Friday, July 22, 2011

Types of Singularity Immortality

Though there may be types of "ideal" immortality that you or I could come up with in our dreams, our minds, our thoughts, the types of potential immortality I wish to write about here and types that likely are possible given the present limits of science. So, even though I'm talking about Science Fiction I am also talking about potential scientific fact rather than only idealistic fantasy.

The first type of immortality that the most people present on earth think is possible scientifically is what I would call "A human personality digitally installed in a computer". To some degree we are already doing this just by voice recording, video recording, and people's writings, emails, texts, all over the world. This type of scientifically possible human immortality is already in progress and will only grow in complexity in the coming months, years, and likely centuries for all of us who write, email, text, or talk on the phone, video record ourselves, our thoughts etc. And in time a constant digital feed of all of our thoughts, dreams, desires, disappointments, hopes and dreams (in other words most everything that we are all about) might be possible or at least more possible with each new day, week, month, and year going forward. So, all we are about eventually will be able to be maintained as long as there isn't a power outage or EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) as in a nuclear blast. However, if all we are is stored on a DVD or Blue Ray DVD or a series of them or something like that it could be okay because it would be in a non-magnetic and non-electrical storage format and would survive an EMP but not necessarily an Earthquake or flood. In the case of a flood I'm talking about it being washed away to an unknown location. In the case of an Earthquake it would be irretrievable because of a building collapse. So, though it is possible to store literally "Everything about a human's personality and mind" electronically and digitally and on non-magnetic media, even this kind of immortality is potentially temporary. Because even if it survives floods, earthquakes, fires, etc. it is still vulnerable to digital electronic corruption as one often has found in hard drives over the years. And the same with non-magnetic media that become scratched.

Another type of human immortality being talked about is physical immortality through technical and medical means. One theory is that nanobots could be installed in people to keep their arteries and veins clear of plaque buildup from too much meat and fats in their diets. Another way I suppose is to become a vegetarian. When I had a heart virus in 1998 and 1999 one of the things that saved my own life was that I had been raised a lacto-ovo vegetarian(Dairy products, eggs and veggies) since birth until about 32 years of age when I decided to include some meat, fish, and poultry in my diet. But since I still would say I'm about 85% to 95% vegetarian when I had an angiogram I had the cleanest veins and arteries of any adult they had ever seen as doctors and nurses ever during my angiogram of my heart.

But even as a vegetarian there can be problems such as not getting enough protein and ones bones weakening, especially for women starting about their 50s. In my parents church when people died often their bones were very weak especially the women because of having been vegetarian for so many years and many broke hips and arms and backs the last few years of their lives. So, once again it is important to have some sort of balance in one's life if one actually wants to become immortal physically.

In addition to this "physical health" one must also cultivate mental health. To some degree this is an individual private process. Some people will believe in God and this will allow them to do things in their lives to become immortal but others will simply find their calling in life by becoming humanistic and benevolent to others in emotional, and charitable ways. In this way they will find enough meaning in their lives to live on in contentment and relative happiness. Either way, those that have the wish to become immortal here on earth almost always wish to be caretakers for others, whether those others are either human or animal or another species that walks, crawls, swims or flies. But almost always people's need to care for a significant other or others or just other creatures that they love and care for allows them to be interested in immortality even  if only to continue caring for others on into perpetuity.

Another addition to the previous physical human immortality is to have more than one body that one keeps in order to have the same experiences and memories in both. How this exactly would be accomplished is theoretically possible but in actuality how this would be done is still a work in progress even in my own mind.

dragonofcompassion - Memories Part 2 and 3

For example, I have written about the fact in "Memories" in regard to the Time Lord, General Ragna of 70th Century Earth. Note: if interested in reading more about this click above. For example, standard working procedure in his time is to "Time Replicate himself completely and to keep that replica available at all times to his King should anything happen to him on a Time Changing mission. In this way every memory and experience of both Ragnas would be intact up to the moment of when he left and didn't return in one of his bodies from a mission for any reason. This is another potential way for an irreplaceable person in a government, for example, to go on a mission somewhere while still knowing that everything about them up until the moment they left will be there for their government ongoing. In other words there is always a replacement person available who still knows about everything up until the moment he left. In fact, it might also be possible for everything to be known up until the very moment of death of one of the bodies if that was also found to be useful to the needs of the situation.

I saw a movie with Bruce Willis Surrogates

Surrogates (2009) - IMDb

in which Bruce Willis and his wife have artificial bodies so they can either be beautiful and young or indestructible because of Bruce Willis being a cop. I suppose this would be another potential way to be immortal by having all your powerful experience lives in a sort of vicarious way in which you would always be safe. However, for me personally, I would rather experience life myself as any barriers decrease the full import of any given situation.

So, there are many different kinds (many of which I haven't illustrated here) of immortals that could or should exist for people of Earth. However, many people say things like, "There is so much poverty and famine that it wouldn't be fair to use resources for immortality.

However, my point of view is much different than that. My point is, "What if the only humans who are able to survive at all have to become immortal to do it?"

What I'm saying by this is that Global Warming might just become so severe that no normal people at all will survive. We may need to have immortals just so they can terraform earth back to where normal humans can still live on it again!

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