Comment by JumpCrisscross
1 day ago
> shifting the whole demographic towards them is not looking good for retirement, social constructs, and more
I'm genuinely not seeing the problem. Longer lives means more productive lives. (A massive fraction of healthcare costs are related to obesity and aging. A minority of medicine is in trauma.)
> Immortality would bring this even further, especially when meant literally
We don't have a path to entropy-defying immortality. Not aging doesn't mean literal immortality.
> you can still suffer horribly, physically or otherwise, for a variety of reasons
The fact that you're levying this argument should seal the case. It's an argument that can be made against anything good.
Yes, of course it can be made against anything good, but what I mean is… is death truly the worst thing? Isn’t it better to focus on other ways to reduce suffering? Unexpected death is of course tragic, but everything eventually stops. I understand looking into ways to treat diseases, reduce other unpleasant events and possibly reduce pain (physical or otherwise), but immortality to me looks like something you (a generic you) just for the sake of it. Also because, when you think about it, you only die once, but you experience suffering in a variety of ways. In addition, death is a way to “enforce” change. Sometimes it’s bad, other times it’s good.
> Longer lives means more productive lives.
When you work until you’re, say, 80, what happens? You have less time to enjoy some rest, you still do your work (which means, if everything else stays equal, that there is less room for people taking your job and gaining experience because you are as productive as always).
> Isn’t it better to focus on other ways to reduce suffering?
Why?
> ways to treat diseases
Aging underlies tons of diseases. (It’s similar to obesity in that way.)
> death is a way to “enforce” change. Sometimes it’s bad, other times it’s good
This is true of everything bad. You could use this logic for ceasing research into curing cancer, trauma medicine or seatbelts and traffic lights.
> of course it can be made against anything good
Which makes it a pointless argument. (And implicit concession that you’re arguing against something good.)
> When you work until you’re, say, 80, what happens? You have less time to enjoy some rest
…why? You have more time.
In a world without aging, retirement at 80 would be an objectively better deal than retiring at 60 today. You’d be retiring with a body that hasn’t started failing. And you’d have more years, on average, ahead of you.
> there is less room for people taking your job and gaining experience because you are as productive as always
Lump of labour fallacy. (Average adult lifespans have gone up over the last two centuries. That has accompanied more, not less, labour-market dynamism.)