Earth's carrying capacity is a problem to be solved, there are many viable solutions that can be executed in parallel, and it doesn't really sound like a big challenge relative to getting life extension working in the first place.
Really, it's just bewildering to me that having a death wish is considered common-sense, normal viewpoint.
"It takes all kinds to make a world" isn't just a saying about polite tolerance.
It isn't altruistic to value one person's life more than another for their demonstrated ability to contribute what you think is best. That is literally egocentric selfishness, which is pretty much the opposite of altruism. I think the word you want is "utilitarian".
A person's ability to contribute is also context dependent. Woz was an innovator, but he also got lucky in multiple respects to have contributed what he did. Picking "Golden Children" tends to have negative sociological and innovative effects.
I'm not Steve Wozniak so if I did want him to be immortal I'm pretty sure that would not be selfishness. I'm also unsure why you think whichever human is "replacing" Woz in this hypothetical is going to up the level of diversity.
All that said, I actually do disagree with the fundamental premise that resources are finite in a meaningful way and that one person's immortality is stealing from someone else in a zero-sum game. Intelligent life is not zero-sum, and it is just as likely that Immortal Woz would develop a new farming technology that allows X extra people to exist than that he would actually require enough resources to be a net negative.
My "all kinds" cite wasn't meant to be about diversity per se, but about new people. Additionally, youth brings with it a native understanding that age (barring possible global amnesia) can't.
> I'm not Steve Wozniak so if I did want him to be immortal I'm pretty sure that would not be selfishness.
I'm not trying to pull the Nazi card here, it's just the first parallel I can think of: Hitler wasn't blonde haired nor particularly tall, yet his desire for a race of tall, blonde, blue-eyed Aryans was still egocentric.
> Intelligent life is not zero-sum
No, for many other sentient terrestrial species, and even non-sentient ones, human life is negative sum.
Regardless, human society would have to fragment quite a bit for older folks in this hypothetical world of immortality to not dominate opportunities for the younger folks. I hope this happens, but am skeptical enough I assume it's more likely that domineering paternalism is more likely to grow.
How can you say with a straight face "Hitler liked blue-eyed people, this is very egocentric of him as a person without blue eyes"? Makes no sense. Was Hitler egocentric? Most certainly. Is his ideas of Aryan supremacy a good example of that? Clearly not, as you so succinctly pointed out.
Back to the actual point: if the immortals actually made life shitter for everyone else, you can assume they would be French Revolution'd without too much overture.
When I was looking this up I discovered that Hitler did, apparently, have blue eyes.
> if the immortals actually made life shitter for everyone else, you can assume they would be French Revolution'd without too much overture.
The most proximate cause of the French Revolution was a tax on the aristocratic classes, and increased taxes in general, quite similar to the American Revolution: https://www.britannica.com/event/French-Revolution
Another cause was shared with the Russian Revolution: Gradually increasing rights for the hoi polloi that made them acutely aware of the unjustness of the constraints that still existed.
The aristocrats provided the wealth, and the hoi polloi provided the numbers. But in an immortality scenario the aristocrats are being given a privilege, not taxed against it. Or if this immortality is available to all, then the old immortals may outnumber the youth.
In the case of France, an emperor replaced a king. In the case of Russia, a dictator replaced a czar. In the US the previously existing legislatures continued ruling, but without oversight.
Also, if we're positing indefinite limits to the number of humans, then an immortal wouldn't be replacing one person, but the whole series of persons their extended life is taking the place of (and would be altering all lineages descended from those persons).
That's like saying Rails isn't good scaffolding for a web service, because they're made of steel and are meant for trains.
The silliness of the trope starts with the notion that once you have gone immortal you can't go back. Somehow you are stuck yearning for the sweet release of death.
In reality life is extremely fragile, maintaining the right conditions to support it requires constant effort. There is no reason to think that any future scientific advance will alter this fundamental fact.
Therefore it is highly likely that whoever achieves practical immortality will be also able to undo their "curse" by simply discontinuing whatever practice keeps them alive.
