Death

[AmazonQueen]

Apparently there exists an immortal jellyfish that disagrees

I wonder what happens to the cycle of reincarnation if you're reborn as an immortal jellyfish.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Apparently there exists an immortal jellyfish that disagrees

The exception that proves the rule?

Like most other hydrozoans, T. dohrnii begin their life as tiny, free-swimming larvae known as planulae. As a planula settles down, it gives rise to a colony of polyps that are attached to the sea-floor. All the polyps and jellyfish arising from a single planula are genetically identical clones. The polyps form into an extensively branched form, which is not commonly seen in most jellyfish. Jellyfish, also known as medusae, then bud off these polyps and continue their life in a free-swimming form, eventually becoming sexually mature. When sexually mature they have been known to prey on other jellyfish species at a rapid pace. If a T. dohrnii jellyfish is exposed to environmental stress or physical assault, or is sick or old, it can revert to the polyp stage, forming a new polyp colony.[6] It does this through the cell development process of transdifferentiation, which alters the differentiated state of the cells and transforms them into new types of cells.

Theoretically, this process can go on indefinitely, effectively rendering the jellyfish biologically immortal,[3][7] although in practice individuals can still die. In nature, most Turritopsis are likely to succumb to predation or disease in the medusa stage, without reverting to the polyp form.[8]

The capability of biological immortality with no maximum lifespan makes T. dohrnii an important target of basic biological, aging and pharmaceutical research.[9]

This ability to reverse the biotic cycle (in response to adverse conditions) is unique in the animal kingdom, and allows the jellyfish to bypass death, rendering Turritopsis dohrnii potentially biologically immortal. The process has not been observed in their natural habitat, in part because the process is quite rapid, and because field observations at the right moment are unlikely.[3] Regardless, most individual medusae are likely to fall victim to the general hazards of life as mesoplankton, including being eaten by predators or succumbing to disease.

Or it is a strategy that helps it stay in the game, but doesn't allow for unbridled success. The question is: how old (in years?) are the oldest living specimens?

 

[warpus]

I wonder what happens to the cycle of reincarnation if you're reborn as an immortal jellyfish.

Reincarnation most likely isn't a thing, as it requires an existing infrastructure in the universe to maintain all the reincarnations happening. Which seems crazy to me.

There are actually many immortal animals, including at least one species of lobster - but they are inevitably killed by other factors, ensuring a pretty normal lifespan. In the case of the lobster, it eventually grows so large that it simply requires too much energy to molt and regrow its shell, due to the exponential increase in surface area over time, and starves. Another animal becomes too large/fat to hunt sufficiently and suffers the same fate.

Seems like obstacles humans could overcome, if we could duplicate this sort of immortality. I suppose the problem then becomes.. How to feed and provide for an ever growing human population.. in a world where nobody dies?

If immortality ever becomes a thing it will probably just mean replacing your organs when they need servicing, and possibly nanobots keeping your insides well oiled and maintained. But that would include them going into your brain and making sure you don't go senile either. So probably many decades if not centuries away. And at first likely only accessible to the rich.. and the whole thing breaks down if you stop servicing yourself. So you need a constant maintenance of your body, it seems. Might make more sense to just transfer your conscious into a robot body, but that seems even further away.

 

[civvver]

I'm not up to date but aren't heart disease and cancer collecting as many victims as ever?

Yeah because we solved all the other diseases, these are the only killers left.

 

[El_Machinae]

My opinion is that involuntary death is an enemy worth battling. It's the permanent destruction of something that should be invaluable. I think we under-invest due to a variety of instincts and heuristics. So, instead of battling involuntary death, we buy bigger houses so we can watch our bigger TVs for longer. And then people die that needn't have. But I'm outright crazy, with the eventual goal being functional immortality.

 

[MaryKB]

Accepting our own mortality is I think one of the most important things to do, and spending our lives trying to extend it is a huge mistake. Many villains in stories are obsessed with avoiding death (ie, Voldemort, whose name literally means "runs from death"), and it leads to great evil. Even in our societies now, we spend sooo much money trying to extend life even by just a short time. We're all going to die, it's going to happen, and I feel it's important to be at peace with that. I feel it's so much better to focus our energies on life rather than death, and improving peoples' lives than trying to avoid our own inevitable passing.

I view death as something peaceful, like going to sleep. I wouldn't want to stay awake all day every day. Rest, and returning home (wherever that is, even if it's just the Earth) feels extremely appealing to me.

You can't run from death, but you can greet it like an old friend.

