Talk:Immortality/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

WikiProject Time assessment rating comment

Needs a lot of improvements, but essentially a B.

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—Yamara ✉ 15:10, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Who?

Under "Mind-to-computer uploading", it says "However, some argue that it is impossible to truly move one's consciousness from one body to another; it could be duplicated, but the original would still exist, creating two independent consciousnesses.". Who are those "some" in this case? It doesn't have to be very long. Just some explanation. NPOV of course! Ran4 00:31, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Talk Archive

I archived this talk page, as it was getting very lengthy. It was extremely disorganized, making it an ineffective means of communication. After reading through the majority of it, I found that most of the page was discussion on POV issues. Much of this page is also original research, making this article vastly unverifiable. --Balrog30 09:44, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Proposed Split

I would like to propose that this article be split into smaller articles. It is now 15 printed pages, making it far too lengthy to hold a reader's attention, and also making it very difficult to edit. Some of the topics discussed here already have articles of their own, so some of the work may just be locating these related pages and getting them up to speed. I'd like to propose that Immortality in Fiction be an article on it's own, as it is a common theme in many works of fiction and may be discussed in a more literary sense, rather than a philosophical or scientific sense as the majority of the article is in it's present state. I'm prepared to do some of the work, but I'm not an expert, so I'll need to do research to help weed out what belongs on separate pages, and what doesn't belong at all. Any help would be appreciated. Please used sub-categories to talk about the split, to keep the fresh talk page organized.--Balrog30 09:44, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

this page is very disorganized.Starovoytov 15:54, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Fiction section style

I have just seen Tuck Everlasting added to the fiction section. It was already mentioned once in this article and surely that is enough. I would just delete the new entry, but it was put under the Negative Effects subsection while the current reference to Tuck Everlasting is under Other. I am not sure where Tuck Everlasting best belongs.

Another issue is that I think these examples should serve to illustrate something rather than merely being a list of works of fiction involving immortality. Tuck Everlasting does explore the negative side of immortality, but the new paragraph about it does not mention that. Doesn't it make sense that every work mentioned in the Negative Effects section should be explicitly related to how immortality can have negative effects?

I think a work needs more than to merely be mentioned; it needs an explanation of why it is a notable example of immortality showing some aspect or mechanism of immortality that is not already illustrated. For example, I don't think we have anything about immortality achieved by transfering the mind of an old person to the body of an unwilling young victim, such as in Being John Malkovich and many other works.

So Being John Malkovich should be added, but not in a paragraph about Being John Malkovich; the point is not the movie. The point is the nature of the immortality of which Being John Malkovich is an example. So we do not add Tuck Everlasting just because Tuck Everlasting is a book about immortality; we find something to say about immortality that Tuck Everlasting nicely illustrates. In this way we make this article more than a mere list. — Lilwik 03:38, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. This is why I suggested above that the Fiction section of the article could be split off into it's own article. This article is already far too long, and Immortality in Fiction is a complex topic that could be covered in depth. In fact, I'm fairly confident that it is a topic with enough meat and potatoes to write and entire book about the theme of Immortality in Literature; though a Wikipedia article will suffice. I think efforts would be better spent moving the entire Fiction section to a new article, rather than cleaning up what is in this one.--Balrog30 22:39, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

As an afterthought, I've gone through and combined the two references in the Negative Effects section. The new one was in the right place, and the old one had more detail as to why it would belong there.--Balrog30 22:46, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

Nothing will be done People have been talking about spinning off the fiction section for a long time, look at the archived talk page. When oh when will somebody actually do it?

This article is unreadable. Slash and burn all the crap...but the crap will just come back. So do what everyone does and don't bother improving anything.

Surely it is far from unreadable. I think it was greatly improved by breaking the fiction section up into modestly appropriate subsections. I wouldn't mind seeing the "other" section get deleted; I expect it would improve the article overall, but I'm not the sort to go wildly deleting large chunks of articles. Other than "other", I think it is a fine article. -- Lilwik 03:36, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

When cruft piles up to the level of 30 kilobytes, it can leave its host to seek its fortune on its own: Immortality in fiction. You're welcome. —Yamara ✉ 15:10, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Time

time is only the space that exists in between possibilities, it has no finite value. we exist to realize infinite possibilities so in this sense of time we are eternal beings. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chabit (talk • contribs) 02:15, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

There should be a distinction made between biological immortality and true immortality

If you just switch bodies, sure, you're immortal in a sense. But if you're shot or the sun explodes, you’re screwed. True immortality (able to see the end of the universe and beyond) is the only real type of immortality.

