Man vs Immortality

A day or so ago, I was having a useless argument with my friend, which later turned into the subject “immortality” . Well he’s basically a pessimistic asshole , and wants to live his so called “delusion” in the present only , while considering me , I am the totally opposite (a bigger optimistic asshole) . But as my friend says “It’s basically a delusion, till anything is proved.” He’s right on his part, but then it does not mean we stop trying (Then he doesn’t even say to stop trying also, he’s basically a retarded jerk).

Well you could say, we all are immortal, in one sense, as our existence is merely defined on a relative basis. I.e. If ‘you’ or ‘I’ were to exist or not to exist, it makes no difference to this universe and doesn’t have an effect on it in any way. (So hey there, don’t you think you are someone special ^_^.)

Some might find ‘immortality’ insane and sordid , but I want to make one thing clear, ‘basically’ all the research going on in the world regarding immortality and rejuvenation is not for us to live forever and play the role of god, but to increase the lifespan of human life. (Why are you going for cosmetic surgery girl ? ). We are mortals because, as time passes by “aging” occurs, i.e. the accumulation of damage to macromolecules, cells and organs. The cells have a finite lifespan based on the number of doublings the cell undergoes before, cellular senescence occurs. So basically we want to reverse that damage. If this is possible in the near future, and after a point we don’t “age”, it does not mean that you won’t die if I were to chop your brain down, but yea u might still survive, if I preserved your brain only and burnt the rest of your body.

Immortality can be divided into two ways – physical and biological. Physical immortality “is a state of immortality, that allows a person to avoid death and maintain conscious thought through a source other than organic life, say a computer.” Whereas biological immorality is the absence of aging. A cell or an organism which ceases to age at some point is biologically immortal.

Talking about physical immortality first, a person is considered dead according to the ‘information theoretic ‘criterion only if the information in the brain is not reversible by any means. That is the structures in the brain that encode memory and personality have been so disrupted that it is no longer possible in principle to restore them to an appropriate functional state. This is so because, memory; personality and identity are stored in cellular structures, principally inside the brain. It is widely accepted that brain activity is known to stop and later resume, under certain conditions.

Coming to biological immortality now, remember that life defined as biologically immortal is still susceptible to death (accidents, disease etc.) Biological immortality is basically achieved by preventing cells from reaching senescence. Biologically immortality is no dream or fantasy, as some notable species are already biologically immortal. Species such as Hydra , Turritopis Nutricula (a jellyfish) are biologically immortal.

Well you could so easily say , that as no remarkable results have been seen (some are there but) as yet , this all is bullshit and may turn out to be total waste in the future , but I think I have given you enough evidence that it might ‘not’ be a no horse race. The age old example that , that “did the people in the 19th (yea not the 15th or 16th) century , think that , the world will be connected like this through the internet , or we’ll be able to send our robots to mars and do research there ?” is valid here also . I am not in a position to comment whether the soul exists or not, but if the soul exists , it must be a universal concept , and should be applied to every “living” creature in the universe , so in the end it all cancels out like infinities in maths ^_^ . But I myself don’t find any difference between a wood frog, a human being, or a future android (they should or will possess the term known as “soul”, and what about a cloned baby ? ).