victorialis

What would motivate an immortal? There would be no urgency to anything.

Isn't that terrible, in an insidious sort of way?

Immortality would not bring escape from consequences, either; only an open-ended opportunity to incur them. Consequences would have an immortality of their own -- in the minds of those who remember them. Can you imagine having an endless memory?

Death as an idea is the ultimate limit for humans -- a boundary that makes us organize ourselves in life. If there were no death, on what basis would we organize ourselves? Doesn't the very idea of "good" require some kind of contrasting background against which it can be seen?

Hey Seraphim -- I think you got hold of something good there when you saw the hamster. If enlightenment didn't come in pieces, could we bear it?

omnia

I have to agree, victorialis. I understand the fear of death and the desire to live longer than human span, but I cannot fathom immortal life. There would be no emphasis on the now, no thisness. If you can't live in the present, what good is ongoing life? Even if you tried, focusing on the present would be difficult as it has no importance. I guess that's why christians argue that god is outside of time. Otherwise he'd either get bored or kill himself or become like Q from Star Trek or something.

Anyway, to Seraphim's original post, I thought by

Seraphim meant that we all had emotions and attatchments and sense, and even if they weren't the same we at least had experienced or could understand those of others. We all have similar, if not identical neurological structure and responses. The variation responsible for diversity does not mean there is not similar results.

pariah

ask later. my first urge would be to bitchslap the motherfucker in the head.

Seraphim

by Aquila ka Hecate

WRT getting off the wheel, I do think it's a very real possibility that someday we'll learn how to acheive this.

Nope ... it isn't. It is simply a process where you transfer your Hamster from a small cage (Life) with a single Wheel (which is your body) to another cage (Life) with maybe a single large wheel or multiple wheels (life spans which exceed our current one).

Even if Science managed to transplant your brain into another body and get it running, it is still the same. Your consciousness doesn't change, only your body does.

My grandparents lived into their 80s.My parents, through bad fortune, only to their 60s.

I on the other hand have an estimated natural lifespan of over 100-and that's not counting the technology that we'll com up with before then.

If in just 2 generations we can stretch three score years and ten into over a century, what might we not be capable of in the next?

Maybe it is different in your world, but in mine, Death doesn't send a telegram or an e-mail stating he is coming for you.

Transhumanism is dedicated, so I beleive, to the goal of acheiving functional immortality for humans through technology.
I'll have to eucate myself a bit more about it, but I'm not against this at all!We have the power, we should use it for our betterment.(imho of course!)

Given lifespan of a 1,000 years for example, what do you wish to do which could be different now?
Travel the world? It can be done in 100 years.
Learn as many things as possible? Useless since you can forgot the first thing you learn after mastering a few more.
Freedom from Death? Sorry ... you're not free ... just postponed it for another day.

whoo-whoowhoowhoo.Good one. I don't disagree.

Like I said, humans have their own mental boundaries which they cannot exceed (probably due to our Evolutional stage). Humans are simply animals which a consciousness.


by victorialis

Consequences would have an immortality of their own -- in the minds of those who remember them. Can you imagine having an endless memory?

How many of us willing to face our consequence for our actions? How many of us willing to look at the faces of people we hurt?
How many of us thinks that we have enough time to make things right now without screwing up some more?

I don't know about you, but remembering a past for the past 30 years (all those dissappointment, hurt and loneliness) is more than enough ... I don't think I could endure for another 1,000 years.

Death as an idea is the ultimate limit for humans -- a boundary that makes us organize ourselves in life. If there were no death, on what basis would we organize ourselves? Doesn't the very idea of "good" require some kind of contrasting background against which it can be seen?

Agreed.

Hey Seraphim -- I think you got hold of something good there when you saw the hamster. If enlightenment didn't come in pieces, could we bear it?

Thank You. It is amazing what a rodent running around in a circle on a wheel can teach a person.
As for Enlightment ... no one can answer it till they past that stage, so why bother trying now? We will get there when time comes.

