Biological Immortality VS Death In Scifi

[Spacescifi]

 

Do not know how often this concept is explored in scifi, yet I will provide my view on it.

Biological Immortality: How and what happens depends solely on the writer. So do not be surprised if in it you see views and attitudes that support and promote what the writer or writers ACTUALLY think about immortality. It seems it is a popular trend for writers to view immortality bad and death good. If any scifi writer/creator has shown otherwise I have yet to see it.

Nonetheless I will explore the results of biological immortality... as in being born that way.

1. Population control will be necessary eventually. It may even provide a legitimate reason for space colonization

2. Rule or ruin... the homeworld. You know all the stuff humans worry about? If a civilization lived forever they would either have a solution for their problems or keep looking for them. If they have solutions, they will have less problems than us. Of if they do not have solutions, then their civilization will likely either die permanently or be punctuated by several extinction level events followed by rebuilding only to do it again and again. A rather vicious cycle of death and rebirth with no end in site.

Is immortality bad per se? Is death what defines being human? The popular answer is yes. That is the kind of stuff some scifi promotes.

Nonetheless like all life, it is not so much existence as what is done with it that counts. Cutting it short just ends existence, even if one can live forever otherwise and act, feel, and be... alive

Feel free to discuss.

 

Edited March 31, 2020 by Spacescifi

[Kernel Kraken]

I recommend reading "The Postmortal" by Drew Magary. It shows the life of someone who got the "Cure" circa 2016 and culminates in countries nuking their own population by 2095. It's very chilling and scarily realistic, 10/10.

[Spacescifi]

20 minutes ago, Kernel Kraken said:

I recommend reading "The Postmortal" by Drew Magary. It shows the life of someone who got the "Cure" circa 2016 and culminates in countries nuking their own population by 2095. It's very chilling and scarily realistic, 10/10.

 

Have not read it, but a cursory google search revealed that with a cure for death, people begin to escalate bad forms of behavior until death is inevitable.

Truth be told, the only way living forever can work is if good wins and evil loses.

So long they exist together, death is not far away, whether people do not die from aging or are killed. Death follows evil like a glove fits a hand.

They go together.

Edited March 31, 2020 by Spacescifi

[kerbiloid]

4 hours ago, Spacescifi said:

It seems it is a popular trend for writers to view immortality bad and death good.

Any immortal sci-fi writer?

[Spacescifi]

5 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Any immortal sci-fi writer?

 

"I kept dreaming of a world I thought I would never see. And then, one day I got in..."

Kevin Flynn-Tron Legacy

 

 

[KSK]

This is actually one of the main themes of my KSP fanfic.

Basic premise is that the kerbals live in symbiosis with biologically immortal, sentient groups of trees known as Kerm (similarity to Kerman not a coincidence  ). The eldest Kerm have memories dating back to kerbal prehistory. 

The problem is that Kerm are extremely territorial and, as a practical matter, Kerbin can only accommodate so many of them.

So what happens when there’s no more room left on the planet?

 

[Kernel Kraken]

14 hours ago, Spacescifi said:

 

Have not read it, but a cursory google search revealed that with a cure for death, people begin to escalate bad forms of behavior until death is inevitable.

Truth be told, the only way living forever can work is if good wins and evil loses.

So long they exist together, death is not far away, whether people do not die from aging or are killed. Death follows evil like a glove fits a hand.

They go together.

The problem is that the concept of immortality is inherently an evil thing. It is one of the most selfish things possible- wanting life for yourself. People will continue to leech off of society for longer and likely won't contribute as much to society. Humans are an inherently selfish species, there is no balance right now. Evil has already won. And the ultimate evil is taking life for yourself forever, while depriving others of the same life. You can be sure that the people who first invent it will capitalize the excrement out of it. 

[Dirkidirk]

11 minutes ago, Kernel Kraken said:

 And the ultimate evil is taking life for yourself forever, while depriving others of the same life.

are you saying that in order to live forever, you must suck the life from others? there is a 100% chance you're not, but I must know!

3 hours ago, KSK said:

So what happens when there’s no more room left on the planet?

the kerbals go to teh space, leaving the trees to fight each other for some amount of time.

Edited March 31, 2020 by Dirkidirk

[Spacescifi]

20 minutes ago, Kernel Kraken said:

The problem is that the concept of immortality is inherently an evil thing. It is one of the most selfish things possible- wanting life for yourself. People will continue to leech off of society for longer and likely won't contribute as much to society. Humans are an inherently selfish species, there is no balance right now. Evil has already won. And the ultimate evil is taking life for yourself forever, while depriving others of the same life. You can be sure that the people who first invent it will capitalize the excrement out of it. 

 

I think you misunderstand my intentions.

It is not my purpose to write about flawed humanity acheving immortality on their own. As you mentioned and I agree, things are'nt right with humans for us to use such power responsibly.

No. It is my purpose to write about scifi alien humanoids who were born biologically immortal.

Their behavior won't be exactly like humans, at least with regard to responsibilty. They will either be responsible, or choose to refuse responsibility, but they will never take up any responsibility and not do their best to carry it out. In fact, they never make mistakes due to negligence, only due to being misinformed or because of outright sabotage. In the story they have warp technology and constant acceleration engines.

Edited March 31, 2020 by Spacescifi

[Shpaget]

Have you read about Lazarus Long?

[Spacescifi]

25 minutes ago, Shpaget said:

Have you read about Lazarus Long?

