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I found this accidentally while browsing through Wikipedia a couple days ago. At first I thought it would be just another weird organization full of wackos, but apparently they take it very seriously.
Of course, there's a few interesting things in their constitution:
Article I. -- Identity
Section 1 -- Name
The name of this nonprofit organization shall be “The Immortality Institute†or “Immortality Instituteâ€Â, abbreviated to “ImmInst†and heretofore referred to as such by this constituting instrument.
Section 2 -- Duration
The duration of ImmInst shall be perpetual.
Article II. -- Mission & Function
Section 1 -- Main Mission
The mission of ImmInst is to conquer the blight of involuntary death.
Section 2 -- Umbrella Organization
ImmInst shall function as an umbrella organization to help its members succeed in working towards the possibility of human physical immortality. This Institute shall serve as a platform for the exhibition, exchange, debate, and creation of concepts and methods toward that end as well as to physical immortality.
The conduct of any Advisor when posting in the Health Sciences for and between them and the Membership
Definition of Health Sciences encompasses any area that relates to issues of human health outside of research (including but not limited to: nutrition, exercise, pharmaceuticals and medical treatments)
When Advisors communicate with members they must present information in a non-authoritative manner i.e. “it may be of help†rather than “this will helpâ€Â
Whenever possible, any information provided by an Advisor to a member should be accompanied by one or more references from a peer reviewed medical journal.
Pheh. An ancient dream that won't be realized in any of these people's lifetimes, probably not ever. Even if it is, at this point it would be unacceptable because of population problems.
Besides, why would you want to live forever? I don't get it. An extension of life, sure... But man, 100 years seems like plenty to me.
How to be a Conservative:
You have to believe everything that has ever gone wrong in the history of your country was due to Liberals.
If there was a way to hook the human brain up to a machine it might be possible to extend ones life for quite a bit longer, but still not live forever.
I wouldn't want to live forever, but over 100 would be nice.
BoneyCork wrote:The dream of immortality only works if you assume that there will always be somewhere to actually live your life. When the world ends...then what?
Kill yourself.
Anyways if you could live forever why would you waste your time with things like eating and drinking when you could be doing stuff like chopping off your head and throwing it at people. It doesnt matter since you cant die.
BoneyCork wrote:The dream of immortality only works if you assume that there will always be somewhere to actually live your life. When the world ends...then what?
Kill yourself.
Anyways if you could live forever why would you waste your time with things like eating and drinking when you could be doing stuff like chopping off your head and throwing it at people. It doesnt matter since you cant die.
I would assume immortality would preclude serious harm coming to your body and would likely entail a very advanced immune system as well as eradication of all manner of mental and physical ailments that come with aging. Like you could be killed but only if you were seriously injured.
I seem to remember that someone did a statistical analysis based on accidental, violence-related, and other non-aging-related deaths and came up with a figure of approximately 1000 years as the average lifespan if people generally lived as they do today but didn't die of old age, congenital diseases, etc. . I don't know how much stock should be put in that particular number even given such dubious assumptions, but the point remains that you can't utterly conquer death. Still, I do support the idea of research in the direction of preventing or "curing" age-related diseases and general degeneration. To me it's a natural extension of medical research, and I don't see any particular reason not to do it.
Lartrak wrote:Even if it is, at this point it would be unacceptable because of population problems.
I don't think longer lifespan would necessarily exacerbate population problems. Even though the immediate effect is to reduce the death rate, I think this kind of advance would likely come hand-in-hand with cultural shifts that reduce the birth rate among the affected population as well.
"You know, I have a great, wonderful, really original method of teaching antitrust law, and it kept 80 percent of the students awake. They learned things. It was fabulous." -- Justice Stephen Breyer
Life as a head in a jar would hardly be worth living. I'm sure some sort of breakthroughs will come through in our lifetime, and the first person that will live to be 200 is more than likely alive today. Nanotechnology and several other things are really changing the way we live... and if stem cell research continues uninhibited, I'm sure organ replacement will become a routine operation as we can simply 'harvest' organs without needing a person.
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The earth is going to be uninhabitable in the next 300 or less years anyways, so why the hell would you want to live that long? So you can breathe out of a mask, wear 50,000 Sun Screen, and eat rats (if they are still around).
Code-Red wrote:The earth is going to be uninhabitable in the next 300 or less years anyways, so why the hell would you want to live that long? So you can breathe out of a mask, wear 50,000 Sun Screen, and eat rats (if they are still around).
Code-Red wrote:The earth is going to be uninhabitable in the next 300 or less years anyways, so why the hell would you want to live that long? So you can breathe out of a mask, wear 50,000 Sun Screen, and eat rats (if they are still around).
Fucking 60 years is enough for me.
Keep in mind that a few volcanoes erupting cause more detriment to the environment than that of all of the humans on the planet combined.
butters wrote:Keep in mind that a few volcanoes erupting cause more detriment to the environment than that of all of the humans on the planet combined.
Why do people keep saying this? I've never seen any evidence presented for it (and yes, I've looked).
"You know, I have a great, wonderful, really original method of teaching antitrust law, and it kept 80 percent of the students awake. They learned things. It was fabulous." -- Justice Stephen Breyer
Well, of course there is no really good evidence, as we STILL aren't sure exactly how we affect the planet. But the biggest volcanic explosions have had enormous impacts... Krakatoa is thought by many to have decreased the average temperature of the planet by 1 degree since its eruption, for example. I dunno if it is more than humans have done, but for a single event it is pretty spectacular.
However, we've done more than affect temperature... There's also the effects of killing off the planet's fisheries, leveling the forests, etc. Very difficult to quantify which is the "bigger" effect.
How to be a Conservative:
You have to believe everything that has ever gone wrong in the history of your country was due to Liberals.
I feel that some form of life will still continue despite whatever we do to the planet. While it may mean that we can't survive, there will still be life on this planet. The downfall of humanity in my opinion will either in the short term be a nuclear war, or more in the longterm our changing of the worlds ecosystem by us destroying species of animals along with changing the terrain to make our lives more comfortable (like dams for example). Regardless of how it happens humans are most likely going to die out and some new form of life will replace us as the dominate species of the planet.
Anyways, enough apolcalypse talk, more on topic is the fact that I don't want to live forever. While I was no means near death, I had plenty of time to think about it while I was having all my medical issues. I hit sort of a serenity right before I was knocked out for a surgery, that even if I die, whats really the big deal. Sure a few people will be sad for awhile, but in the end shit happens and life will go on. I certainly don't want to live an extremely long life. My preferance would be to accompolish something with my life before I die, but if I don't I really can't complain about it. Death will be nice in that I will be just able to not exist anymore. No more problems to worry about, just nothingness. I don't need to believe in an afterlife to make me feel happy, just the thought of death ending it all is quite comforting.
