Will death be cheated??

# 1 24-07-2010 , 02:17 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

Ok we have all the science fiction novels movies etc etc. Bad arse aliens..weird scientists and all that BUT is some if it actually possible??

Lets take immortality for instance...is it possible..I think it is in the near future. We all have the inbuilt notion of living forever (why I would want to pay taxes for eternity is beyond me)...you know drink a potion and vwala..instant immortal.

Now of course you can still die!!! a freight training running over you whilst completely drunk will still do the job Im afraid. BUT what if we take some tips from 'Brainstorm' and 'Avatar'??? Your life and everything around you is basically a memory right??? IF we could record those, upload at will, have a cloned avatar (no memories) sitting in the vat (yes beer dave) waiting for our actual demise? Then just upload our life to the new body and carry on.

Does this sound feasible. My mate pointed out not long ago they are workin on a 'Total Recall' gadget apparently...so you can have holidays on Mars etc etc..whether this is BS or not..I dont know. But it got me thinking about immortality...maybe thats just all we are...big USB sticks...and we only have to download out learned data to another one.

Would there be morality issues for the avatars?? Im an Atheist BUT some who believe in God might ask "do they have souls?" and or is your soul given to the avatar when you upload??

Interesting

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 2 24-07-2010 , 11:22 AM

Subscriber
Join Date: Dec 2007

Location: NZ

Posts: 3,125

there is a reason why people die, it's to get rid of the crappy old ideals and keep moving on (like how people didn't believe bacteria could exist (some countires they still believe that i think) when they clearly do and if no one realised bacteria existed we would still be dying to something that could be easily "cured"). it's called evolution.

that aside, i think the notion of immortality you put forth was downloading your memories to another body, and you keep doing that and you live on and on. (dangerous because not everyone likes to learn or see their flaws and do anything about it)
but then, is a body who has your memories still you?
i dont know... maybe having memories of someone else who is suppose to be you makes you that person since you have no memories of your own, but then, what's to say you'd still act the same?

if you 'download' your memories to a newborn baby who would become normally become someone who likes to murder for fun will that infant have all your memories and still want to murder even though you wouldn't? i say newborn baby because if you donwload your memories into something that has memories then you've taken someone's life if you wipe over them, and if you don't wipe over them then there's absolutely no chance that you've got the same person. the problem with a new born though is that i don't think they retain their memories. (does anyone remember being born?) therefore it's pointless downloading your memories to a new born.

so maybe you don't go down the new born route, maybe you take a teenager and it's ethically correct to kill them in favour of some old geezer who just didn't want to die and who doesn't add any value to the world by being stuck in their ways.
that implies that you can just download yourself to another person.
and following the notions of Ghost in the Shell what happens if you can download other people's memories? their experience becomes yours? you know what they know. you could trick yourself into being another person. at what point do you stop being yourself and become someone else? people will eventually all become the same because no new source of identity will ever arise because everyone wants to be awesome.
if you can do stuff like that then surely hacking into other people isn't that far off either. make them do things they normally wouldn't, make them have memories they never had

you ask, would the copy have a 'soul', i have no official religion myself but i don't think the soul is capturable or digitizable. the 'soul' would transfer to the other body provided the other body doesn't have one and that the 'soul' is willing and capable. although, i dunno if that's possible.. you can leave your body anytime if you know how, but i dont know if you can disconnect yourself from it and connect permanently to another

so... is it feasible to download your memories into someone else to achieve a sense of immortality? maybe we have the technology.. i dont know..
is it moral? the simple answer... hell no. why stop evolution? that and even if you could do it, you'd have to "kill" someone to transfer your memories.
then there's the whole what-gives-you-the-right-to-take-someones-life-thing and the whole what-gives-you-the-right-to-live-on-past-your-expiration-date?

that's a "Ch" pronounced as a "K"

Computer skills I should have:
Objective C, C#, Java, MEL. Python, C++, XML, JavaScript, XSLT, HTML, SQL, CSS, FXScript, Clips, SOAR, ActionScript, OpenGL, DirectX
Maya, XSI, Photoshop, AfterEffects, Motion, Illustrator, Flash, Swift3D

Quote

# 3 24-07-2010 , 12:09 PM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

VERY good mate!!! Yes I agree on some of what you say. My downloaded 'avatar' however would be clean...no memories at all...nothing. So if you downloaded to it...you would theoretically still be you, just in a new body. In fact it would be your body anyway as it would be a clone of yourself. I wouldnt think it would change you mentally as it will still be you. So you dont need to kill anyone.

Whether or not it has a soul...I agree...dunno. I guess it would be alive...but without a conscious because it has no mind..welllll..again dunno.

A baby does have memory as far as I know.....its just so far back you cant remember but it is still there. This 'mind' you download to a new body is yours and there wouldnt be a hint of taint in it apart from..as you point out..your own flaws.

