io9 
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San Francisco, 7:39 AM
Sun Dec 20
11 posts in the last 24 hours
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11/29/09
11/29/09
Otherwise, expect several decades of enhanced bloodbath.
-Kle.
11/28/09
Fact: The cost of elderly care is the single largest consumer of health care dollars in the world.
Fact: The number of elderly is growing faster than the number of new babies.
Fact: Due to retirement and loss of productivity due to age, the elderly are not only a drain on our economic resources, our health care system and our entire society, they are all of these things because they have no other choice.
The elderly do not CHOOSE to be elderly. They became that way because of the gradual failure of their bodies self repair and maintenance systems.
Most of the problems of old age, INCLUDING RIGID THINKING, are due to the results of the bodies gradual deterioration. Cells lose their ability to eliminate wastes as effectively, DNA transcription errors occur, the brain loses it's ability to process new ideas and retain new information. ALL of this is due to biochemical changes in the body.
But what if those changes could be undone? What if we could not only maintain the health of our youth, but actually enable our elderly to become young again?
The research done so far indicates that this is not only possible, but achievable in the not very far future.
Do you want your Grandparents to die?
How about your parents?
How about you? Do you want to grow old, lose your ability to work, to play, to enjoy life?
Indefinate life extension is not a fantasy, not a sci-fi dream. It is a real, and achievable goal. It is being created right now. The more funding it gets, the sooner it will become a daily fact of life.
For more information check out the Sens Foundation.
[www.sens.org]
or come to imminst.org, where you will find a enormous amount of information and links.
Forever young has been mans dream for all of history.
It's not a dream anymore.
11/28/09
11/28/09
11/29/09
Have you actually read into the current research that is underway, or studied any of the material? Have you actually read through the work of SENS research?
Until you have, and seen for yourself what is possible, then you really have no reason to claim I am spouting hyperbole. I stated that research is underway, and that based on that research it looks to be an achievable goal. That takes it out of the realm of dreams and makes it a cold hard reality. The research is being done, and progress is being made. The time frame may be twenty years, it might be thirty or forty, but from the perspective of today, it appears to be something that can be done.
None of that is hyperbole at all, simply telling the truth.
Now if I had claimed that you could be immortal today, or next year, or if I had, say, touted any one of those various "life extending" supplements (rolls eyes) then you might have had a case.
As for your other reply... You want your parents to die so you can inherit their house???? I can only assume you are joking, because if you aren't you are one disturbed individual.
11/29/09
And when you jump the gun and claim otherwise, you sound neither scientific nor serious. On the same note, if I heard someone say, "Have you seen how much research has been done on curing cancer? Curing cancer isn't a dream anymore," I'd submit that it sure seemed like one to all the people with terminal cancer.
11/29/09
11/29/09
11/29/09
You could perhaps instead question whether recent ideas for extending the limits of human longevity have borne fruit, though naturally it will take a while to demonstrate one way or the other what effects these techniques produce on human lifespans.
11/29/09
I'm not saying anything especially complicated here -- just that no matter how close something is to happening, it's still not a reality until it happens. I don't see why that should be controversial.
11/29/09
This debate around "reality" vs "dream" or "possibility", though, does not strike at the core issue. Do you consider very-long or even indefinite life-extension a realistic possibility, or "merely" a dream with little realistic chance of occurring?
Clearly, PistachioWildebeest credits life-extension research with a high probability of success over the coming decades, while you seem to remain highly skeptical. Do you wish to articulate why your confidence-level stands so, or does the prospect sound too "far-fetched" to be worthy contemplating to you?
It's also worth discussing, as you have mentioned, what the consequences or desirability of life-extension may be, though that does not directly impact its feasibility.
11/29/09
But my skepticism is not, in fact, the core issue -- at least not in this particular thread, and I don't think I've commented elsewhere on this post. I haven't made any claims about the veracity of the life-extension research in question, or about the probability of the researchers' success.
The core issue -- the only point I addressed in my original reply -- is the use of language. The statement "It's not a dream anymore" as it applies to human immortality is patently false.
Now, that said, I don't think Valkyrie Ice was "lying" in the sense we generally mean when we use that word. I think he or she was exaggerating -- saying, in effect, "We are so close to making people immortal that it is no longer a fantasy." Or in other words, using the literary technique known as hyperbole.
And while I have no problem with hyperbole or any other literary technique per se, my opinion is that if someone is trying to convince a neutral or skeptical audience about the validity of controversial scientific research, they should take pains to be as accurate and scientific with their language as possible. If Valkyrie Ice had said, "In x amount of time, it may not be a dream anymore," I'd have had no bone to pick. At that point, if I wanted to argue, it would have to be over either the time frame cited or the possibility of immortality in and of itself; and then my argument would have hinged on the evidence offered by the research.
Instead, he or she drifted over into language that befits an overly enthusiastic ad copywriter at best or a snake-oil salesperson at worst, to no benefit I can see. And since my guess is that the Immortality Institute and its ilk must face a fair number of accusations that they are exactly the latter, it would probably behoove them to present themselves in such a way that makes it clear they aren't.
