Would people want this? Imagine waking up to a world where 200 years has passed, everyone you knew is dead, everything you knew is history.
I don't necessarily want to live forever. But I am very curious about Humanity's ultimate fate. I want to see how things play out
I want to know if there is life out in the universe, if humanity ever meets other intelligent life, or even if we ever meaningfully leave Earth
I don't know. I love the good in humanity, I hope we eventually wind up more good than bad, and I just want to see.
Edit: Also, if we ever actually build a society that is a lot more meaningfully ethical and good than our current society, maybe I would want to live forever in it, or at least a very long time. Maybe it would just be nice to have the choice of when I go
As for "everything you knew is history", who wouldn't want to witness and be a part of a new world?
You have to imagine what it would be like for someone who lived in 1826 too wake up today, in a world where nothing they know is relevant, they have no connections, no idea what to do with any of it. Historians might want to interview you, or the first couple of people like you, but then what?
You will be an audience member to a show you don’t understand, until you die.
I can imagine "educators" who can get them up speed. In a future where people get reanimated, I would think this shouldn't be a problem long term.
Any existence may be better than non existence.
Once this passes through a few generations of people responsible for tending to the needs of rich people's frozen brains, the empathy and money will be gone. Imagine inheriting a business funded from people wanting to skip over the entirety of your lifetime because they assume your time is too boring for them. Plus, your impact on that business will be null. There is nothing you can do except keep it going and get more rich people's brains in there. The only "innovation" that's going to drive business is bringing someone back to life... which for a large span of brain custodians, will only be possible AFTER their death. Maybe you need to model it after a religion; humanity has kept stuff going for long spans of time under that framing... but are you still just a servant to these ancient people who you have not met, and will actually NEVER meet since you'll die first... having spent precious time in your life taking care of them? Seems like an uninspiring religion.
Or... you do some fraud, which is much easier. They're already functionally dead, and you presumably have access to a lot of their money. Money that is worth more in your lifetime, than in their future.
People have historically cared very little about the personal feelings of the pharoah as they dust off his bones and take his nice things. Doesn't even need that long. Guess what, T+200 years, the brains are getting dumped in a river.
I mean - I barely understand what I’m seeing in the world now. Maybe I can look back on now and understand it with the benefit of unclassified files and whatnot?
Me?
This view is grounded in the assumption that the future will be better than today. There is no guarantee of that. This is, in my opinion, the same flaw in the thought process of wanting to live forever. The assumption being that, this "new world" is a better place than where you are now. That it is compatible with you as you are. That you will never grow tired of existing.
I know for a fact that I will grow tired of existence. Why would I want to continue it? The bar is very high for me to want to continue to exist in a "new world". I would need guarantees that the world will be a better place where I can thrive in ways I can not in this one. That I will be accepted in this "new world".
Can anyone guarantee those things?
It could be better, it could be flawed in the same ways, it could be flawed but in different ways, or it could be worse altogether. Compare our current lives with someone a century ago. Two centuries. A millenia. Plus hey if you wake up and the oceans have boiled off, there's solutions to your continued existence then.
> I know for a fact that I will grow tired of existence.
I think that's the main part - ceasing to exist should be a choice. It wasn't one to be brought into this world, but inhabiting it and going out of it should be done on one's own terms and when having lived as good of a long life as one might want to. For some people that will be close to a century. For others that might be a thousand years. Who knows, for some it might be a million years.
If this is all thought experiments, why not? At that point, why even care about waking up in a capitalist dystopian hellhole? Might take a few centuries to overthrow them but it's not like that sort of life is the end point of humanity. And if it is, at least you'd know that for sure. Or maybe it's nuclear winter. Or something closer to a utopia, or at least something where everyone's basic needs are more or less met. Asking for guarantees doesn't work either way.
No one can guarantee those things.
No one can guarantee anything in this world.
You are free to choose non existence but others are equally free to be brave enough to wake up in a worse world.
They may even feel responsible enough to try and fix it rather than requiring a "guarantee".
> The assumption being that, this "new world" is a better place than where you are now.
No one is assuming that. At least, I am not assuming that. Even if the world gets worse, I think it is rational to want to live longer and try and fix that.
Even if it is provably 100% unfixable and worse, any existence is better than non existence (certain forms of Hindu/Buddhist meditation teach you how to get into a state where that is obvious).
People overemphasize the "time loop trap" piece but seem to overlook the fact that he eventually uses the time to better himself in almost every way. He's a much better, much more enriched and happy person by the end.
The biggest thing holding people back imo is fear of failure, fear of consequences.
If your dream is starting a business but if it fails you'll be broke, it's understandable if you're hesitant
Fear of failure cripples people because setbacks are so costly. Many people never attempt anything because they are afraid they will fail. Or more accurately because they cannot afford to fail
If you mean it in the sense that 'ultimately, nothing really matters', then the subtext to that is that nothing ultimately matters because we all die in the end. Which would be completely negated by immortality.
Or, as in the Bobiverse books, the brain of a space probe, but I have a bleaker view of the future than that…
Same question as if you'd like to drop everything and create a new life on the other side of the world, not for everyone.
I've dealt with loss. It sucks, but it's part of being alive (I say with just a hint of irony).
I do recognize that not everyone feels this way about this topic though. That's ok.
But I don't have much faith in humanity to make things better, so I'm not sure I'd want to see a future with another 200 years of people making things worse.
I guess I would say I'm happy to live my life now and let the future can take care of itself.
As for traveling to the future: that sounds like fun!
Worse even is never truly waking up but instead being replicated and turned into the brain for a servitor. If you believe the Roko Worshippers, you might be woken up just to be tortured.