Hi guys,
Hope everyone’s day is going by and hope you all got good chest for the week.
Just a simple & hopefully a fun rhetorical question.
What’s your concept of immortality? Is it a flaw or a blessing?
I personally feel immortality in most senses is far a worse fate than death as you may progress throughout history and much yet you’ll find it hard to be attached with anyone you love because you out lived them. I also think you become stagnant from learning as we’re not certain what are the limits of our capacity to learn, especially when change is introduced.
On the other hand some may see it as an avenue to progress and moving forward while also terrified at the concept of death.
Just had this cool convo with someone over guild chat and hope to bring some light into it despite the forums being flooded with elf topics and other stuff,
Well, fire away!
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For me, the fact that I’m going to die is what really motivates me to fully participate in life.
If I knew I would live forever, I’d probably spend an eternity eating potato chips on the couch.
I’d also argue that a lot of people share the same philosophy, and some of humanity’s greatest achievements, specifically in the arts, all come as a result of humans either trying to find some sort of immortality through fame, or simply trying their best to achieve something with the time that they have.
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That’s a great response!
It all goes to our ego without repercussion
I suppose it depends on your view of the afterlife. If there is nothing after death then immortality would be better.
But even if you believe in an afterlife you could be wrong so immortality is better?
Immortality = Limitless potential
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Perhaps…
Likely given with immortality maybe one day you might know the answer regarding the after life, even then would you still remain immortal and live on?
Immortality is when there is nothing that can end your existence.
This is of course impossible, because the longer you exist the more time you have to encounter things that can make you stop existing.
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Mortality gives us a reason to live, a reason to be productive. If we could live forever… why do anything at all?
If you truly could live forever, then you will outlive everyone, watching anyone you have ever known or will ever know pass you by, die, and eventually over the span of billions of years, you will witness the heat death of the universe, and you will float in empty, black spacetime, never able to breathe ever again – forever.
Immortality is a curse.
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Sounds like something a pathetic mortal would say to make himself feel better about being so killable.
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It has it’s ups and downs for sure.
A big downside is the fact that you will eventually see the death of everyone you meet and care about while you live on. Perhaps, after a century or a millennia, giving up on forming meaningful relationships all together. Living an everlasting solitary life. After millions of years, humans will probably have evolved into something else that you wouldnt be able to relate with anyways.
But the upside will be that you will get to see humanity potentially progress. And perhaps even journey the stars should FTL travel be possible. You will have all the time in the universe to experience things you wouldn’t ever be able to with a mortal existence of (80 years average).
The downside of course, being that you will see the eventual limitation of technology and the stagnation of everything. Then before long, you still see the universe as you know it start to decay. The last red dwarf star will fizzle out (assuming Heat Death theory is accurate) and plunge the universe into complete darkness with nothing but black holes, black dwarves, and decaying protons around you with cold lifeless planets.
Edit: Actually immortality doesnt seem like a very good thing. Though living for a thousand years would be cool lol.
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That actually terrifies me so much,
Its just a nightmare beyond comprehension,
Thanks for your input!
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The first thing to do is define what is meant by immortality. Often it is intended to mean unaging, that is, death can occur by means other than old age. That’s how it seems to be in WoW.
Then you could also add in invulnerability, that is nothing can kill you. This could be a problem if you are not also unaging.
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Forgot to add that distinction. If FTL travel is possible you get to planet hop around the universe for awhile until you reach the last livable planet. But if it’s not, you’ll get to experience our own star turning into a red giant and getting burned up. So you’ll die eventually.
But if you’re invincible as well, then i imagine it would be an agonizing eternity.
If I may quote something. For context this is coming from an alien creature that are ageless but not fully immortal.
“You’ve got to wonder.”
“What’s that then?”
“Kivouachians don’t perish with time. Billions of years we’ve been about. And lifes not worth much once all the rest is gone. You get bored of the wind and the birds. The sound of laughter and the smell of pine. Life is like a piece of paper, and the writing is our lives. Our stories. When you only have 90 years the ink turns to gold. So valuable all the words. The days you live. Because soon the story will end. But what if you have a never ending page? A bottomless ink well. The more you write, the less it all means. That’s our curse. We live so long that it’s not even life anymore…we’re not living forever. We’re dying forever…”
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That’s quite the deep touch in which we can only imagine it then,
Even with being long lived and ageless, it would seem a life without purpose. You’ll be beg and welcome death at that point,
So far it seems that we all have our own similar views regarding it as a curse than a blessing
In my Faith we see death as merely part of an eternal cycle, linked towards the progress of obtaining a divine soul. Each death leads to a time of respite where we can review our life choices, see opposing threads of fate, and ultimately prepare for our next life in the cycle.
Such immortality does not excuse one of poor choices, nor allow us to rest upon our laurels. We must strive to be the best we can within the circumstances of each life, as negative choices will be revisited upon us in the next life so that we may learn and appreciate those failings and hardships.
We are all immortal, in our own fashion. The energy of our soul is eternal, even though physical existence may fade entirely in time. As such it is my duty to seek rapture and bliss within each lifetime, to seek out new experiences and points of view.
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Its hard to define it in the deepest concept considering the opposite of mortality,
I can only assume that immortals are immune to any disease, perhaps aging and remaining in tact whichever age might be while it also begs the question, how vast is your learning capabilities? how much more can you learn?
I find it very intriguing and yet something that I don’t think we’ll be able to grasp it as not everyone is fit to know-it-all despite how intellectual you may be but intellect also dwells in so many areas and fields and not just on academia or otherwise.
Now with invulnerability, well, thats something else, I think its far from being immortal but beyond it
that depends… if im immortal and cant die no matter what, if i dont feel any pain then yeah i think its a blessing, but if you can feel pain then no, its a curse.
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wouldn’t that also remove the stimuli of physically feeling of all sorts if pain isn’t felt?
The feeling of touch and being touched as also the wind etc.,
maybe not… immortality can be associated by some form of regeneration, but that does not desativate your nervous system.
Maybe if you are like indestructible, so nothing cant actuallly damage you that would make sense.
It’s my belief that ours is a cursed species. A big brained species with generational amnesia. Are we really progressing or are we on a cyclic pattern that extends so far out that we can’t tell one way or another?
I don’t generally give it much thought beyond that. No point in dwelling on the negative but to answer your question I think an immortal person would know the answer.