Does that make sense? I don't have a dog in the immortality fight. I haven't read the research, I'm sure I'm not qualified to comment on a lot of it, and I don't plan to study it anyway, because (1) I don't have much desire to live forever and (2) if it becomes possible, I'm sure I'll hear about it. I do have an interest in how people use language, and especially how they use it to argue.
11/29/09
I felt that describing life-extension as an abstract "dream" rather than a concrete "possibility" made it sound more like a far-fetched scenario than a likely future, hence "skepticism", but I see your point.
It's certainly a good point that advocates may want to keep a degree of calm in their arguments, even or especially when describing a very compelling vision.
I am personally persuaded by the argument for life-extension, both technologically and ethically, though I do not flatter myself an expert in the field, yet.
Your point about language in argument is a good one.
11/29/09
I agree wholeheartedly with Moff's observations about your over-the-top register here (which doesn't mix well with your grammatical errors, as I tell my first-year writing students), but I'm even more hesitant about your claims because of your retreat to impossible-to-deny appeals ("Do you want your parents to die?" asked Sally Struthers, pleading, with tears in her eyes).
Sorry, but people die, and--as it now stands--that's still part of life. Death is neither external to life, nor a negative side effect of it. I can acknowledge that, and accept it--even when a loved one's death makes me personally unhappy as a result--without having a death-wish for my parents or anyone else's. Making the rhetorical move that people who disagree with your ethical stance want their parents to die is both a tad childish and, yes indeed, hyperbolic.
You can't deflate a "fluff piece" with sensationalist rhetoric, my friend.
11/28/09
11/28/09
Think about old social ideals generally die with the generations that hold them. If they live forever then they will generally be in the positions of power to keep those ideals alive.
Many of the social changes for the better come from the young, who eventually change thing by getting into power, this would be made more difficult if their parents and grandparents are the ones holding the power.
Imagine if a bunch of dictatorial governments had access to this technology, generations could be oppressed by a few and considering the drop in birth rates i assume would also be coupled with the changes, revolution from the youth would be made unlikely.
11/28/09
11/28/09
my hovercraft is full of eels!
11/29/09
I will not buy this immortality; it is scratched!
11/28/09
I mean, it's nice to live longer, but if it creates a society like that, then I don't know if it'd be worth it.
But I guess that's what a lot of science fiction does?
11/28/09
Also, bah -- you kids get off my life extension.
11/28/09
11/28/09
Indefinite life-extension is even more about damage repair as it is damage prevention. (because there are obviously limits to the repair your body can carry out unassisted) What we currently think of as an 'old' body is accumulated unrepaired damage of various kinds. If you buy an old dilapidated house with he intention of making it livable, you don't just prevent further damage, you fix it up before anyone moves in...then continue to prevent and repair further wear and tear from then on...
11/28/09
OR CAN YOU!?
11/28/09
[www.experiencefestival.com]
And if you're willing to invoke advanced nanotechnology (which the above does not require), the idea of cell repair nanomachines has been around for a while:
[wfmh.org.pl]
[www.alcor.org]
11/28/09
Think about it: where do all of the revolutionary ideas come from? From old fart scientists? Nope. Those guys did their best work before they hit 25, and they wind up spending the rest of their lives defending their ideas.
Think some more about it: why has there been a growing consensus about Global Warmin[io9.com] over the past 15 years? Could it possibly have anything to do with the fact that most of the climate scientists who disagreed with the findings died?
I hope science can give us all a good quality of life. If my brain and my body can hang together, more or less intact, until I draw my final breath, great!
But living more or less forever? Bad idea folks. Very Bad Idea.
11/28/09
11/28/09
Well if people could control ones private parts and not hump like rabbits, we wouldn't have to worry about starving children. Stop having 8 or 10 children just for the welfare and food stamps. Get off your ass, get a job and feed your own children.
11/28/09
11/28/09
11/28/09
Should people have fewer children? Yes.
Does this have anything to do with food stamps and people not having jobs? No.
What a weird non sequitur. What sort of person even has that in their arsenal of things to be annoyed by anymore?
Are time warping Republicans from the eighties infecting the future with their retro brand of stupid here or something? Food stamps? Get a job and stop having kids? It's almost quaint it's so outmoded.
11/28/09
And, unlike other diseases and conditions, aging is guaranteed to get everyone eventually, and it's especially messy toward the end...
We're a civilization that can walk and chew gum at the same time. Otherwise, we have to decide which of the other things that can kill us is more important than still others?
For example, is Cancer more important than Alzheimer's or heart disease or diabetes? (Oops, those are all age-related too, aren't they?)
11/28/09
11/28/09
Yes when i said "Stop having 8 or 10 children just for the welfare and foodstamps. Get off your ass, get a job and feed your own children"
I was mainly referring to 50% of the people in the usa today. Yeah I'm sure it isnt 50% but that sounded cool.
So why don't you get back on your high horse and go help build houses.
11/28/09
11/28/09
[www.imdb.com]
11/28/09
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11/29/09