In the next 1000 years....

[Jakigi]

What Zylark and Jimbozu said is not out there. Although it sounds like it, we're going to be entering a hugely controversial time in our existence. We are going to figure out how to live forever. Although the average life expectancy will probably be around 3000 years old because of accidental deaths. Since death will only come in the form of accidents, I see humanity becoming incredibly introverted. We're going change so much.... damn, I'm tripping.

Someone is going to figure out how to make mass amounts of money with this, and essentially control society. The future looks fucked up in so many ways...

[.ViciouS.]

Originally Posted by Zylark

Another question alltogether is, would we want to live that long? Many who live to a ripe old age, feel ready for death. Could it be the human psyche is not entirely ready for a virtually eternal existance?

I think this question is probably the best one to ponder. Technology is unsurmountable, with it a lot of impossible becomes improbable, which time can remedy. So the ultimate question is, are humans(the mind/psyche/ego, etc) even ready for the technological progressions of overcoming aging?

[BlazinX1]

Originally Posted by the roach

Do you think in 1000 years we could live to be 200 years old?
Or do you think we will cap off around the area we are at now?

You're assuming we make it that far.

Also I think it would be horrible if we were able to live untill 200, the world isn't meant for so many people.

[Maitereya]

let my body die and hook me up to a robot body. sounds like ghost in the shell

[thatcrazydude]

even if you could live forever would you really want to
i also think that its fiarly possible in the next thousand years that some shit like i am legend will happen and we will inevitablly kill everyone/turn the remaining people into zombiesque creatures

[CosmicSerpent]

I'm pretty confident that the world's average life expectancy will never rise above about 85 or so. People may eventually live to be maybe 150 or 200 at the most, but who would really want to? I know I wouldn't.

[amsterdamage]

If I could live to 3,000 as a 24 yr-old I'd be in!
..but if I get to 3,000 and I look 3,000 ..hell no!!!

[Bluntzilla420]

67 isnt all THAT bad...78 would be nice

[w33n]

Originally Posted by Jimbozu

Theres no reason people shouldn't be able to live forever in 1000 years. I mean, modern medicine is still quite primitive if you think about it. Almost all of our medical techniques suplement the body's immune system, instead of fixing the problem directly.

Hell, we've already figured out the reason for ageing, all that comes now is fixing it.

I would account that to beurocrasies like the FDA. As long as our lives our controlled by big brother, we will continue to live in stagnation. We would have cures for cancer and aids if it wasn't for the fed govt.

[Jimbozu]

Well, to give everyone some insight into how likly imortality and what it might look like...

We have already isolated the exact cause for aging in the human body. When DNA Telemorase (I think, I'm in a hurry and can't look these things up right now) "unzipps" your DNA a small part at each of the ends is broken off. Now the DNA molecule is big. FUCKING BIG. The ends don't have any useful information on them, but for some reason when you cut them off you start aging. It shouldn't be that difficult to fix this, so that you no longer age. Hypothetically, if we were cure aging, you could biologically age to about 25, go to a clinic, and have it turned off, living purpetually as a 25 year old.

There is a question as to how long you could possibly want to live, but if your eternally youthful, it isn't as big of a question. Whenever old people speak of welcoming death, its because their lives a miserable. All their friends a dieing off, they probably have some form of disease which is really painful, and they're weak and decrepit. If you were 90 and were still out clubbing, you wouldn't welcome death you wouldn't even be contemplating death...

This is also assuming that the species doesn't migrate to a post-physical reality of the mind before too long. At the rate that computer technology is advancing it wouldn't be a surprise that a post-physical "transcendence" happened before we started traveling to the stars and such. Kurtzweil says it's going to happen in the next 50 years, I would say in the next 500 but still rather soon.

Edit: I forgot to mention that theres really no reason that death should be permanent. Resuscitation techniques are already getting to the point they could be called miraculous, and the more we learn about the human consciousness, the more likely it will be that we can make a backup copy, in case something happens to the original.

[klizzle]

Originally Posted by amsterdamage

they aren't getting close to preventing aging. They never will.

We're biological organisms, we live, we age and we die. Aging and dying aren't unnatural things that we have to try to avoid, they're a natural part of our lives and they'll never be able to be removed from us.

I've read a lot of stories in the news regarding this so I have a good idea of where progress is. Granted, half of it is bogus but a lot of it is from reputable sources such as PhysOrg.com. Close is a relative term that I use here because we're learning so much about the process. I think you vastly underestimate the power of technology that we may have within the next 50-100 years. All you have to do to solve a problem (aging) is isolate the cause (someone above said DNA or something) and prevent it. Tell me how that isn't eventually possible when we can build computer chips a quarter the width of a human hair today (we should be able to modify DNA on an entire body scale efficiently at some point w/ microscopic robots etc)?

[Liquidtruth]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/...n1168852.shtml
http://www.mprize.org/

Originally Posted by amsterdamage

they aren't getting close to preventing aging. They never will.

May I ask how you are so certain of that?

Originally Posted by CosmicSerpent

I'm pretty confident that the world's average life expectancy will never rise above about 85 or so. People may eventually live to be maybe 150 or 200 at the most, but who would really want to? I know I wouldn't.

I would want to live much longer than that. Perhaps I could see the day when Creationist's say "Yes, there is ample evidence for evolution. Sorry about that everyone."

[Maitereya]

the only problem with living that long is overpopulation becoming a real problem, every inch of earth would be covered in cities. i suppose we could colonize planets and use technology for something useful.

[Liquidtruth]

Originally Posted by Maitereya

the only problem with living that long is overpopulation becoming a real problem, every inch of earth would be covered in cities. i suppose we could colonize planets and use technology for something useful.

Why? If living to be 10,000 years old was common, or immortality was reached, why assume we would still reproduce at the levels we do today? There is a lot of room on the planet as well, we can build up or down, we do not have to sprawl. Though, yes, I imagine we will have to colonize other planets or else we will die out.

[amsterdamage]

Also, we're assuming people will want to have children in their 20's/30's as they do today.

Maybe people will want to put it off a bit, like until they're 500 or so.
Just like today, we'll have to learn how to control our population regardless of our life expectancy.