 

[El_Machinae]

Accepting your own death is going to be a different thing from battling death. But your point is a good one, and I will try to rephrase the way I describe it. Death happens everywhere, and I insist that battling involuntary death is a noble effort.

I'm actively arranging my own life in order to prevent my own death, I won't deny. But I also look at my current basket of charities. IF I was as obsessed with preventing my own death as I could be, I'd either be targeting those donations towards savings or at least to self-benefiting charity efforts (SENS, Alzheimer's Association, etc.)

But I'm not. Now, I'm terrifically transhumanist, but my current focuses on charity are polio eradication and mental health research (well, and climate change). It's transhumanist if you squint. But in other words, I'm also trying to permanently end a type of unnecessary death and creating quality-of-life. If I arrange my efforts, things I do will benefit me. But I can also arrange my efforts to benefit others. And there's even win/win out there. We might never beat "death", but by golly we should be fighting "death from X" then "death from Y".

 

[Terxpahseyton]

The sentence "I will die" is only true because it assumes the existence of an "I". But technically, that doesn't really make sense. Whatever this stream of consciousness is which I relate to as me, it isn't an "I" nor even a human being. "I", "human being", "person x"... They all just describe manifestations or (subjective) aspects what is me. But by necessity, what is me must transcend me. Otherwise, it would have emerged out of nothingness, which would literally mean magic, and that makes less sense than anything even can make, like by definition. So whatever this is, I am, it can not die. Because it never was born, to begin with. It is as infinite and endless as time and energy itself.
HOWEVER - nothing in there means or even barely suggests any kind of trippy flowery afterlife life fantasies human fantasies have dreamed up over the years. That is just us still moving within human concepts when discussing stuff transcending human concepts. So I do not know what this actually means, to whatever I am. I just know that is must be true, by logical necessity, for all I can see.
So, already feeling soothed and consolidated?

 

[Birdjaguar]

Reincarnation most likely isn't a thing, as it requires an existing infrastructure in the universe to maintain all the reincarnations happening. Which seems crazy to me.

We all choose something that is comfortable for us. The other options all seem wildly crazy and wrong. All options are just guesses. In most cases our individual fundamental assumptions about existence will determine what kind afterlife we lean towards. Cultural bias can play a huge part in our thinking,

 

[Narz]

As for an afterlife, I think that there is at least something after death, whether it's your mind deconstructing your life in the five minutes it takes your brain to die after the body dies

Sorry to nitpick but technically that would not be after death.

Most of the people that I have cared for came to accept death as a form of oncoming peace. A few, when their deaths were very close, even saw dead relatives or Jesus or God, or Mohamed, or something of a religious nature. I'm sure that some of it can be chalked up to hallucinations at the time of death, but what if they aren't? A part of me likes to believe that someday I will be reunited with my loved ones. Who knows? Maybe God will let me fly amongst the stars?

A gruesome death process likely wouldn't be selected for by evolution. It would bum out the rest of the tribe to see their compatriots raging & moaning against the dying of the light. A peaceful death process gives strength to the living.

IMO spirituality is a very uplifting and life affirming delusion which is why it exists in all cultures. A perfect grasp of reality is not necessarily adaptive (case in point : depressives tend to be more realistic than their non-depressed counterparts and yet have worse life outcomes due to their mental state).

dear god I hope there's no afterlife. Every version I can imagine is hell: Christian heaven? Hell. Christian hell? obviously hell. Reincarnation? Hell. My mom's mystical idea of being a spirit bound by nothing, free to float around the universe, dive into and out of stars? Hell.

That reminded me of this vid (the Christian heaven doesn't appeal to me in the least either)

 

[Narz]

The sentence "I will die" is only true because it assumes the existence of an "I". But technically, that doesn't really make sense. Whatever this stream of consciousness is which I relate to as me, it isn't an "I" nor even a human being. "I", "human being", "person x"... They all just describe manifestations or (subjective) aspects what is me. But by necessity, what is me must transcend me. Otherwise, it would have emerged out of nothingness, which would literally mean magic, and that makes less sense than anything even can make, like by definition. So whatever this is, I am, it can not die. Because it never was born, to begin with. It is as infinite and endless as time and energy itself.
HOWEVER - nothing in there means or even barely suggests any kind of trippy flowery afterlife life fantasies human fantasies have dreamed up over the years. That is just us still moving within human concepts when discussing stuff transcending human concepts. So I do not know what this actually means, to whatever I am. I just know that is must be true, by logical necessity, for all I can see.
So, already feeling soothed and consolidated?

"I" kind of prefer "myself" in this current configuration rather than worm-food. I will resist death as long as possible, selfishly clinging onto to this structure of cells.

