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Death cleans out old ideas. I have a hard time getting over the feeling that an older civilization is also more conservative. Especially a civilization where th

Death cleans out old ideas. I have a hard time getting over the feeling that an older civilization is also more conservative. Especially a civilization where the people with money and power are the ones who are older. "Death is very likely the single best invention of life. It's life's change agent, it clears out the old to make way for the new." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd_ptbiPoXM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd_ptbiPoXM

abstractbill 16y ago
It's possible that older people are more conservative because they are going to die sooner. If everyone was suddenly immortal, old people might start acting quite differently.
delinquentme 16y ago
well become better at coping
orangecat 16y ago
Once again I defer to an alternate version of Harry Potter: "Uh huh," Harry said. "See, there's this little thing called cognitive dissonance, or in plainer English, sour grapes. If people were hit on the heads with truncheons once a month, and no one could do anything about it, pretty soon there'd be all sorts of philosophers, pretending to be wise as you put it, who found all sorts of amazing benefits to being hit on the head with a truncheon once a month. Like, it makes you tougher, or it makes you happier on the days when you're not getting hit with a truncheon. But if you went up to someone who wasn't getting hit, and you asked them if they wanted to start, in exchange for those amazing benefits, they'd say no. And if you didn't have to die, if you came from somewhere that no one had ever even heard of death, and I suggested to you that it would be an amazing wonderful great idea for people to get wrinkled and old and eventually cease to exist, why, you'd have me hauled right off to a lunatic asylum! http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/39/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/39/Harry_Potter_and_the_...
- Helianthus 16y ago
  the thing about Eliezer's rather snide take on cognitive dissonance is it doesn't really address the issue at hand. people dying does clear out old ideas. the leopard doesn't change his shorts. or at the very _least_ you could make an argument that people can be changed, that old hard-line racists can be won over, instead of claiming that any idiot who thinks immortality might have its seamy side is just displaying 'cognitive dissonance.' labeling arguments 'cognitive dissonance' ought to be a fallacy all its own. it says "I won't tell you what arguments defeat your argument; you're just being irrational."
  - SkyMarshal 16y ago
    >people dying does clear out old ideas. the leopard doesn't change his shorts. First, that's not necessarily true. Old ideas persist across generations even today. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Taoism, Buddhism, etc. etc. Second, new ideas are not necessarily valuable anyway. Having just moved to the SF Bay Area, let new age religions and whatnot be exhibit #1. There's something to be said for passing the test of time. Third, your implicit assumption is that immortality would then prevent old ideas from being cleared out, which is not necessarily the case. The reason why older people 'cling' to old ideas is that as we age our neural pathways become calcified along current paths and connections, making it more difficult to change our minds about something. If aging were inhibited, presumably that problem would be one of the ones solved as well, so people's minds would remain as agile and flexible as they were in young adulthood, indefinitely, and hence able to change and adapt new ideas.
    - yesbabyyes 16y ago
      The reason why older people 'cling' to old ideas is that as we age our neural pathways become calcified along current paths and connections, making it more difficult to change our minds about something. If aging were inhibited, presumably that problem would be one of the ones solved as well, so people's minds would remain as agile and flexible as they were in young adulthood, indefinitely, and hence able to change and adapt new ideas. That's quite a leap of faith, IMO. It might be so that clinging to old ideas is a chemical "problem", or it might be how the brain works. When studying other people, I come to the understanding that around 30 years of age, many people have decided on an ideology, decided which music they enjoy, what food they like, and many other interests. When presented with new information which might require change in that internal model, many people seem to ignore the new information rather than changing their model, because changing our internal model is hard, and it becomes harder the more elaborate our model of the world is. So, the older we get, the more elaborate our models, and the more reluctant to change we grow. I'm know people are different - I am fighting this kind of stagnation in my mind every day - but I'm not convinced that the people who are most likely to become immortal are the ones that are the least prone to stagnation. I'm afraid it's quite the opposite.
michaelchisari 16y ago
I have a hard time getting over the feeling that an older civilization is also more conservative. I'd assume most conservatism would die with the generation which rejects longevity. Those who embrace it are more likely to be interested in human progress and advancement.
- yesbabyyes 16y ago
  Or they are more likely to be interested in keeping their privileged positions. I fear few things more than a ruling class that never dies.
SkyMarshal 16y ago
I'm pretty sure the benefits would outweigh any perceived drawbacks: 1. Like elves in Tolkien's works, people who can only die by disease or by being slain might be much more careful about starting wars that could kill them (politicians probably wouldn't, but those who have to do the fighting might). 2. Imagine a world where the Einsteins, Hawkings, etc. don't die just as they've come to master their field, but continue contributing for centuries. 3. Would the saying "Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it" still hold? Would we keep making many of the same mistakes over and over, or would our longer term memory and experience allow us to better avoid them?
- meric 16y ago
  Robert Mugabe, forever.
  - meric 16y ago
    I guess I've been too brief in my reply, but no one has addressed the elephant in the room. "Revolutions" in Libya and Egypt we saw recently aren't frequent occurrences. Many dictators in history have stayed in power until the day they died. Yet, they are some of the people most able to afford "immortality". Previously, if you had a very evil and capable dictator, the populace suffers his rule for at most half a dozen decades.
    - AngryParsley 16y ago
      Would you be willing to set off a tactical nuke in Harare if you knew it would kill Mugabe? Let's say you predict the nuke will kill 1,000,000 people. 150,000 human beings die every day. About 100,000 of those are age-related. No dictator can hold a candle to that. Dropping that nuke is equivalent to delaying a cure for aging by 10 days. And yet you want to delay a cure indefinitely? That would condemn billions to the grave.
      - meric 16y ago
        And yet you want to delay a cure indefinitely? I did not say that. See goblin89's comment.
andrewflnr 16y ago
Given an infinite lifespan, you'll probably figure out how to change your mind better.