Also, "forever" doesn't happen all at once. Give me immortality, and then check in with me yearly if I still want it. I will let you know once I'm over it.
Immortality as a subscription service—brilliant!
That seems to jive with GC's point. The definition is the ability to live forever, not the requirement to live forever.
Because the "true and cursed" immortality is not on offer. Spending resources to extend our life is a possibility. Spending resources to better understand what aging is and how to extend our youth is. Getting cursed with immortality is not in the cards.
> The word immortality has a specific meaning, even if you don’t like what it is.
Ok. You can have your discussion about your fantasy concepts. They are fun! What should we discuss next? How many duck sized horses we would fight just to avoid being cursed with true immortality? It is all good with me as long as we don't try to draw real world conclusions from said fantasies.
I like the rational attitude. Like you pointed out, somehow people think it's some magic portion that you drink without ever the possibility of going back to being mortal.
The few elderly I know of who approached that age and were reflective enough told me they just ended up letting go. And they were actually happier.
Being sufficiently well-off is probably helping ;)
People seem to "tribal" and self-centred. People don't hold doors for people, they walk past people struggling like say their hands are full and they drop something but people just walk past not helping them. In stores people walk in front of little old ladies nearly knocking them down. Just a total lack of innate civility.
This is one of those cases where one shouldn't generalize from fictional evidence. Immortality as curse is a very lazy trope that breaks down upon casual inspection.
> even surviving to 90 or 100 can be its own kind of hell for those whose life is being unnaturally preserved for the sake of those who can't or won't let go.
That is indeed true, both in fiction and reality, but it's not the kind of immortality that's under discussion. Obviously being forever locked in a state of agony, in a failing body, is something no one wants.
I wonder if being selfless in that sense is not actually the "norm" when we consider most of the people who live and lived. In-between all the ones willing to sacrifice themselves for a descendant, a cause, those with a tightrope life, those who have spiritual beliefs etc.
Most people I know are at ease with their death, which is very different from having a death wish.
It's not getting solved though, it's getting worse day by day because of climate change making increasingly large amounts of space uninhabitable, soil erosion, the aftereffects of pollution with all kinds of crap (PFAS, microplastics, nitrates from fertilizer runoff, ...) and over-exploitation below replacement levels (e.g. in fish).
> there are many viable solutions that can be executed in parallel, and it doesn't really sound like a big challenge relative to getting life extension working in the first place.
We barely understand how our body works in detail. We know a bit on how to do genetic manipulation, but at the moment no one seriously works on manipulating germ cells out of ethical reason - even something as "simple" as cloning a human is widely seen as unethical, and completely forget about using something like CRISPR to manipulate the genetics of a live human outside of people for whom this is the only chance at getting a few years out of some fatal disease.
> Really, it's just bewildering to me that having a death wish is considered common-sense, normal viewpoint.
Memento mori.
That's a few decades in the future at least, but biodiversity and climate change is on a way faster scale.
That's the problem with the futurist mindset in a large part of tech culture - we need action now.
And it's not a death wish. I think a lot of us realise that we probably don't offer a net positive to this earth, that our individual existence probably uses more resource than it provides. So technically that means that the earth would be better off without us, but that's not a death wish. We're not saying we're actively going to kill ourselves
Hitler was bad for human society even if he pooped enriched uranium every 5 minutes. There are people who provide no resources whatsoever who make the Earth way, way better.
Thinking about a human life’s value in terms of “resources in/resources out” suggests to me that you have little understanding of the true value of humans and human culture.
I don't believe most people go as far as reasoning this way - I was thinking more about internalizing "the natural order of things" / "circle of life" stuff too much.
The kind of thought pattern you described can be, for some, a rational and accurate view of their circumstances. It can also be a sign of depression (especially internalizing the "earth would be better off without me/us" part). It can, unfortunately, be also both.
This again reveals the wisdom of very basic biblical truths, like “all men are made in the image of God”. Meaning all humans have value, a special value different from animals and plants