-G —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.117.158.83 (talk) 01:37, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Cousteau's opinions in the beginning seem to be unscientific nonsense

Looks more like 'old man philosophy' than real science.

I read this remark as equating unscientific=nonsense. Science is only a tool, and a blunt tool at that. It may or may not bring insight. Immortality is such a rich well of civilized discourse and intellectual development (with universal repercussions for every living individual) that Cousteau's thoughts are just as valid as anyone else's and perhaps more valid than most. Many people find his thinking interesting. I also want to take this opportunity to point out that someone got REALLY carried away with the "fact" macro in the beginning of this article, sometimes requesting a citation for a sentence that essentially is a citation and sometimes requesting a citation for things that are so self-evident as to be a joke if seen otherwise (i.e. do religion and philosophy dwell on mortality?). Bob (talk) 22:32, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

That might have me getting "carried away", but if you've seen what it takes to bring an article to GA—let alone FA—status, even the most "obvious" statement needs to be cited. Besides, on a subject like this, someone always wants to argue, and citations are the only acceptable way to settle. Also, I invite everyone to look at a version of this article before I worked on it (what I excised can be found here: immortality in fiction —it's still growing). If I hit every other sentence with a cite request, it's only because I want this article to be taken seriously, and not dumping ground for a list of the latest unkillable bosses in World of Warcraft. Plus, I have been looking up cites while on my current, supposed, wikibreak. —Yamara ✉ 16:11, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Removed

I've removed the following revision by 87.3.151.16 as of 19:49, 2 April 2008; no cites, and not quite clear enough how it differs from the preceding grouping of religious dogmas:

• Existential sciences like anthroposophy affirm throughout their studies that a so called oneself, namely a principle and center of human individuality, survives to the death of the physical body, proceeding to an afterlife period then reincarnating again following the karma cycle. nevertheless the humankind shares a superindividual oneself that connects together all the single individualities and that is supposed to be everlasting

Error

"In religious contexts, immortality is often stated to be among the promises by God (or other deities) to human beings who show goodness or else follow divine law."

This isn't actually held by Christians. Christians believe people are necessarily immortal (except for the few oddball annihilationists or other insignificant sects). The result of goodness is that this immortality is spent in Heaven instead of Hell. Christians hold that resurrection is guaranteed for all human beings. -~

Agree

- personally, I agree with this interpretation. To have the total faith allows to become as immortal Jesus in this world and it is necessary to ask to God to obtain it for all the human beings. Olivier Goetz ( ol.goetz@laposte.net ) in 28.10.2010

Again, not your personal soapbox. --~

The immortal characters because of their faith, in the Bible

The patriarch Hénoch and the prophet Élie rose to the sky without dying. Everything lets think that came true for them the word of Jesus Christ: " whoever lives and believes in me will never die " (gospel of Jean 11, 26). Their faith in God was completed. The story of these two characters leaves dreamer: could an unwavering faith in God make immortal? It is what suggests a detailed reading of gospel, like the word of Jesus which we have just quoted. Indeed, it is necessary to meditate the radicality of the word of Jesus Christ: " the follower is not over its teacher, but every well formed follower will be as its teacher " (gospel of Luc 6, 40). This word is clear: the follower who applies the teaching of Jesus Christ can also become immortal as him in this world. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.64.0.100 (talk) 16:20, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Immortality as a goal

I have been developing a theme to unify the article under the concept that Immortality is goal.

Like any goal, it is not shared by all, and being an uncertainty, is not approached the same way by different interested parties. And just as I have no interest in, for example, playing basketball, at the moment, it does not mean that shooting the hoops does not remain a goal to those who are. My edits to the Buddhism section reflect this: an incarnate immortality is not a goal, and indeed even the seeking of a goal would be too egoistic to achieve nirvana. But that does not mean it is not sought, whether through faith or by technology (or both).