abstractbill 16y ago

It's possible that older people are more conservative because they are going to die sooner. If everyone was suddenly immortal, old people might start acting quite differently.

delinquentme 16y ago

well become better at coping

orangecat 16y ago

Once again I defer to an alternate version of Harry Potter: "Uh huh," Harry said. "See, there's this little thing called cognitive dissonance, or in plainer English, sour grapes. If people were hit on the heads with truncheons once a month, and no one could do anything about it, pretty soon there'd be all sorts of philosophers, pretending to be wise as you put it, who found all sorts of amazing benefits to being hit on the head with a truncheon once a month. Like, it makes you tougher, or it makes you happier on the days when you're not getting hit with a truncheon. But if you went up to someone who wasn't getting hit, and you asked them if they wanted to start, in exchange for those amazing benefits, they'd say no. And if you didn't have to die, if you came from somewhere that no one had ever even heard of death, and I suggested to you that it would be an amazing wonderful great idea for people to get wrinkled and old and eventually cease to exist, why, you'd have me hauled right off to a lunatic asylum! http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/39/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/39/Harry_Potter_and_the_...

Helianthus 16y ago
the thing about Eliezer's rather snide take on cognitive dissonance is it doesn't really address the issue at hand. people dying does clear out old ideas. the leopard doesn't change his shorts. or at the very _least_ you could make an argument that people can be changed, that old hard-line racists can be won over, instead of claiming that any idiot who thinks immortality might have its seamy side is just displaying 'cognitive dissonance.' labeling arguments 'cognitive dissonance' ought to be a fallacy all its own. it says "I won't tell you what arguments defeat your argument; you're just being irrational."
- SkyMarshal 16y ago
  >people dying does clear out old ideas. the leopard doesn't change his shorts. First, that's not necessarily true. Old ideas persist across generations even today. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Taoism, Buddhism, etc. etc. Second, new ideas are not necessarily valuable anyway. Having just moved to the SF Bay Area, let new age religions and whatnot be exhibit #1. There's something to be said for passing the test of time. Third, your implicit assumption is that immortality would then prevent old ideas from being cleared out, which is not necessarily the case. The reason why older people 'cling' to old ideas is that as we age our neural pathways become calcified along current paths and connections, making it more difficult to change our minds about something. If aging were inhibited, presumably that problem would be one of the ones solved as well, so people's minds would remain as agile and flexible as they were in young adulthood, indefinitely, and hence able to change and adapt new ideas.
  - yesbabyyes 16y ago
    The reason why older people 'cling' to old ideas is that as we age our neural pathways become calcified along current paths and connections, making it more difficult to change our minds about something. If aging were inhibited, presumably that problem would be one of the ones solved as well, so people's minds would remain as agile and flexible as they were in young adulthood, indefinitely, and hence able to change and adapt new ideas. That's quite a leap of faith, IMO. It might be so that clinging to old ideas is a chemical "problem", or it might be how the brain works. When studying other people, I come to the understanding that around 30 years of age, many people have decided on an ideology, decided which music they enjoy, what food they like, and many other interests. When presented with new information which might require change in that internal model, many people seem to ignore the new information rather than changing their model, because changing our internal model is hard, and it becomes harder the more elaborate our model of the world is. So, the older we get, the more elaborate our models, and the more reluctant to change we grow. I'm know people are different - I am fighting this kind of stagnation in my mind every day - but I'm not convinced that the people who are most likely to become immortal are the ones that are the least prone to stagnation. I'm afraid it's quite the opposite.

michaelchisari 16y ago

I have a hard time getting over the feeling that an older civilization is also more conservative. I'd assume most conservatism would die with the generation which rejects longevity. Those who embrace it are more likely to be interested in human progress and advancement.

yesbabyyes 16y ago
Or they are more likely to be interested in keeping their privileged positions. I fear few things more than a ruling class that never dies.

SkyMarshal 16y ago

I'm pretty sure the benefits would outweigh any perceived drawbacks: 1. Like elves in Tolkien's works, people who can only die by disease or by being slain might be much more careful about starting wars that could kill them (politicians probably wouldn't, but those who have to do the fighting might). 2. Imagine a world where the Einsteins, Hawkings, etc. don't die just as they've come to master their field, but continue contributing for centuries. 3. Would the saying "Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it" still hold? Would we keep making many of the same mistakes over and over, or would our longer term memory and experience allow us to better avoid them?

meric 16y ago
Robert Mugabe, forever.
- meric 16y ago
  I guess I've been too brief in my reply, but no one has addressed the elephant in the room. "Revolutions" in Libya and Egypt we saw recently aren't frequent occurrences. Many dictators in history have stayed in power until the day they died. Yet, they are some of the people most able to afford "immortality". Previously, if you had a very evil and capable dictator, the populace suffers his rule for at most half a dozen decades.
  - AngryParsley 16y ago
    Would you be willing to set off a tactical nuke in Harare if you knew it would kill Mugabe? Let's say you predict the nuke will kill 1,000,000 people. 150,000 human beings die every day. About 100,000 of those are age-related. No dictator can hold a candle to that. Dropping that nuke is equivalent to delaying a cure for aging by 10 days. And yet you want to delay a cure indefinitely? That would condemn billions to the grave.
    - meric 16y ago
      And yet you want to delay a cure indefinitely? I did not say that. See goblin89's comment.

andrewflnr 16y ago

Given an infinite lifespan, you'll probably figure out how to change your mind better.