Let me use this post as a place to ask a question: Would you want to live for a thousand years? I am curious how this might change the future. For instance, if I thought I was going to be around for a longer time I would go back to college and study topics I have an interest in. Would be nice to be able to change what one is going to do once one learns a skill and wants to do something else. Of course, one would be healthy as it would be just a pain to be in pain.
Absolutely! The opportunities created over a thousand years would be beyond our imagination.
I matters if it's just me, or everyone, who would live 1000 years. If everyone lived that long most people would pay more attention to our earthly ecology. If it was just me, it would be just me.
If I could have the health of at least my 40-year-old self, it MIGHT be terrific. Plenty of time to study new occupations, serve humanity, learn new hobbies, travel everywhere, dance as much as I want…BUT can I afford it? Having to work a 40-hour week for over 900 years does not sound pleasurable. I need a better understanding of the terms before deciding.
I have a buddy that has such a horrible case of FOMO that given a continuation of his current state of health, he'd want to live until the heat death of the universe. I can't wrap my brain around that at all..
Does he claim FOMO or is that your guess?
I would do it just for the challenge of figuring out how to avert the heat death.
@skado That's my word for it I guess, but he did say he didn't want to miss anything that might happen, so I don't know how much of a stretch it would be.
I don't think that's a possibility according to the theory...
Nah. I've had enough of stupid humans.
Absolutely yes I would.
Naturally, the health issue is the biggest mitigating factor. I've spent too much of my life fighting for my health, so I'd want that to stop, and I'd need financial security. But there are so many things to discover and learn about, and it's exciting to consider how vastly things will change in the future. Plus, I have yet to tire of going out to gaze at the moon every night, and I don't see that ending any time soon.
I would never be bored in a hundred thousand years. And who knows... I might even learn how to live well and contribute something of value to the world by then. (I’m a slow learner.)
Fuck no. Life is already taking forever. Plus look at how fucked our planet is now, it will be either be a hellscape in a thousand years, or most/all humans will have already died off and the planet would be recovering from the human infection it had (or a solar flare or planet x wiped out everything).
I tend to become deeply involved in a profession until I have mastered it. Then I become bored and eventually quit.
I have been a government chemist, an elevator technician - followed by senior management, and a magazine publisher/editor. (Note the utter dissimilarities between them!)
Long before a thousand years everything would bore me to death.
"utter dissimilarities"
I have been :
Science Teacher/Coach
Construction Laborer
Cab Driver
Ski Instructor
Carpenter
Software Developer
. . . retiree
@FearlessFly Another "Jack of all trades" I see.
Three of those sound like my hobbies.
I enjoy building, tiling and plastering.
I enjoy woodwork.I even have a benchsaw.
I taught myself to write code in 1981, and still set myself little "projects", such as teaching a spreadsheet to produce HTML.
... and, of course, I am busy pretending to be retired.
My niece is the same. She has (successfully) been, among other things, an arson investigator, an insurance adjuster, a long-haul tractor-trailer driver (trucker), and a Department of Corrections Officer (prison guard) in a Maximum Security prison. I lost track a long time ago.
@MsKathleen Amazing how many "grasshoppers" there are. My mother was the one also. Farmer, magician's assistant, shorthand typist, private secretary, hairdresser, author, ....
@MsKathleen My mother had 3 husbands leave home, all divorced. My brother had 3 shortish term wives before his present long-term one. My elder sister had two husbands die on her, but the present one has stuck it out.
(Meanwhile, my younger sister has had the same husband for 59 years and I'm still on my first wife.)
I really don't think I'd want to live 1000 years. That's too long. I enjoy knowing that I only have only a few more decades to live, so I'd better make the most of it and/or enjoy as much or as little as I wish. I work better with a deadline, and if I have seemingly an eternity to do something, it likely won't get done.
It's never too late to learn about subjects you enjoy or take on new hobbies and pastimes.
I'm happy with my current life span -- I plan to live to be 102. I consider my mid-life crisis/correction at 51 to be the mid-point of my life. Vowing to do better in the 2nd half of my life.
If I waste it just enjoying life, then so be it, or if I somehow get inspired to create something that makes the world a better place, then that would be great. It hasn't happened yet, so I doubt it would happen if I had another 1000 years to do it. I don't mind being channeled into the very reasonable human lifespan we currently have.
That's a tough question. Assuming I would be healthy (no ailments, slim, no age-related issues) and remaining in good health for the vast majority of the 1000 years then I think I would like to try living to a thousand. Of course, this would require a huge leap forward in medical technology.
For that matter, just the leap in medical technology that would make me feel 30 years younger would be huge. That alone would improve life considerably even if I were only alive for another 30 or 40 years.
I think I would. If I changed my mind, i could always end it.
You can't though. If wanting to be dead translated to being able I kill yourself we wouldn't be talking right now.
@JeffMurray Well you can't live for 1000 years either.