immortality... if it does happen, chaos is assume all around the world as people battle for supremacy and some living in fear of the other...

immortal means u cant die no matter what.... so if u r captured and tormented for ur whole life, u will wish u will be dead but u cant die...

Immortal may be a good thing for few people but not the whole population.

Based on the content initially posted, this is not relevant as even if you manage to extend your lifespan indefinitely, you can still die of mortal wounds.

True. Which means probably the only way to truly be immortal is to somehow transfer your consciousness into a machine and hope to hell it don't get nuked! I just remembered the movie 6th day, where the characters were cloned and their consciousness and memories were somehow backed up into a hard disk by retinal scan. BS i know, but maybe that might lead sumwhere?

The short run problems can be overcome by advancing technology. Eventually those problems I mentioned will be a problem no more.

And honestly, I don't really have any concerns about "appreciating life'. There's nothing to appreciate in life except ones achievements. If you lived all your life in some jungle isolated from society, nobody is really going to give a crap whether you live or die.

Michael Jackson is being appreciated because of his work in the music industry, in pop and in bringing a new light to black musicians in the US. If he was a road sweeper, do you think he'll get the great "send off" he's getting now?

So with this in mind, the achievements of individuals will always be appreciated as long as it works out for the better.

And if you are concerned about death being irrelevant in the future, don't worry, it still will be. If advances made it such that humans become immortal, people become used to the concept of eternal life and death will be perceived in a far scarier way than us now because it's not normal and it'll be strange and unbelievable. To highlight this, I give you an example. Take as an example our situation now, our average mortality rate is 78 years old, but about a century or two ago, the mortality was 36 years old. At 30, you would have been considered as a wise old man in the past, but today you are considered still young. So now if I come and tell you that the average mortality of the people living in Nigeria is 35, you'll be shocked and you'll find that it's unbelievable. That's how it will be in the future when the future when someone dies. It might make it onto CNN when someone dies somewhere in the world...

Hey, just because someone is biologically immortal in their natural state, doesn't mean the death penalty would no longer hold sway. Electric chairs will still kill, decapitation will still kill, poisons, bullets, injuries and all that will still kill. It's just that diseases might be less lethal, HIV might have no effect, cardiac arrests will be unheard-of and cancer will be like flu now. Also it'll be such that brain neuron cell death and stagnation can be prevented and reversed, organs that fail can be easily replaced with stem-cell clones, animal-human hybrid organs or synthetic organs and so on.

Sure, prison sentences like 200 years prison and so on now means the person can actually make it out, but it'll be enough time to completely change a persons mindset (for better or worse).

This post has been edited by DeniseLau: Jul 14 2009, 11:55 PM

too bad rapamycin has side effects of immuno suppresant..just like resveratrol in high dose is toxic..btw, seems like these drugs is acting on slowing the senescence process.. it prolonged 30+% of mice lifespan..and no human test result...zz caloric restriction can prolong life of mice too, anti-oxidant drugs can slow aging too..still way to go for immortality..i think finding ways to control telomerase action to counter Hayflick limit would be more hopeful to reach immortal..

immortality doesnt necessary mean u will need to suffer..u can end ur life anytime when u're bored of living, which many ppl does time to time...

We should also take into account the psychological effects of having an indefinite lifespan. A human mind surviving through more than two centuries is unprecedented, let alone for infinity. There is a huge probability that it would drastically effect his mind, either for better or worse.

That will require 2 definitions of immortality:
1. Conditional - can end if choose
2. Unconditional - cannot die no matter what

im a firm believer of....

i love immortality cuz i'm curious about how the world will end

and life is too short,people say tat all the time...

Depends on what your defination of immortality is. If it is a human that cannot die whatsoever even if you stab them a million times, then i think the world will be in total chaos. Who will want to work anymore? We don't need food and water to survive, we can make as much enemies as we want but none can do anything to each other. Seems like an eternal torture.

This is not even the road to immortality, what we perceive Immortality is that he is no longer subject to many human basic needs. And by any means, he no longer have basic emotions too. So, Immortal is someone who will never die and will never succumb to mortal wounds. So the term mortal =/= immortal because of the word 'im' is attached to the word "mortal".

So, this discovery is pure bullcrap, making someone younger is only an anti-ageing process. So, meaning that making someone look younger or his insides are younger and healthier.
No matter what, he will still succumb to mortal wounds.

in my opinion, if one is immortal, they will just take their life for granted.

the reason life is so precious is because its temporary, and it's up to us to make use of it.

This post has been edited by hako: Jul 26 2009, 12:11 AM

If immortality means you can still die from stabs, starvation, illness (since its not invincible), then humans will die before 'immortality' will happen, because when no one dies, the ecosystem will go haywire... overpopulation and hunger

Every living things is struggling to die, what stops death is awareness.

Immortality is a kind of indulgence, something that people at the top of the social pyramid usually crave , so do the average men.

If immortality exists, I would say that everything will become ordinary and trivial because without the awareness of death, everything is ordinary.

Also, if immortality of our physical body does exist, men will never learn to appreciate what is around him. Imagine if you are playing a mario game, what will you do when you have 99 life and what when you have only 1? No matter who we are, all of us have only 1 life and when we die, it is game over. But most people live as though as they have 99 life

Immortality of the physical body does exist but only to people who are able to manipulate the position of their assemblage point.

Everyone of us, however, can maintain our awareness which normally cease upon death if we so desire, but only through a rigid and disciplined practice and with sheer determination. Noted that this does not mean immortality.

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Added on July 27, 2009, 7:09 pmYes, life in this world is short. In fact, it is so short that we can't witness all the marvels of it.
So, one should be aware that every moment could be his last moment on earth. Just like a warrior, he treats every battle as his last battle on earth.
Hence, one has to really reduce what is superfluous in his life.

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Added on July 27, 2009, 7:10 pmClap clap! so live like one!

This post has been edited by darksider: Jul 27 2009, 07:10 PM

if being immortal is only awarded to those who can afford it (meds or something) then the person is going to lead a sad life later on.

all the fun / thrill in this world is around because of our simple and short life I believe. To do things and succeed under all its "life" restriction made all achievements all the better. Extreme sports for example would lose its charm if we are immortal. To being able to do something while putting your whole life at state is a bliss.

plus I doubt that it is fun to see everyone else around you die while you are the only one still living. If we feel that 5 years could be a short time, then an immortal would feel that 50 years is a short time. Before they know it, their child is replaced by grandchild, great grandchild, great great grandchild. Their friends gone, replace with their children and grandchildren too. Time will fly so fast that life would be dull and its only a matter of time before death is desired.

If a tyrant was in power forever with his immortal army, I can already imagine how much suffering he'll bring to countless generations. Just imagine if Ivan the terrible or Hitler was immortal.

immortality to certain people is good
like those scientists....professors .... etc

to everyone its bad

You mean to everyone else?

There is a problem with immortality that is the problem of overpopulation on earth.

Michio Kaku predicted in his 3-part documentary '2057' that by then we'll have an almost perfect system of 'forever youth'.

You can argue that if you're young and fit, immortality isn't that bad a deal for whatever else counter-arguments out there, no?