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Comment by jjoe | Hacker News Reader

I can think of a few pertinent cases. With every new generation you get fresh perspectives. Old practices die because generations die with them. Can you imagine slavery practices getting a "lifespan increase."

I bet the "cold war" mind set works the same way. You rarely see cold war brought up by much younger folks. It's always an old gen rehash.

What about a ruthless dictator like Kim Jong Un getting 12 extra years on earth?

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With every new generation you get fresh perspectives.

Who says we can't solve that problem as well? We've already had a bunch of research into psychedelics and countless anecdotes about people who claim drugs like LSD completely changed their outlook on life. I could envision a future where people effectively live forever and continually renew their interest in life with drugs. Selective amnesia, personality-altering drugs -- a new person from the same body!

Fresh perspectives generate fresh perspectives. Birth doesn't as well, because schools tend to standardize viewpoints as do religions. If birth was a good cure, you wouldn't get regression. Like the dark ages, or what's going on in Iran. Rolling the dice and hoping for a better outcome is inferior to building and advertising better outcomes. It would be easy to dream the pro death people die off and be replaced with more adventurous types, but its not fair to wish for someones death because they disagree with you.

All these dictators in Africa ruling for (eternal) life ?!! What a nightmare !

The nightmare would be, as Hannah Arendt pointed out, the perfection of the concentration camps: the ability to torture someone forever while keeping them alive.

That's not different from having a bad leader ruling forever... That's torture. 1789 occured for a reason.

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