Diving right in:
I think one of the primary concepts of this blog is immortality. So a good start might be to explain my views on human beings eventual technological ascent into immortality. If I could wager on it, I’d stake reasonable amount that someone alive today will be allowed to choose their own date with death. There is a CHANCE, a real, legitimate, honest possibility that human beings might be able to select for themselves the specific details of how and when they die. Some might survive to see a day when death no longer exerts its uncontrollable presence in our lives – due in full to the advancements of science, medicine and technology.
You can doubt or disregard this possibility if you want – I know it’s a lofty claim that some might feel belongs in a science fiction novel, but really - is the idea really so farfetched? Search on the term ”Life extending pill” (or let me do it for you: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2004/04/19/367344/index.htm) - experts project it’s about a decade away. Ten years from now, we’ll be able to visit the local pharmacy and extend our lives by some yet-to-be-determined amount of years. While that’s surely not immortality, it sure as shit is a step in the right direction – a step away from impending death. Whats more, these extra years of life granted will extend the life of the life-extending researchers, which allows us to leverage our brilliant minds that much longer. Research into longer lives will benefit from its own researchers’ longer lifespan. These ”little bonus years” could compound, resulting in a surprisingly inflated life expectancy before the close of this millenium. Cooperative and goal driven behavior towards lifespan extension will probably result in technology/medicine/science curing everything but severe, immediate brain trauma – and we may even find a work around for that unfortunate feature one day. My point is that it’s entirely possible that neo-humans from the future will look back at the life-extending pill as the first step towards liberating us from mandatory death. The same pill that somone is working on in a lab at this moment.
This blog is really derived from this concept. I’m 29 years old, which puts me in a weird spot. By my own stupid, ill informed calculations, this puts me right in the borderland. The borderland belongs to those individuals who might die before the pill becomes truly effective, or before the 2nd medical advancement following the pill (and so on and so forth) ultimately meaning that we’ll be some of the last human beings to die involuntarily. And we’ll know it. The sad fact is that many walking around today are simply not going to make it to the finish line. There’s a good chance I myself might not make it, which truly bums me out. I’d like to be there the day when humanity is finally ”comfortable” with itself – all grown up.
My less-than-educated guess is that everyone born after a particular date (like any time in 2075) just…won’t die unless they themselves choose to do so. Researchers might find a way to belay the order from DNA to halt 25-year-old cell reproduction and start wrapping up shop - stop the very onset of aging. Those of us without these science-based genetic advantages are going to have to FIGHT tooth and nail for every extra year we get. Well guess what - all other things being equal, fights are more likely won when they are scouted preemptively. I say it’s never to early to start this discussion. Afterall, we’re going to have to survive all the way to the finish line, and chances are it’ll have to be cooperatively. I guesstimate the chances of my generation – the”80′s babies” making it as “less than good”, simply because all the medical advances are in their infancy – not to mention our falling prey to cancer, AIDS, heart disease, etc. All I can cling to is some form of hope that I was born late enough on humanity’s timeline to experience several millennia, rather than the 70 years of life nature and medicine arbitrarily selected for our race.
The illusive date – the day that the specific scientific advancement that’ll get us across the finish line becomes a reality – is anyone’s guess, and it is absolutely date that can be yanked backwards in time. Instead of October 21st, 2099, it could be May 2nd, 2050. My ability to “make it” to 2050 is far more likely than 2099, so in addition to surviving to 2050, I need to do whatever small things I can to get that date moving backwards in time – not only for myself but for those around me that it’d be nice to have around…for a while. This blog aspires to do just that - in whatever ways I can with small, meaningful steps.
