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Comment by woodpanel | Hacker News Reader

I'm torn between the argument that the gift of life is such a precious one that eliminating death is one of the most virtuous endeavors at all – and the other argument where this is peak escapism and a fundamental not-getting-it-what-life-is-about.

At least one can be sure: Death is such a fundemantal part of life that every social norm we take for granted (thus not even noticing it exists) will be uprooted.

Technically that doesn't need to be a bad thing. It just makes it so much more likely that advocats of ending death are overlooking the bad parts.

Plus, I can't think of a scenario where, once this technology exists to extend life indefinetly, the state's monopoly on power won't turn into a dystopian monopoly on life.

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Suppose we hit the SETI gold medal, and meet and interact with intelligent aliens. We discover that these aliens are effectively immortal.

The aliens ask you for advice about how to live. Would you recommend that they all commit suicide at age 100, because it will be so good for them and their society?

Always flip the default and ask, will you switch back.

What if you could ask an octopus the same, and it suggested that dying after breeding is best for society to prevent the problems of overpopulation [1]? Unlike your hypothetical aliens, octopodes live in the same resource-constrained world we do.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus#Lifespan

>I'm torn between the argument that the gift of life is such a precious one that eliminating death is one of the most virtuous endeavors at all – and the other argument where this is peak escapism and a fundamental not-getting-it-what-life-is-about.

The problem with this line of thinking is that no one is ever going to eliminate death, ever. Even if you completely eliminate aging, people are still going to die at some point, whether it's from war, or natural disasters, or accidents, or murder. Making people ageless isn't going to keep them from dying when a piano falls on them.

So pontificating about humans living until the heat death of the universe is utterly pointless. Statistically, even without aging, humans aren't going to live beyond 1000 years most likely.

> the state's monopoly on power won't turn into a dystopian monopoly on life

Dystopian as in our status quo? (Also, monopoly on violence is essentially a monopoly on whether your life continues.)

> Plus, I can't think of a scenario where, once this technology exists to extend life indefinetly, the state's monopoly on power won't turn into a dystopian monopoly on life.

And the wealthy’s monopoly on wealth will only consolidate.

It reminds me of two quotes:

“Science progresses one funeral at a time” (paraphrasing Planck’s principle).

“[…] Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. […]”

That’s probably what worries me most, when it comes to extended or unending lives.

Also Kuhn’s idea of a paradigm shift. Good luck getting a new paradigm adopted when the decision makers at academic and scientific institutions never leave.

I wouldn't be so cynical. Many power structures rely on death to drive churn. But there are other mechanisms, e.g. sequential term limits and retirement. (Retirement doesn't mean you can't do anything anymore. Just not that thing.)

Moreover, while longer lifespans may drive calcification, they would also promote long-term thinking. How would we vote about the climate differently if we knew we'd be around for a couple hundred years?

Hence “worry”, and not an adamant objection to the idea of prolonging life.

> Moreover, while longer lifespans may drive calcification, they would also promote long-term thinking. How would we vote about the climate differently if we knew we'd be around for a couple hundred years?

Would we act more in favor of the general long-term good, or would we scramble even more to get ours now in order to secure our own future? I'm not so sure cooperation would win.

Not sure why this was downvoted, but I agree.

It is easy to see why an individual would choose life over death, if one has the means for a comfortable life. A second order question would then be: would the society value your life over their own? Even as we speak, many thousands are dying of preventable causes, including man made starvation. There is no way immortality will be accessible to all, and will only increase inequality.

I'll happily change my mind if we can fix world hunger and homelessness before conquering death.

“Science progresses one funeral at a time” (paraphrasing Planck’s principle).

I would be careful at citing that quote as evidence for how science work, especially when considering the historical uniqueness of the last two centuries or so.

This article said it's more complicated than that and more hopeful.[1]

1. https://www.realclearscience.com/articles/2019/11/07/does_sc...

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