As for others, I agreed. We, being humans do things differently not because we are different, it is because our background is different.
A greedy person is always greedy ... except maybe the level of greediness he has, same as for angry person, lustful person, closed-minded person, short-tempered person etc.
Can anyone show me a person who does something different?

In this context, it is possible by understanding oneself, he could understand others.

If I'm a greedy person, and by looking into myself, I could understand why another person would be greedy as well.
If I'm a lustful person, by looking into myself, I could also understand another lustful person as well.
It goes on and on. Agreed?

Aquila ka Hecate

Agreed.It's called empathy.

Although, according to a test I did online, since I have a lower empathy rating than an autistic person, perhaps I shouldn't be commenting.

Seraphim

by Aquila ka Hecate

Agreed.It's called empathy.

Although, according to a test I did online, since I have a lower empathy rating than an autistic person, perhaps I shouldn't be commenting.

It doesn't matter what rate a person's empathy is (and it certainly doesn't matter what some test says either), IF one can understand oneself, he can understand others. How much one understand oneself is between you and yourSELF.

What is an Austic person?

Aquila ka Hecate

Yes, yes, Seraphim-I know.
My sense of humour is sometimes a little obscure.

Autism:
Truth be told, it's frighteningly easy for me to put myself in someone else's shoes-which is probably why I clamp down on it.
But back to your point-I think I' only started to understand myself around the start of my deconversion.
It is my contention that the deconverted atheist is more likely than the theist to have a grip on both reality and him/her self.

It's probably the act of actually having to think for oneself that does that.

Seraphim

by Aquila ka Hecate


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Most autistic children are perfectly normal in appearance, but spend their time engaged in puzzling and disturbing behaviors which are markedly different from those of normal children. They may stare into space for hours, throw uncontrollable tantrums, show no interest in people (including their parents) and pursue strange, repetitive activities with no apparent purpose. They have been described as living in a world of their own. Some autistic individuals are remarkably gifted in certain areas such as music or mathematics, as depicted in the film Rain Man. All need help
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Half way reading this, I'd suddenly remembered the comic character - Calvin and Hobbes.

Truth be told, it's frighteningly easy for me to put myself in someone else's shoes-which is probably why I clamp down on it.
But back to your point-I think I' only started to understand myself around the start of my deconversion.
It is my contention that the deconverted atheist is more likely than the theist to have a grip on both reality and him/her self.

You don't need to put yourself in another's shoes at first. All you have to do is think about everything you do and say. There will be small glimpse of yourself which will be visible in your action.

Like - "Why did I do that?" OR " Why did I say that?" etc.
But most people attend to ask "Why did HE/SHE did that?" OR "Why did he/she said that?" OR "Why did God did that?" (Last one is a sarcasm :P).

It's probably the act of actually having to think for oneself that does that.

If you don't, who will?

I was thinking about what Muslims said to me in another forum about how their God had set everything up. Frankly speaking, I didn't agreed to what they said before.

I think thinking about the Hamster brought me an new insight about what they said. Maybe their God know that Muslims (being Human like everyone else) will be too lazy to think for themselves , so their God set everything for them and all they had to do was live (and even that they seems to have problem doing) .

Hmmm ... never thought a day where a rodent on Wheels could teach me more about Islam then bunch of Muslims could (some of them are from colleges).

victorialis

Nor could I. And I don't know what would be the point of it. What use is more time, unless I get a lot better at using what time I've got? How much time is enough? I have to assume that the time there is, is sufficient. No other answer makes sense.

A ripening mind can learn anywhere, from anything.

Agreed!

Seraphim

by victorialis

Nor could I. And I don't know what would be the point of it. What use is more time, unless I get a lot better at using what time I've got? How much time is enough? I have to assume that the time there is, is sufficient. No other answer makes sense.

Agreed ... Use the time given to us to the best of our abilities and maybe, in end of our long journey ... Death could indeed be a blessing.

A ripening mind can learn anywhere, from anything.

Thank You. Still got a lot to learn ... Shouldn't be too happy with what we have.