I am confident this insight is not original research, and is mainly presented as an organizational tool for the article. --Yamara ✉ 17:14, 4 June 2008 (UTC) GEARS OF WAR — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.99.79.168 (talk) 17:09, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Quote from Cousteau is not science, just his opinion

If he thinks evolution is mandatory, that's his opinion. The cockroaches and ants might not agree with him. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.193.144.79 (talk) 09:41, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

It is still an accurate statement in the light of biological immortality being no guard against trauma. As for evolution, he says nothing about it being mandatory, but about its being fundamental to survival, which is certainly on-topic for evolution (survival of the fittest). He only says that death is mandatory, which is on-topic for this article. Cheers, Yamara ✉ 17:17, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Removed text from Causes of death—aging

Note on this section: This of course is assuming that the first reason for aging, cell loss without replacement, isn't actually the only true reason the rest occur. When one looks at any of the other "reasons" for aging, one can see that with the same level of cell reproduction as a 20 year old, a person that were 40, 60, or 80 would have a siginificantly higher liklihood of survival, and therefore less pronounced aging. It's entirely possible that if we were to solve the cell reproduction issue, that all of the rest would fall in line. We are also talking about normal, healthy 20 year olds, and comparing them to normal, healthy 40, 60, and 80 year olds. Confusing aging with pathology or disease would be an easily made mistake. Our bodies are designed to repair themselves. Given the material of a never ending cell supply, it could easily be conjectured that we would become essentially immortal. See below. Biological Immortality

This needed citations (WP:V) to remain, and the the first-person pronouns were not in keeping with the WP:MOS. -Yamara ✉ 12:56, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't have the source handy but some theorists see reduction in cell division as merely an effect and not a cause of the primary senescence mechanisms as evidenced by modest differences in aging rates seen in mitotic tissues such as fibroblasts vs non mitotic tissues such as neurons. Lack of mitosis doesn't appear to accelerate senescence and unimpeded mitosis doesn't appear to offer any protective effect. I think wound healing was one of the exceptions they mentioned where reduced mitotic potential would be significant.Zebulin (talk) 06:51, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

The cause of reduced cell division is the cell's telomere running out. --Andreasvc (talk) 23:08, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

citation needed

I am seeing a ton of these citation needed tags every where. Could someone ether take out the tags are put in the citations? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.108.154.225 (talk) 02:24, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Putting citations in would be great. Just taking tags out leaves us with either 1) A bunch of unverified assertions or 2) A much more piecemeal article, since the unverified statements could simply be removed. This article has come a long way since it was cobbled together with transhumanist imaginings, a fiction section that took up half of it, and work by an editor that wanted everyone to know what every religion thought about Hell. Much of this is still in the article: the cite tags I put in are either by statements that I believe can be cited, or such strong assertions that I feel need to be backed up.

Immortality is an ancient obsession with mankind, but it's still impossible to achieve for certain: thus, statements confusing fact and fiction have to be flagged. I have mentioned the numerous cite tags before, in this archived talk page-- and I have replaced a couple since then myself. I'm going on a "wikibreak" for awhile, but anyone who has citations to add or improve should certainly do so. Cheers, Yamara ✉ 03:37, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Myth section

Found this old text hidden on the page, and decided to move it here:

THIS OLD STUFF MIGHT GO IN A MYTH SECTION: The depiction in literature of Gilgamesh was one such as this and an entire cycle, or cycles of Arthurian legend exist in the British Isles, including the Knights of the Round Table going in search for the Holy grail; supposedly, the chalice from which Jesus and his disciples drank at the Last Supper. It may also be taken to mean being invincible or unable to be killed.

--Yamara ✉ 18:17, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Dualism

I removed a statement that immortality has its foundation in dualism. It wasn't referenced and wasn't true. The Christian belief in immortality is not based in dualism, for example. DJ Clayworth (talk) 17:18, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Disposable soma theory

What does the "disposable soma theory" have to do with evolution? --Ernie 76 (talk) 00:29, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Unsuitable heading "Prospects for human physical immortality"

Imo a better wording would be "Prospects for human immortality" as a subsection concerns mind uploading which is no longer about keeping the original physical body at all. --Ernie 76 (talk) 00:43, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Consequences

Very much of the page seems centered around achieving immortality, but I would like to see more about possible consequences of achieving immortality, such as extreme population growth or insanity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.67.6.36 (talk) 07:59, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree, and I am opening up an item here on dilemmas involving immortality.Julzes (talk) 06:48, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Aubrey de Grey on immortality

I would like to point out that Aubrey de Grey believes that indefinite youth, not immortality, is achievable within a couple of decades: "despite my best efforts, the media predictably describe my work as an attempt to engineer “immortality.” Let me, therefore, be quite clear: That description is erroneous. Immortality is not what I’m engineering. Aging is one cause of death—a very common one, to be sure, killing roughly twice as many people worldwide as all other causes of death combined, but still just one cause."[1] (p6–10) I will correct this mistake in the article. --Green06 (talk) 22:50, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Dilemmas