And really arent we heading that way, cybernetic upgrades, genetic fusion etc etc etc. Arent we as a species already becoming extinct?? Evolving into..omnihumans. Abilities to run faster, leap higher, see better, live longer etc? I dont propose we 'take' anyone at all, grow your own so to speak.

Ghost in the Shell...are good movie. Yeh I guess you could in theory get hacked, be hard but you could do it!

What is evoltion then mate?? To me it is an entity that adapts/mutates to survive and carry on isnt it? So to me its just another arm of evolution.

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 4 26-07-2010 , 01:12 AM

Subscriber
Join Date: Dec 2007

Location: NZ

Posts: 3,125

(this might not be a great response since i'm at work right now)

when you say you'll be moving into a clone what age is that clone?
if it's an adult clone (or rather a clone that isn't an embryo) you'd surely have issues growing it. how would you grow a human without it becoming "alive" in the sense that it develops its own personality and memories. if that's unavoidable then again, you've just taken another persons life (your own in a crazy way, but still taken a life)
so, say you dont go that route then you'd be doing it t a baby you.
babies probably do have memories, but the brain (physical storage) would be continuously changing and these memories would get lost

cybernetics is when you augment yourself with physical machines right? like integrating a special contact lens that does stuff
yeah it's happening, experiments and research is being done on such things, but would you really say that humans are becoming extinct? technology augments us, it doesn't change our genetic code, therefore it's not physical evolution
genetic modification to bodies or designer babies doesn't make humans extinct. we'd still be human. it's not like we'd get a drastic change from it (like the whole dinosaur evolved into a chicken). or if we did and that change was for the better then humans as we know it would be extinct.

evolution is what you say it is. adapting and mutating to survive. now... take that definition literally. when you look around outside at the city what do you see? buildings? cars? roads? it's evolution in thought. the way people think changes, it adapts to the surrounding and it adapts the surrounding to it.

Quote

# 5 26-07-2010 , 02:24 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

Me 3...Im at work LOL I will read into it tonight..have a good un

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 6 26-07-2010 , 11:00 AM

Head of 3d Admedia
Join Date: May 2007

Location: nairobi , ken-ya

Posts: 1,340

hmmmm really food for thought imagine another Nelson Mandela or another Adulf Hitler....... scary where your mind goes sometimes bullet

Quote

# 7 26-07-2010 , 11:19 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

True...but we are all capable of being monsters murambi. Hitler may have not become what he did if the environment in which he lived was different??? A lot of life is about circumstance I believe...in the right place at the right time..etc.

Well I dont think my mind is too bad...LOL, I think of lots of things like this....they are all possibilities are they not. Better to think about what may be I say...

I love technology but Im scared for the future of the human race..all these struggles..achievments...could be for nought IF things like this happened. What I want to know is ...well ...what would happen. Where would we go...people like me ( I speak for myself here) would fight to the death to protect my family...BUT if some how I was against somebody who couldnt die..well I would also want that advantage.

Just thoughts mate...just thoughts

cheers bullet

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 8 26-07-2010 , 11:38 AM

Subscriber
Join Date: Dec 2007

Location: NZ

Posts: 3,125

wait... i just realised... if we got downloaded into a new body just like us then we'd be like the skinned cylons

Quote

# 9 26-07-2010 , 11:54 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

ccccccccooooooolllllllllllll.

My minds not on it tonight..LOL 30,000 point DTM and I had to fix it...well half of it. Wheres Wally...and I have to idenify where!!! siiigghhhhhh

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 10 02-08-2010 , 02:31 AM

Subscriber
Join Date: Jun 2005

Location: Atlanta, GA

Posts: 258

Memory transplant sounds along the lines of the matrix.

and implantation into another being sounds along the lines of the movie Avatar.

Lengthened life could be achieved by figuring out how to stop the bodies cell from having a half-life.

it's like the math puzzle.

would you rather have a million dollars instantly? or have a penny that will double itself everyday for month.

Of course the penny that doubles! You'd make more money!

It's like that but backwards. You start will a unknown amount of pennies that count down to 0 in every part of your organs and tissue.

I disagree with people die because it's to get rid of the old ideals and whatnot. Wisdom comes with age and experience and what better way to pay down true knowledge than to have lived through it and learn from your own mistakes.

history books don't tell all. they only tell the side of the story of who wins. Then things are forgotten only to have them repeated again.

How about immortality through draining out blood with another viable chemical compound containing nanobots that doesn't make the body work so hard to keep it clean. while these nanobots are made of cells to begin with they will double.. triple.. your cell regeneration and as they die out they will use your own cells to replicate themselves as they keep double and tripling your cell regeneration. No worries for cancer it will strip it out before it even starts. The world could call it a miracle. Of course you would still be able to die from a gun shot.. train.. car wreck.. being blown up.

