Mortality or the afterlife?

The afterlife would be too boring - no vices

I pick infinite life.

Whawawawawa, me Count Drakoolya!

I'm not really sure. I've seen elderly people just ready to move on, and I suspect that their readiness is based on more than just aches/pains/sickness (though I could be wrong on that one). I suspect that I may be ready to move on after a while living past my normal span.

It would depend on where my relatives choose to go. We would probably make that decision together. Paradise sounds appealing, though. No problems! That would be cool.

I think I would give up immortality for the afterlife. An afterlife of paradise/Heaven would be wonderful, plus I would get to see my Dad again!!

Afterlife sounds nice. It would probably kind of depend on what my friends and family did, I think.

This is very hard. I think the afterlife if it really were guaranteed to be paradise. Immortality would be great, but I think there would come a time when I would be ready to move on. If I could take the immortality pill until I felt ready then that would be ideal. If I absolutely had to choose, I think the afterlife. But maybe not...Perhaps immortality with all its hardships would be better than paradise. Paradise for me wouldn't be the way most people imagine it - would it be my paradise or the general idea of it?

Great survey though.

i'll check out the afterlife....
buh bye

Afterlife for sure!

I'd like to live for a long time, just to see what happens in a long time.

everlasting paradise would suck... it just doesn't make sense. Existence is a cycle and mixture of good and bad times... most of what we feel is the difference, the change. If it was always good, you get used to it and it would suck

could i take the immortality pill until i'm ready to die? yes, i want to have my cake and eat it, too, ok? actually, i think i'd just take the afterlife.

afterlife...

give up immortality, none of this is real anyway!!!!!!!!

I'd take immortality and then when I inevitably got bored and my clothes, taste in music and hairstyle were aeons out of date, I'd arrange to go into cryogenic stasis until the end of the universe.

It wouldn't suck for me. I'd love it. I wouldn't need bad times to appreciate the good. I would remind myself to appreciate it. Bad times are worse than constant good times could ever be.

I would go on to the afterlife...of course....already had enough of this!!!!! dang!!!!

some of you guys seem to have no conception of what it would mean to "be" in the afterlife....I don't think you could ever get bored because your spirit and your mind would be open to every possibility imaginable....utter mental creation so to speak...we have no idea what that is like...so how can you say you wouldn't dig it??? Right now your brain would implode just trying.....

I would continue to live in this world. And btw: based on my predictions, this isnt as hypotetical as it seems. I would defnatly take advandage of this if the technology were available.

what about a simulated paradise, where you would expireince a simulated cycles of goods and bads but more on the good side than this world.

that's not my objection at all. My issue woudl be that I simply like this world. What can I say?

that's cool then...

I'll be dead before then. Even if I was still alive in 20 years, I wouldn't take the pill so I seriously doubt that I would be alive in another 50 years after that!

> give up immortality, none of this is real anyway!!!!!!!!

Or is it!?

I have to decide right now?!?!?! ... and I can't change my mind

Definitely going with afterlife. The way this world is going, I don't think I want to be around endlessly. How many times can one witness the demise of other cultures, creatures etc. while the "machine" keeps rolling along?

naaaaaaaah!

I still think it's flawed... look at people who are born rich, like Paris Hilton... they are jaded and dissatisfied with life... it's all a joke to them... they don't care about anything... they don't seem happy to me. People create their own troubles if life is easy for them... Paradise is a paradox.

Yeah, you're probably right.

what if there was a simulated 'paradise' where it was a life just like yours, only with a few modifications to get rid of some of the really bad stuff, plus you get to be "high' more often.

OK, but now you're talking about something very much like real life... so, in answering the question... immortality becomes very similar to the afterlife.

Bill, I agree that a lot of people who are born rich are jaded and dissatisfied. That is because their parents failed them. They placated them throughout their life with material possessions and never taught them about Philanthropy or Inner Self Worth. But jaded kids do not come from rich parents alone. They come from everywhere from the top of the income ladder to the bottom. For lots and lots of reasons. More now than ever before. The problem with the concept of Paradise is that it has a different meaning for everyone. So, if it were to actually exist it would have to do so on millions of planes.. each existing for that one person...