The hypotheticals on the feasibility of immortality for the individual should, in my opinion, be joined to features of ourselves and our environment that have to be weighed against the achievement of immortality. Here is a list of questions: 1) Would we choose it over having children? 2) Would we constantly be saddled with questions of who should die? 3) Would we be able to move beyond our own planet at a satisfactory rate? 4) Would the sense of time change in a mentally hazardous way? 5) Would we, in fact, be violating some God's law and not know it? At any rate, I myself do not feel comfortable adding such a collection of material, but perhaps some more experienced wikipedian would.Julzes (talk) 07:02, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Symbols

This section is entirely unsourced and confusing. For instance, "the ten kanji" is mentioned, but it's unclear whether this refers to the kanji for the number 10 or a kanji pronounced "ten" (such as 天, heaven). Exploding Boy (talk) 06:55, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Bacteria

Why only bacteria included? Are not the eukariotic protists immortal? For example, amoeba? --Dojarca (talk) 12:45, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Real Immortal

can this be mentioned? www. nowpublic. com/culture/summary-facts-my-story-about-finding-real-immortal

an actual account of a man who has lived for 2,800 years. A real actual Biological Immortal Human.The Unbeholden (talk) 05:18, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Since it comes from a single source, I believe that it does not meet Wikipedia's criteria for notability WP:NOTE. If it ever does reach the standard of notability, it would go under List of people claimed to be immortal, until accredited biologists confirmed how "real actual" the claim was; such a genuine confirmation would reach notability rapidly on its own. -Yamara ✉ 18:23, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

physical immortality vs heat death of universe

Perusing the article, I saw no discussion of the compatibility (or incompatibility) of human physical immortality with the currently-projected heat (or other) death of the universe.

For example, if mind uploading becomes possible, and we create ever more sophisticated computers which can outlast, e.g. the death of the earth, the death of the solar system, then we eventually must overcome the death of *everything*; the evaporation of the last black hole, the decay of the last proton, the loss of the last free erg of energy, and the unbounded expansion of space, leading to the inevitable maximization of entropy.

Of course, mind uploading and other significant life-extension technologies may give us enough time to discover we're wrong about the heat (or other) death of the universe, and that the universe itself may be immortal, and of course I wouldn't mind a few extra countless eons of existence, even if it is bounded, but I think this topic is worth a mention in the article (by someone who more knowledge of the topic than I do).

98.14.192.146 (talk) 00:18, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Ah, this is an interesting hack to achieve perceived immortality in a mortal universe. Clever.

Physical - Spiritual...

Should Physical Immortality and Spiritual Immortality not have their own seperate articles?210.185.9.87 (talk) 01:29, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Meaning of 'Immortal'

'Word "Immortal" is driven from The month in Iranian calendar "Amurdad" '

Is this true? I assumed it derived from some Latin word, like 'mort' or whatever the appropriate word for death is. I accept the possibility that this in turn was derived from ancient Persian, but there is no citation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.141.52.251 (talk) 22:24, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I think somebody is confusing this with the term "Paradise", which does come from Avestan (Av. pairidaēza > Gr. παράδεισος > Lat. paradīsus; the original Avestan word referred to a circular fenced enclosure, and was applied to royal gardens); Immortal comes from Latin in (not) + mortālis (subject to death, mortal; transitory, perishable; human, earthly). --Wtrmute (talk) 17:59, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Wittgenstein's quote

What is the purpose of Wittgenstein's quote in this article? It has nothing to do with immortality as conceived in this article, its a grammatical observation about limits, and the vocabularies which exist only within those limits. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.65.124.182 (talk) 11:47, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Christianity

"Contrary to common belief, there is no biblical support of 'soul immortality' as such in the New Testament. " A few minutes work provided these examples: Jesus's words to the criminal crucified with him (Luke 23:43) "this night you will sup with me in Paradise" Simon's final prayer (Acts 7:59) "Lord recieve my spirit" Paul's desire to die and be with Jesus (Philippians 1:23)"For I am hard-pressed between the two, having a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better." Peter regards his body as a 'tent' to be discarded. (2 Peter 1:13&14)

Or even OT, with Samuel's ghost appearing to Saul (1 Samuel 28). These are only the ones I could remember offhand, so can this section be deleted? Doesn't violate wiki terms anyway, as new 'research'? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.176.44.24 (talk) 11:07, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Pointless Citation Needed tag.

the sentence: "iological forms have inherent limitations which may or may not be able to be overcome through medical interventions or engineering." has a citation needed tag. For some reason. i may be missing something but wouldnt "may or may not be able to.." be one of those "the sky is blue" type things? 74.132.249.206 (talk) 02:52, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

I came to the discussion page to make the same point, so seconded. There is no evidence to cite that immortality is possible. There is no evidence to cite that immortality is impossible. Thus, it may or may not possible - the statement requires no citation because it is a comment on a lack of evidence, (You could cite every piece of evidence in history for all knowledge, demonstrating that non of it proves or disproves the point, if you really wanted to add a citation...)

