Morrus]

Whenever I've thought about the concept of immortality, I've figured that, while it may be medically possible one day, the sociological problems with prevent it ever becoming available to the masses. We're overpopulating the world as it is, and if people keep having children and nobody dies, you have a recipe for disaster.

So, who decides who gets to live and who gets to die? It's not practical for everyone to live forever; however, the technology will one day be available. Is it going to just be for the uber-rich? Would that not create civil unrest?

Dunno. It's all food for thought. There may be answers to those questions, but I don't know what they are.

 

[Torm]

Is it going to just be for the uber-rich? Would that not create civil unrest?

I read this as "uber-lich" the first time through. Seemed appropriate.

I guess they'd have to make the treatment also make you sterile, and maybe only give it to people without kids. How they'd regulate that, though, I'm not sure.

 

[Hand of Evil]

Zelazany's book Lord of Light does come to mind.

 

[ForceUser]

Whenever I've thought about the concept of immortality, I've figured that, while it may be medically possible one day, the sociological problems with prevent it ever becoming available to the masses. We're overpopulating the world as it is, and if people keep having children and nobody dies, you have a recipe for disaster.

So, who decides who gets to live and who gets to die? It's not practical for everyone to live forever; however, the technology will one day be available. Is it going to just be for the uber-rich? Would that not create civil unrest?

Dunno. It's all food for thought. There may be answers to those questions, but I don't know what they are.

Sure. We'd have a small, immortal ruling elite of "haves," and the great unwashed masses of "have nots."

You know, there's a great idea for a campaign...

 

[devilish]

No, they decrease, because the authors no longer have the spectre of Death looming behind them, urging them on. They, too, can be immortal, and would have forever to finish.

Very Very True! The Dark Tower was only finished because Stephen King had
his accident (so he says in the new forewords) : Those who remember reading
the books when they came out will recall SK saying "Eh, Don't know if I'll
finish this series --- might take decades -- may never be over..."

Spectre of Death is a great motivator.

 

[Carnifex]

Spectre of Death is a great motivator.

And worth loads of XP if you defeat it

 

[Queen_Dopplepopolis]

Sure. We'd have a small, immortal ruling elite of "haves," and the great unwashed masses of "have nots."

You know, there's a great idea for a campaign...

Indeed, that IS a good idea for a campaign, ForceUser... very good. The character concepts are flooding my brain!