What's your view on Immortality?

[Asyajyl]

If given the choice would you want to be immortal and why? 

I'm interested in hearing everyone's views on this topic, particularly with an aromantic perspective. From what I've asked of my allo friends, the pain of out-living their loved ones would be too great to consider it. Of course for us, it would also be difficult to leave behind our friends and family, but I wonder if not being able to become romantically attached to people would change anything.

[Jot-Aro Kujo]

I have read enough Fullmetal Alchemist to know immortality is a curse. No thank you

[vinniebandit]

11 minutes ago, Asyajyl said:

From what I've asked of my allo friends

I suppose you're referring to alloromantics and not allosexuals? That would be supposing that romantic love is a steady and lifelong thing. ?

You're also certainly thinking of immortality of consciousness/awareness:whatever"soul"? We don't know about that in the first place. Metaphysics lead nowhere.

 

[nonmerci]

I suppose it won't be annoying if I have the possibility to quit one day if I want to.

[NotHeartless]

My friend (who isn't into romance/dating and sex either) always says she would find it fascinating to become at least about 3,000 years old. She would like to see how society develops and with what else humankind comes up. In the good ways and the bad. But she wouldn't like to become immortal.
It's similar for me. I wouldn't like to be immortal but not because of the pain of outliving my loved ones (tbh I think you can always meet new people, which doesn't mean you forget the people that were important to you), rather because I don't view death as something negative. A part of my soul, spirit, or what you might wanna call it, is relieved to be put at peace at last.

Our brains are incapable to imagine what it is like to be dead and samewise are incapable of imagining eternity. Still we like to specualte about both, but I find death more fascinating than immortality for some reason. Maybe because it is a mystery on its own and I would definitely get tired of living at some point.

Edit: Welcome to the forums, Asyajyl .

Edited April 22, 2021 by NotHeartless

[DeltaAro]

On 4/22/2021 at 7:36 AM, Asyajyl said:

From what I've asked of my allo friends, the pain of out-living their loved ones would be too great to consider it.

Though that can happen in the course of a normal life as well.

On 4/22/2021 at 7:36 AM, Asyajyl said:

If given the choice would you want to be immortal and why? 

Probably I would be too afraid of agreeing.

But there is so much cultural baggage. Desiring immortality in an earthly, physical fashion is generally considered a very unhealthy and dark desire.

It's understandable that humans thought that way in earlier times. They also had a way more relaxed attitude about their lives and safety.

But nowadays we have "public health" which operates on the strange ethics: "Nothing is worth a reduction of your life span". If someone simply prefers living with unhealthy habits (e.g. lack of exercise, overeating) and is ok risking a shorter life, it's framed by "public health" that this could not ever be a valid, reasonable choice.

20 hours ago, tempesta said:

Also, when you get older time seems to run faster and faster.

In my opinion this is more a result of someone's life lacking new experiences and not age directly. There were monotonous periods of my life in which time seemed to run fast but I was younger. Of course for a younger person new experiences are generally more likely.

On 4/22/2021 at 12:14 PM, NotHeartless said:

Our brains are incapable to imagine what it is like to be dead and samewise are incapable of imagining eternity.

What I find surprising is that while we can't imagine eternity (= form a mental image that corresponds to it), we can still conceptualize it (infinity or eternity). I mean, our grasp of infinity is so precise it entails more than just infinity being the negation of finiteness. E. g. we can recognize that there are different types of infinity, like countable and uncountable infinity.

It's what I find most peculiar about humans that though all their activities, experiences and imaginations are finite in nature (like counting things or imagining a certain number of things), their reason can break those boundaries, fully generalize and stretch to infinity (e. g. arrive at the insight that every number has a successor).

That puts us in a bad spot to regarding the question of immortality. It's a question we can understand, but it's not like a mathematical theorem (something without emotional involvement), and our imagination completely fails.

[Rolo]

Nah, immortality sounds boring and intensely lonely. Imagine having no common experiences with the people who surround you, having no one who could even begin to imagine what your life has been like, or what your childhood was like... imagine outliving all other life on earth... sounds awful. I wouldn't mind having a few extra centuries though.

[Asyajyl]

Thanks for the replies, I enjoyed reading them ^^ This definitely opened my perspective around this topic

On 4/22/2021 at 3:55 PM, vinniebandit said:

I suppose you're referring to alloromantics and not allosexuals? That would be supposing that romantic love is a steady and lifelong thing. ?

You're also certainly thinking of immortality of consciousness/awareness:whatever"soul"? We don't know about that in the first place. Metaphysics lead nowhere.

 

Yes, they are alloromantics. The immortality I had in mind is where one does not experience death physically. Although thinking about it, I didn't consider the possibility until now that the consciousness could die/fade while the immortal body lives on, if that's what you are meaning.