 

No.

In fact the only scifi novels I read cover to cover were abridged versions of The Time Machine and The Strange Tale of Jekyll and Hyde.

My inspiration for this post comes from knowledge and from checking out online what passes for ST nowadays.

Edited March 31, 2020 by Spacescifi

[Nuke]

i think immortality if theoretically possible would be statistically improbable in practice. even if you have perfect cellular repair or maybe you uploaded your wetware into a computer, that system is still going to require an energy intake, its still going to require environmental tolerances which should not be exceeded. the laws of thermodynamics are what they are. like if you are stuck orbiting a dying star, you are going to need to relocate. and if you cant make the delta-v budget, you are going to fry. if you have to ride a generation ship (if you live a few million years its not a generation ship anymore), and that ship has problems in transit, you might run out of power and freeze to death. its possible you might survive till the heat death of the universe, but even if immortal, not everyone is going to make it, and those that do will get to watch the stars blink out one by one and their survival would be impossible or very difficult at that point. 

[Spacescifi]

15 minutes ago, Nuke said:

. its possible you might survive till the heat death of the universe, but even if immortal, not everyone is going to make it, and those that do will get to watch the stars blink out one by one and their survival would be impossible or very difficult at that point. 

 

Not all accept that that will happen IRL in the future. Humans can't even predict the weather with 100% accuracy let alone world events that happen suddenly.

And in scifi, such a future is by no means a certainty. It's up to the writer and whatever they wish to make happen.

 

EDIT: That said, my scifi universe still has problems of it's own. They are not utopias, but some civilizations have less issues than ours IRL.

Edited April 1, 2020 by Spacescifi

[Nuke]

the heat death is a long ways away and immortals might opt to end there existence than live in a dark dead universe forever. 

its not just the universe you have to worry about. immortals might value their own existence so much they are willing to throw other immortals under the bus for their own survival. people dont have to be immortal to exhibit that kind of behavior. 

Edited April 1, 2020 by Nuke

[Kernel Kraken]

On 3/31/2020 at 1:09 PM, Spacescifi said:

 

I think you misunderstand my intentions.

It is not my purpose to write about flawed humanity acheving immortality on their own. As you mentioned and I agree, things are'nt right with humans for us to use such power responsibly.

No. It is my purpose to write about scifi alien humanoids who were born biologically immortal.

Their behavior won't be exactly like humans, at least with regard to responsibilty. They will either be responsible, or choose to refuse responsibility, but they will never take up any responsibility and not do their best to carry it out. In fact, they never make mistakes due to negligence, only due to being misinformed or because of outright sabotage. In the story they have warp technology and constant acceleration engines.

Do they move from world to world to manage overpopulation or something?

[Bill Phil]

On 3/31/2020 at 12:52 PM, Kernel Kraken said:

The problem is that the concept of immortality is inherently an evil thing. It is one of the most selfish things possible- wanting life for yourself. People will continue to leech off of society for longer and likely won't contribute as much to society. Humans are an inherently selfish species, there is no balance right now. Evil has already won. And the ultimate evil is taking life for yourself forever, while depriving others of the same life. You can be sure that the people who first invent it will capitalize the excrement out of it. 

Immortality can indeed be a selfish thing - but not necessarily so.

"Leeching" off society wouldn't necessarily happen either.

I would argue that humanity, as a social species, is not inherently selfish. We care very much about others - perhaps not caring for the entirety of the species but we certainly do care about others. I would also argue that hundreds of thousands of years of human history would seem to imply that we are not inherently selfish. Beyond that, there is not very much scientific research into "human nature" and of the research that exists, it's difficult to find an answer. From my own experiences humans are not inherently selfish. Some grow up in an environment that reinforces that trait, and others do not. 

Though if we were to invent immortality, I believe that society isn't ready for it. An immortal society must be fundamentally different from a mortal society. Though if such a technology were released it would be capitalized on.

[Spacescifi]

1 hour ago, Kernel Kraken said:

Do they move from world to world to manage overpopulation or something?

 

Both birth control and colonization of space.

In fact... when anyone does act irresponsibly it is due to mental handicaps.

Again... they do not have a utopia, both good and evil individuals exist.

 

I guess the real difference with us is that good and evil tend to segregate, but like us, both sides tend to think they are right, and going to either side will eventually alienate a person from whatever side they belong to.

 

 

Edited April 2, 2020 by Spacescifi

[Nuke]

i dont think immortality would change human nature at all. people can do horrible things even when their own survival is not in question. 

[Spacescifi]

1 hour ago, Nuke said:

i dont think immortality would change human nature at all. people can do horrible things even when their own survival is not in question. 

 

It would take nothing less than a miracle to change human nature.

For what it's worth, the evil version of my instinctually responsible scifi race is a type of evil we know all too well.

They are essentially staunch hedonists, that have gone so far as to transfer their heads into machines that can bio-print ANY made to order mortal body they choose that is in it's vast databanks, and insert their brain into it.

They also are connected by a kind of scifi virtual world, where hedonism of all kinds, no matter how extreme or gross thrives.

They did this primarily for their own safety, since one can seemingly 'die' or be 'killed' in the name of hedonism in the virtual world, but in the real one it is permanent

 However time and time again their virtual pursuits spill out into the real one one way or another.

 

[kerbiloid]

Immortal people can patiently wait for KSP-2 and HalfLife-3 releases.