nshepperd comments on How to Seem (and Be) Deep - Less Wrong
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How does a transhumanist respond to a person that wants to die? Like not in the future in a "death has X benefit" way, but an actual concrete "I'm going to finish up these things here and then put on my nice shoes and die" way?
Supposedly there exist transhumanists who don't subscribe to immortalism, as the other two commenters seem to be trying to say, but less helpfully. Probably a more precise formulation of your question would thus be "how does a transhumanist immortalist respond to a person that wants to die?"
That out of the way, my direct response would probably be "here's the number for the suicide hotline". If they don't actually seem to be in any real danger of killing themselves any time soon, I might ask them what they hope to gain by dying today.
See, I feel like suicide hotlines are for people who don't want to live, which isn't quite the same thing? What if they do give you a concrete answer. Is there any answer they could give that would pop them out of the "death is bad" bubble? Like, what if they say they feel like their death is part of some weird, creative, performance art thing?
Thank you for helpfulness! I understand the distinction now. =)
I think suicide hotlines are for anyone who wants to die, although if someone has really though it through I doubt they'd be swayed by the advice of someone who was expecting a depressed teenager.