Based on the way you asked the question, I personally would choose the after life. But I would take my time about passing over. I believe in an afterlife already, and I think that it is a progressive path through life, the afterlife and beyond. I would want what waits for me on the other side, which I believe to be a better existence than life as we now know it. This question is not as far fetched as it first seems. Modern medicine will cause people to consider this , if not total immortality, very extended life. This causes other issues to come into play, for example, How do feed everybody if people do not die? Where will everybody live? It would soon be very unpleasant here if people stopped dieing.

similar but not quite. What if life was 90% perfect as opposed to the 75% perfect we live in right now (I am making numbers up for argument sake). And what about 95% perfect. You see where I am going with this. At some point, 100% perfect would be too happy, and inauthenticity would make the person deep down unhappy. A 75% rate would be realistic, but not "paradicic" enough. If you bring it up a bit, you are beginging to escape reality, but not to the point of a utopian afterlife. At some critical moment, your "true happiness" level would be at its optimum.

Besides, you've done drugs at some point in your life, haven't you? Maybe in college, I am assuming. Anyway, at that particular point in time, you were escaping reality, but not to a full extent. But you still existed in the real world and were still bound to follow the same rules and laws of physics governiming reality, and at least on some level, had your feet on the groud. I would imagine, an afterlife could be simulated similar to what a real life is right now, except that you would get a frequent buzz here and there, but without all the negative consequences of drug use. How would something liek that sound.

> to come into play, for example, How do feed everybody if people do
> not die? Where will everybody live? It would soon be very unpleasant
> here if people stopped dieing.

to answer that question, as you may be aware, there are actually more people aliver today than people that have died at some point in the past. At this rate, the worst case senario if we were to bring all the dead back to life, at worse, the world population would doube, which does so anyway every 30 or 40 years. So, this would actually be the least of our problems. The big issue that I am worried about is the alarming fertillity rates in 3rd world countries, if anything. Besides, if we as a society werent such fat-asses, we could well do away with the shortage of food if we all just did it in more moderation.

I would think missing the afterlife would be like stifling one's own evolution.

Yow. Like 'the time machine', alone with an ebbing sun on a suface of residual protzoa. I would think the sense of 'Boy, did I ever miss out' would be overwhelming.

I still feel that it's just not that simple. You might reach optimal happiness at moments, but if it every felt like it was enough, it would ultimately be dissatisfying. The more sense of control you have, the less it would ultimately work out. I think it might need to dip to 10% once in a while even for 90% to be really good. etc.

Drugs are a good example... it's far from a perfect high... moments, perhaps, but overall mixed.

I spent a week at 100% a few years ago. So many things were different about that state. I can't say it included any desire at all, including to live further. I often suspect the reason I stay up late is because the day was not as satisfying as I could have hoped for, and my subconsious is hoping that the next dreary experience around the bend will be enough to fill my cup.

Not the last days of the universe, not the decline of the universe. The End. The point at which nothing exists anymore. No matter, no energy, no consciousness. Entropy. True death.
If it's a choice between eternal life either here or an other plane of reality, I'll take the third option. I'm not meant to last forever. At some point, I do wish to cease to exist and if that wish is taken away from me, I will take steps to take it back in some form.

I never anticipate that happening. New systems are born all the time. Beyond our 15 billion galaxis, we might eventually find that this universe is one of 15 billion.

The you that does'nt want to exist forever is the ego, making judgements on everything. You can't guarantee that it will even last your whole earthly life.

yeah, there would be (artificial) dips too, only fewer than real life. I am sure that if there really was an all powerful being, "he" could pull it off. Though it would be awfully difficult and a delicate balance, creating a "blissfull" world, but with dilibrate stratigicly placed lows that would somehow simulate real authentic life, only much, much happier than this one. I am sure it could be done.

