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This is the first part of what may be a two or three part series of posts on the topic of Death and Eternity. In these posts I will ponder the perennial human fascination with death and eternal life in the light of scientific and technological advances that are likely to result in a merger between humankind and the machines we humans make, which is known by some as "Singularity." If you have read my last post on Artificial Intelligence, you know that I have, as do others, misgivings about this adventure while being fascinated by the possibilities such advances possess in improving our finite lives.
THE NORMALACY OF DEATH
Death interests me because someday I will die. It's personal. I'm intrigued by it because I also know that some want to find ways to avoid death by merging with AI and robotic technologies which theoretically, at least, can keep people not only alive, but also vastly improved physically and intellectually than ever in human history. It all sounds like science fiction, but it's not. The thought that life can be eternalized makes me wonder about the value we give to natural life and the importance, if any, we give to death in the course of a natural life.
Like most, I don't want to die, but I also recognize an intuitive feeling that living forever may not be the best thing to aim for in a rather chaotic and changing universe which suggests a finite nature rather than an infinite one. It makes me wonder about the concept of eternity, whether such a thing actually exists and what, exactly, does eternity mean ? Is it normal to want live forever or is the desire that some have to live forever as human/machine blend something our reptilian drive to survive and our reasoning ability have come up with to help us cope and stave off the reality of death?
CROSSING THE BORDER
I don't know what happens to people after they die or what will happen to me. I don't think what happens, if anything, is dependent on what one believes. I don't put much faith in beliefs about what happens once one is dead. We really don't know anything about what it is to be dead beyond us living beings being able to observe a truly lifeless corpse decompose, releasing its basic atomic elements to the universe from which all things originate. Whatever held these elements together as a person, that animated it, energized it, and made it an individual with a unique personality is missing. The lights have gone out and no one is home. I know. I've watched people die, even held their hands as they passed away in a hospital bed and the warmth of life turned cold in my hand.
Of course we are free to speculate all we want about what happens to one's sense of self after death. We know what happens to the body, but what happens to the energy and personality that was the life of an individual? There has to be more to a living person than an animated shell of atomic particles that give shape and presence to the person. Isn't there? Is there?
I don't know.
There's an intuition that results from our collective, historical experiences that death, itself, is nothing more than a transition from one type of being into a whole new way of being that is independent of our carbon based physical existence. There are ambiguous hints in nature that lead us to such intuitive thoughts. Perhaps, the desire to live forever by merging with the finite machines we make is the equivalent of behaving like a cosmic juvenile. It's one thing not wanting to die. I don't want to go through the process of dying, but it seems to be an entirely different thing wanting to live forever.
Becoming a superhuman cyborg might lessen physical suffering but one would have to deal with a degree of intellectual anguish or systems angst if one's system started to malfunction. The fact is nothing in the known universe is indestructible. Things might last for what seems like an eternity, but the universe strongly indicates that there is nothing in it that can be defined as truly eternal.
TIME AND ETERNITY
Knowing the age of the universe clues us to the fact that there was a point before time, a point of nonexistence - a point of nothing - including time. Before time, was there an eternity? After time, will there be an eternity?
In essence, eternity is nothing more than a measure of ongoing time, and time, ironically, is the measurement of decay. Time, as a force, is always being expended from a point of anticipation to a point of fulfillment. I believe it was the ancient Greeks who posited that the future is always behind us and that past is always in front of us.
So where did the concept of eternity come from?
It would appear that the concept of eternity is a deduction made from observing the passing of time; in that, as living things pass away other things remain for a time and new living things come into being. This repetitious life cycle; of the birth and death of individual life forms, demonstrates a pattern that is ongoing, that is eternal. Nothing physical that we know of is eternal. The concept of eternity teases the imagination by asking what if one could break this repetitious life cycle pattern and not die?
ARTIFICIAL IMMORTALITY
Immortality, the realm of the gods, theoretically will be within reach of some human beings, but what is the price one would pay to become an immortal super-human? Who will qualify? At present, the general consensus is only those who could afford to pay for immortality would qualify. In other words evolution will become a matter of economy, turning the natural progression of the survival of the fittest into the survival of the richest.
Let me say, I don't see the merger between humankind and machine as evolution, but rather as an attempt to augment a select few. Will it result in a super-human species?
Perhaps, but if so, it will be a species caught in the amber of time.
Death, I suspect, will remain as a choice, unless other natural forces or other super-human specie situations cause it. Yes - death as a choice is something I can see being made if, for no other reason then when one tires of being an "artificial" immortal.
A merged carbon and silicon human life form will not last forever, no matter how durable they are made. In this caustic, oxygenated planet everything eventually deteriorates and needs parts replacement and updating. At what point will the natural human disappear, leaving only an artificial artifact - a robotic zombie - a device resembling a dead species? It seems that such a merger will end human evolution.
We humans are not good at species preservation. Our innovations historically have led to ruination of life rather than sustaining the variety life that exists or has existed on this planet. Yes - there have been remarkable advances in medicine and smart prosthetics that have made human life immensely improved. Prolonging life is not a bad thing as long as it is not done at the expense eliminating the variety of life forms on this planet. The fact is we are already merging with the technologies of our making.
Science is making us rethink existence on many levels. AI technologies and robotics are changing how we do business and manufacturing. They will, I believe, force us to establish a new economic system that will be used globally. It already is influencing philosophy and theology in subtle ways. It is forcing us to rethink what it means to be alive. As advanced as we have become scientifically and technologically, we have yet to find a way to tame our impulse for destruction and distortion. Putting that embedded factor of the human mind in a super human cyborg is something to give us pause.
Until next time, stay faithful
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