Hello again, FutureFans! It is I, TomorrowLad! This week we are going to delve into the darkness of a topic that fascinates many, adn cannot be ignored by those with an avid interest in the future: Death.
Can humanity conquer death? At least forestall it for decades, centuries, millennia? Should we? These questions may arrive far sooner than we expect, as technology evolves faster and faster.
It’s almost dizzying.
The World Future Society is starting to ask these questions already, although the technology to forestall death is still somewhere beyond the horizon, as far as many people are concerned. Thomas Frey discusses the question at some length in his blog essay, When Death Becomes Optional.
So what exactly constitutes death? If we can somehow preserve our mind digitally by uploading it onto the Internet, are we still alive? If we upload our essence into a machine, such as a sophisticated cyborg, are we still alive?
–Excerpt, When Death Becomes Optional
Death has always been surrounded by arguments moral, ethical and philosophical. In the past, however, they tended to gravitate around the subject from the point of view of ending another life, and when it was and was not acceptable (or even necessary).
Which ethical, moral and philosophical issues do you foresee arising should death indeed become optional? Would you partake of this transient immortality? If so, what routes would you be willing to go down? Cyborg? Mental upload? Replacement bodies?
Of course, this all assumes that Death, as a personified concept doesn’t exist and have some very pointed words to say on the subject. Here he is expounding on the nature of light, the Sun and humanity…