Besides, arguing on that path, whose to say that this world isnt a somewhat version of that allready.

You're reaching the conclusion i intended people reach in their contemplation on the subject.

And the you that doesn't anticipate that happening is your ego making judgments on everything, and round and round we go.

I suppose that's true too.

> Besides, arguing on that path, whose to say that this world isnt a somewhat version of that allready.

Indeed, this is basically my point.

how close am I

yes, I can see that.

however, I still am not convinced that this earth is the optimum amount of happiness in the universe (but then again, it depneds on who you are). Off coursd I am biased like that because I dont consider myselft to be that happy here.

Then again, I still wouldnt trade my existance here for something else, but that's another story.

I know there is an afterlife and I look forward to it. It will be so nice to see my parents again and other loved ones that are gone. It will be great to cuddle with my pets that Jesus is taking care of for me.

I would rather pass on into the afterlife far more better than having to stay down here and keep on living and suffering. Death is a whole lot better and I believe there is heaven no questions about it????

I think part of having a good life is striving for happiness... if you don't need to strive, you wont truly be happy.

'What' and 'why' are good to know. 'How' is much more fascinating to observe though.

Oh, that's a priceless image I won't forget soon, Jesus in heaven, taking your former pets out for their morning walk.

I love learning new things so I probably would wait until after I explored the universe, providing we found some way of traveling faster than light, and maybe meet a few alien life forms if any exist (which I believe they do). After that I would give up immortality.

You think learning could ever stop? Pick one of a billion specialties on earth, like poetry or reptile science, and you'll find that you can't possibly keep up with things at the rate they are created or discovered on this planet alone, let alone in nebula populated by immense sentient magnetic-light forms or something.

I wouldnt have took the immortality pill in the first place!

true, but isnt desire the source of all pain.

If you go though life "strving" for happiness, in a sense, you are giving into the notion that you are striving for something that you desire. Whether or not you get it is another issue, but your wanting it, shouldn't that, at least on some level, be also a source of pain?

why not?

*shrug*

Because I dont want to be immortal - apart from the fact that it disrupts the natural processes of the earth which is deeply wrong, I dont want to be around when the world ends and you cant escape that if you are immortal.

They can keep their pill don't want to live forever, not in this world.

> I spent a week at 100% a few years ago. So many things were different
> about that state. I can't say it included any desire at all, including
> to live further. I often suspect the reason I stay up late is because
> the day was not as satisfying as I could have hoped for, and my subconsious
> is hoping that the next dreary experience around the bend will be
> enough to fill my cup.


I feel the same way sometimes, like feeling cheated of a more "worthwhile" experience refusing to go to sleep until it arrives. But burning my candle at both ends even for 4 days straight is hardly a comparison to eternity.

I did five once. But then, and even the three day'ers actually where quite intense and worth staying up for. It's the standard 22 hour days I can do without. It's especially bad when I end my day with an eBay hunt; my creative standards keep evolving until I'm looking for the holy grail for under $27.

I don't want to live forever. There will always be wars to live though, & people being murdered or raped on the streets, and in their homes. Eventually it will catch up with you or someone you love dearly. Besides that, where would the food come from to feed the trillions of people living on earth? Where would people live? There wouldn't be enough earth left for homes. And just because someone is promised immortality, that doesn't mean they will not struggle with the regular issues dealt to us on a daily basis.

If we live forever, we'll probably be rebuilding our bodies without food, possibly combining multiple persons into single persons. Children might be obsolete. Who knows what life will be like 300 years from now, let alone 3000 or 300,000,000 years from now.

LOL right haven't done that yet, but I can imagine. My personal best was 4 and a half days, don't even remember why I did it.

Please God, I hate it it here, Take me home.

I would hate it because in 20 years i would take the pill because I wouldn't know if there was an everlasting life but when the other 30 rolled around I would be pissed because I couldnt ever die and live to know the feeling of everlasting life

I wouldn't have taken the pill in the first place, I'd never want to be immortal.