"It may or may not rain in London at 09:31 on 7th July 2129" - to ask me to prove (read 'cite') this, would be meaningless at best. To clarify, I think the sentence is absolutely fine, just the tag needs removing. --81.110.127.136 (talk) 20:27, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Is 81.110.127.136 suggesting that the above example about London rain in 2129 should be properly included within the London article? I think not, because it is entirely not relevant. The situation is the same here, and the problem will be solved if the current 2nd sentence in lead "It is unknown whether human physical immortality is an achievable condition." is simply deleted as not verifiable, and not relevant. Dartroom (talk) 17:54, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

No citation is needed, by the Law of excluded middle, for the current sentence, but it would be for a sentence that isn't tautologically true, as in "It is unknown whether human physical immortality is an achievable condition." Unfortunately, it's hard to argue that this is irrelevant, since it's likely the top interest of article readers. Why not find a recent source saying that whether or not it is possible is currently unknown? --Wragge (talk) 18:14, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

my thoughts on lead in

I'm not suggesting the page is flawed, but I think it would be more interesting if the lead in paragraph emphasized as many viewpoints as possible pertaining to philosophical immortality. Specifically, the idea that instantly came to mind was how immortality could be a philosophy stating that life is immortal as a whole being & perhaps the fundamental force in the generation of matter in the universe. It is true that the predominant astronomical view of matter is that it is created 'in' start, but in the context I am presenting, it is created 'by' stars on planets, like... say... Earth? I don't know if there are any works out there on this topic, thats why I'm posting. Its just an interesting take on the idea I've never heard of. perhaps its in the article already... not sure... any insight? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.218.85.222 (talk) 17:27, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Lede changes

Im in the process of making some vital changes to the lede, in particular the addition of a paragraph on the religious concept of immortality. This is an especially important point of view, one which hinges on the distinction between a material body, which eventually dies from something, and a "spirit" body - one that has no material flaws, and therefore can live eternally.

There is a brief note about biological immortality of the jellyfish - I dont think this belongs in the first paragraph, so I hid that text in the article body, until I can remember how to make footnotes again. It may be reworked into a note about biological immortality, which seems relevant to this article lede. -Stevertigo (t | c) 00:27, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

timelessness

In my opinion, timelessness is a state were time does not affect you. For this to happen you would need to escape time and space completely. Time is like a massive set of picture frames. Each moment is capture by a camera and then placed together to form time. even as i type this it is always happening When i type this word a different me typed it before me and i typed it before a different me and it is a never ending cycle everything you do everything you think happened before you and happens after you. However that is just a way of thinking of it. All of it is happening at the same time because of times physical form. also known as space. The multiverse is a collection of all of the parallel universes that are each a moment apart. remember when you were in grade school, and you took your first test. Right now a different you is taking that exact same test, and a different you is doing something in that you have know idea will happen to you. Still yet another you is dieing somewhere out there in a parallel world. In order to achieve timelessness you must leave existance and still retain your memory your existance that is the only way that makes sence to me of how to achieve timelessness or immortality because there is no such thing as biological imortallity simply because of your mind. it CAN NOT withstand time. even if you biologically enginere someones body to never age, the mind or the most important part of existance can't that is why my opinion or hypothesis is the only one that makes since to me. Deoblo299 (talk) 10:42, 29 June 2012 (UTC)Time and Space relativityDeoblo299 (talk) 10:42, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Good Source

The definition of this article is true from the sources, because it is an ability and a trait, while the word "Invincibility" is the actual word for being untouched or harmless from anything and anyone, and possibly live forever. Thus, Immortality, is one web out of many powerful source phrases creating the huge spider web of "Invincibility", thus the article is a good source, this is the reason there's a difference between Immortality and Invincibility.—GoShow(...........) 00:19, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

Shouldn't this note people who do not age do to unkown disorders?

Such as Gabby Williams? 108.217.45.210 (talk) 02:29, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

Archive 1

Archive 2