Maybe another way for a immortal way of being would be through a pristine sterile environment. Like a computer works great until it gets a virus. Once you have it even if you put medicine (anti virus software) it's still there just shunned and stifled in a "chest"

I think that is what religion is based upon.. being able to live forever with your friends and loved ones with no worries and only happiness and we wish to achieve that on earth as it sounds too good to be true.

I'm not religious but I do believe there is a higher power.. and we're just their ant farm.

these lyrics goes with this thread entirely.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7reogBmcmgw

Quote

# 11 02-08-2010 , 02:53 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

very good man...totally cool response. I think that living forever WOULD change the world for the better. As you say...history is written by the winner...look at Roman history for instance..look what happened at Carthege!!! WW1 WW2 etc etc

Im an Atheist..I dont believe in a higher power other than Mother Nature...she is the true ruler of our lives...but it would be nice to live longer...and have a truly better understanding of it all>

Cheers bullet

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 12 02-08-2010 , 10:28 AM

Subscriber
Join Date: Dec 2007

Location: NZ

Posts: 3,125

Originally posted by Ataraxy
I disagree with people die because it's to get rid of the old ideals and whatnot. Wisdom comes with age and experience and what better way to pay down true knowledge than to have lived through it and learn from your own mistakes.

history books don't tell all. they only tell the side of the story of who wins. Then things are forgotten only to have them repeated again.

Originally Posted by

taken out of context what i said about people dying to get rid of ideals clearly is stupid. people don't just wake up one morning and say 'hey i think i'll die and take all these silly ideals with me and make the world move forward', however what i was saying was that if poeple don't die we'd be moving forward slower (and also overpopulating the planet)
while the saying 'wisdom comes with age' is true, it only comes when the person lets it.
for example, you crash your car into a lamppost because you're super drunk. a police person tells you that you shouldn't drink and drive, you hate police people telling you what to do, therefore you will do it again.

i've a friend who's grandad hates japanese people because of the war.
some french people in ADR are so in love with their hand writing they hand write all the cues instead of moving to a more legible format
my grandad says he'd never buy a japanese car

if you can't make a mistake you can't make anything, but old habits are hard to break.

i have to disagree with what you said still though, bullet.
if people lived forever the world wouldn't be a better place. there are currently more morons than intelligent people :p

Quote

# 13 02-08-2010 , 10:55 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

LOL love ya Chirone....pity the bars are so far apart..though yours open earlier...cold beer.

Well you could be right BUT if the morons could also live longer doesnt mean they will...they will still be morons and still affected by mortality through mundane means.

Yes your Grandad hated Nippon....so did a lot of my elders. BUT theu hated them for a reason mate...they were there...lets not take an actual memory of horror (on BOTH sides) and say you wouldnt be affected. It takes generations if not longer to forget the atrocities of war my old friend.

Many A.N.Z.A.C's also hated Turks..Germans etc etc but they seem to now respect each other more than before. You will also find Nippon was still feudal and barbaric in war as opposed to our "civilised" battles (that is toungue in cheek to a point).

Sorry Ive drifted from the subject....nature will still weed out the ones who arent up to the game mate..simple as that. There will still be drongo's fixing a light switch with the power running...trying to beat the train to the railway crossing etc. Tha wont change..the Darwin Awards will still be a valid achievment for some of our species..dont worry.

There will still be the Hitlers...Amin's etc etc BUT if you knew you could live for even a few hundred years...I reckon you would think twice about going to war? would you not?

Lets talk over a beer one day.... I intend to get to the island one day.

Cheers bullet

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 14 02-08-2010 , 11:02 AM

Lifetime Member
Join Date: Feb 2010

Location: Australia

Posts: 4,255

Letters from Iwo Jima...have you seen it?? I havent yet. I was brought up to distrust the Japanese for what they did to my family....I dont but.

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

Quote

# 15 02-08-2010 , 11:36 AM

Subscriber
Join Date: Dec 2007

Location: NZ

Posts: 3,125

ah yeah, there are always people who decide it's a good idea to walk in front of a train because they are too busy talking on their phone... or people who decide railway crossings are a good place to stop their car while they wait for the traffic to move.
it's something i'll not ever understand about some people... maybe they are secretly suicidal

i think some people would still go to war even if they knew they would live for a few hundred years. war is usually based on conflict in wants, isn't it?
personA: "i want this land"
personB: "no i want it"
*war*

not sure how a conversation with me would go! i think too much and would be stopping myself from saying anything because i figure out a counter example to whatever i was going to say about half way through saying anything or i think of a counter example to someone elses argument but don't get round to saying it :p

Quote

Will death be cheated??

Posting Rules Forum Rules

Similar Threads

Topics

Free Courses

Full Courses

VFX News