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advancedatheist comments on Why people want to die - Less Wrong
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Death just isn't that big a deal. The desire to live forever—even in a scenario where one could stay young and vigorous—seems very odd to me.
I grew up an Evangelical Christian. We took heaven very seriously and quite literally. Being obsessed with living forever in heaven seemed like a great idea at the time, though it may have been largely due to the fact a literal never-ending-human-oven version of hell was the only other option on the table.
When I stopped Christianing and started thinking, it took a while, but violent opposition to my death went away. Of course, it's still pretty much the biggest roadblock in my future, because it's... well, death. But it's not a problem that requires a solution anymore. It's gonna happen. Oh well.
I think it's cool that smart people like the LWers and others like them might beat biological death one day—through anti-aging, or cryonics and mind uploading, or whatever. But I don't think it's going to be the game changer they seem to think it will be. Problems will still abound.
Eventually I guess you could just wirehead everyone to experience perfect blissful ecstasy for all eternity. Maybe that would solve the Universe.
Or else Immortal Supermen(TM) would have progressed so far that they will enjoy wireheading as an occasional treat, like drinking a glass of some highly regarded wine with dinner.
No. The proper wireheading would max out your utility all the time forever. This would be the one scenario I think the anti-deathists can use to prove death is bad. If everything was perfect for everyone all the time forever, then immortality seems okay.
A significant portion of humanity believes that death will bring them to a state indistinguishable from wireheading (everything perfect, nothing changes).
If you mean heaven, then yes. And this is the argument a proponent of immortality could make that seems solid to me.
It could still be argued this 'heaven' situation is no better than not existing, since not existing via death can't be compared to living in any meaningful way.