Bugsy

You are very easy to bait. My comment about viruses was meant to provoke and in you came.

Humans living indefinitely would, as TRTL has eloquently expressed, have many relationships following that primal urge to have children. Ergo, the planet would become overpopulated. Or would we devolve to leaving babies on hillsides?

The other scenario would be enforced sterility - end of evolution as we know it - a race of jaded 'done everything' beings. I can see a death cult evolving from this stagnant scenario.

As for populating other planets - once again the word 'virus' arises. Just as Australia never was 'terra nullius': the universe may well not be ours to exploit either. We believe that Mars may be terraformed, but other beings may not agree. We simply to not have enough knowledge at this stage. Future generations (who would never be under Bugsy's scenario) will learn more about this amazing universe than we do now and have the vitality that new combinations of genes provide.

Whichever way I look at this idea I find it dispiriting and not a little decadent.

Nothing wrong with living longer healthier lives and that is just what we have been doing for the past 100 years (with notable exceptions of oppressed people). Both of my grandmothers lived into their late 90's. I am only interested in such longevity if I have all my faculties like they both did till the very end. I know that one of my grandmothers chose her death with dignity, grace and style - a fitting punctuation to her wonderful life.

Fractelle,
I get the feeling that your comment about viruses was meant for more than mere provocation as you seem to have stuck with it. I guess the comment of leaving babies on hillsides is more of the same.

Ultimately I think that the science fiction that you read is a bit different (and a bit more depressing) to the stuff I read. The difference being I sometimes read scientific papers on longevity research as well.
I think it's quite possible to extend lifespan, and therefore someone will do it.

The great thing is that humans can choose what to do. At the moment you have no choice but to die when you get old. You would choose to remain that way. I would not, nor would many others I'm sure. Choosing not to die from old age has nothing to do with a lack of dignity, grace or style, no matter what you write about your dead grandmother (thanks for sharing btw).

And if I ever felt 'jaded' and done everything I wanted to do I could choose to not live anymore. I knew a 24 year old who did just that. We have already been doing that for thousands of years, it pisses the fundies off no end.

We are ONLY AT THE VERY BEGIN, humans will increase their knownledges, abilities, performance. We will create colonies on other planets and later on other solar systems.
Today our trip to an other planet is easier and faster than was the trip from Europe to Australia, some centuries before.
The genetic engineering is a very good and hopefull discuvery, equaly our trips to the space are very good too.
Do not worry humans are not so bad as they seem or we think, they did many mistakes, we will continue to do mistakes but we improve our abilities to corect our mistakes, to restore the damages we create.
It is not posible to avoid some damages non repairable, non reversable, this the cost we pay for our improvment, for our development for a better, more safety, more secure future.
We will not follow dinosaurous path, we will improve our abilities to protect our lifes, to protect our planet, to protect the species from our planet, to stay alive!
We learned to live with the risks, the probability to die from a car accident is million times bigger than from an accident in a laboratory. We learn to ignore the real, big every day risks and worry for accidents in laboratories during changes on our genes.
Do not worry we can not become more stupid than we are now but we have big hopes, we expect to become better, smarter, stronger.
Humans separated their self from the other animals because learned to create tools, divices, machines much better from what we can find on the earth, now we found something even better, to improve rapidly our abilities, our performances, our characteristics.
Now from kings on the earth we are going to become creators of new species, of new kind of humans, something we could find only in the myths from the gods.
Do not worry we will destroy any frankestain or dragon who could jump from our laboratories.
Antonios Symeonakis
Adelaide

Bugsy

Stop taking everything so personally. I never claimed YOU were jaded.

I did however outline 3 theoretical scenarios that may be occur should humans achieve immortality. None of which you appear to have understood.

ASymeonakis

The world is not a magic pudding - it does have limited resource. Science can help us make best use of these resources but it cannot make something out of nothing.

My final word on the topic:

http://dilbert.com/dyn/str_strip/000000000/00000000/0000000/000000/40000/2000/800/42809/42809.strip.print.gif

I did not take anything personally Fractelle, I understand you were not calling me jaded, I was not speaking for myself but as one who may be in one of your scenarios. The only thing I do take personally is the statement that you don't think I have understood any of your scenarios. I understand them alright, I just don't agree with them. Anyone can take existing trends and project them into the future. But that's no predictor of it and it is definitely no predictor of human behaviour. Ask any economist.

My last word on the subject:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
-Dylan Thomas

That's one of my all-time favourites Bugsy, thanks for reminding me. When I first read it, I thought it was about death. It was one of those "moments of revelation" that make teenage years worth enduring, when I realized that he was actually talking about life.

I'm particularly fascinated by Antonios' approach to the relationship between us and our planet as revealed on this thread.

>>humans will increase their knownledges, abilities, performance. We will create colonies on other planets and later on other solar systems<<

If you measure such attitudes on a pessimism/optimism scale, with Eeyore as zero and Polyanna at ten, this outlook scores eleven.

We, as the human race, stand absolutely no chance whatsoever of accumulating the necessary will-to-achieve that such a vision needs, in order for it to become reality.

Our starting-point is actually nowhere near what Polyanna Antonios believes.

>>Today our trip to an other planet is easier and faster than was the trip from Europe to Australia, some centuries before.<<

Which planet, Antonios? How easy is it for us to get there, and how quick is the journey?

The distances involved, the time it takes, our ability to prolong life sufficiently to survive the journey... run the numbers, Antonios. They don't add up.

I have no problem with dreaming such dreams. But any idea that the human race will ever experience any other environment than good ol' mother earth is pointless and wasteful.

Future generations will have some very tough decisions to make in terms of the trade-offs necessary for life to continue. But anyone who relies upon interplanetary travel to solve the problem is simply wasting resources.

And there will inevitably come a time, probably not too far into the future, when wasting resources will become a criminal offence. And shortly after that, it will become a capital offence, on the basis that the punishment solves two problems at once.

In the meantime, we have Dylan Thomas' words to remind us on how to conduct ourselves during our minuscule lifespan here.

Have a great day.