 

[Narz]

Yeah because we solved all the other diseases, these are the only killers left.

And yet most people still seem to be dropping off in their 70s and 80s just as those lucky enough to avoid infectious diseases back in the day did (the average age of death was of course much lower but the well-off and lucky still lived much longer, Benjamin Franklin made it to 84 for instance, maybe if he were born in the modern era he'd have made it to 87 or 90).

And old people still look all wrinkly. Call me vain & superficial but I dread looking all dried out like a prune, when people who are 70 start looking 40 I'll get excited.

 

[El_Machinae]

We could use your help. It's a solvable problem, it's just science

 

[Terxpahseyton]

"I" kind of prefer "myself" in this current configuration rather than worm-food. I will resist death as long as possible, selfishly clinging onto to this structure of cells.

Whatever gives you the kicks, man
But should you ever fall prey to a terminal illness, that kind of attitude can give you a real hard time. That the I or ego or whatever is an illusion, on the other hand, can help a lot in such instances. That is why they give LSD to cancer patients waiting to day in Switzerland.

 

[civvver]

Accepting our own mortality is I think one of the most important things to do, and spending our lives trying to extend it is a huge mistake. Many villains in stories are obsessed with avoiding death (ie, Voldemort, whose name literally means "runs from death"), and it leads to great evil. Even in our societies now, we spend sooo much money trying to extend life even by just a short time. We're all going to die, it's going to happen, and I feel it's important to be at peace with that. I feel it's so much better to focus our energies on life rather than death, and improving peoples' lives than trying to avoid our own inevitable passing.

I view death as something peaceful, like going to sleep. I wouldn't want to stay awake all day every day. Rest, and returning home (wherever that is, even if it's just the Earth) feels extremely appealing to me.

You can't run from death, but you can greet it like an old friend.

There's a health care allegory that goes if you asked a 45 year old person hey you aren't going to die for some 30-50 years but whenever that time is, if I can guarantee to extend your lifespan by 6 months for a mere hundred thousand bucks, who you pay up? And of course the 45 year old person always says no way, that's ridiculous 6 months added onto the end of my life is not worth that much money.

But fast forward to that same person on their deathbed, same question and they'll say yes take my 100k and then some!

Now on the one hand it kind of makes sense cus the person at 45 see use for the money while the person dying says I have no more use for the money if I die, might as well spend it all trying to live. But it's still kind of wasteful spending.

 

[AdamCrock]

I wonder what happens to the cycle of reincarnation if you're reborn as an immortal jellyfish.

Good thinking but there's a "but" Even immortal jellyfish isn't truly immortal because she/he can be eaten ? or killed, or destroyed in a freak underwater accident . Being immortal and indestructible is not good either because it will lead to witness the thermal death of the universe, where it would be impossible to do anything unless future aeons scientists find a loophole in thermodynamic laws

 

[El_Machinae]

There's a health care allegory that goes if you asked a 45 year old person hey you aren't going to die for some 30-50 years but whenever that time is, if I can guarantee to extend your lifespan by 6 months for a mere hundred thousand bucks, who you pay up? And of course the 45 year old person always says no way, that's ridiculous 6 months added onto the end of my life is not worth that much money.

But fast forward to that same person on their deathbed, same question and they'll say yes take my 100k and then some!

Now on the one hand it kind of makes sense cus the person at 45 see use for the money while the person dying says I have no more use for the money if I die, might as well spend it all trying to live. But it's still kind of wasteful spending.

On the other hand, if you ask a 75 year old if they're willing to spend $100,000 extending their life by 6 months, or if they would rather leave $100,000 more in their will, you'll get a different answer

 

[Birdjaguar]

There's a health care allegory that goes if you asked a 45 year old person hey you aren't going to die for some 30-50 years but whenever that time is, if I can guarantee to extend your lifespan by 6 months for a mere hundred thousand bucks, who you pay up? And of course the 45 year old person always says no way, that's ridiculous 6 months added onto the end of my life is not worth that much money.

But fast forward to that same person on their deathbed, same question and they'll say yes take my 100k and then some!

Now on the one hand it kind of makes sense cus the person at 45 see use for the money while the person dying says I have no more use for the money if I die, might as well spend it all trying to live. But it's still kind of wasteful spending.

I'm 72 and disagree. Keep me comfortable and let me go.

 

[civvver]

I'm 72 and disagree. Keep me comfortable and let me go.

In many cases it's the children and doctors who push for treatment.

 

[Birdjaguar]

In many cases it's the children and doctors who push for treatment.

That is why living wills are so important. If I can choose, it is my choice and not theirs.