You may be right, but I intend to escape this place.

This reminds me of the Illuminatus Trilogy, in which there's a fairly minor character who, about halfway through the third book IIRC, states: "I've determined that we're living in a book, and I think I've figured a way out."

He is not heard from again.

I thought that was so cool, just a minor thing but it says a lot about our goals: if we really want to leave this place for someplace better, we'll be finishing our stories here when we do go.

Just some thoughts on each of your points. 1) The level of biocontrol that immortality would imply would probably also be capable of producing virtually 100% effective birth control technology. Eliminating accidental pregnancies, happy or otherwise, should go a long way toward slowing pop. growth. In addition the elimination of infant mortality and a guarenteed healthy, wealthy life would probably further reduce the number of children produced simply because they are no longer seen as necessary to support you in your old age. Also, if uploading becomes possible, the resulting solid state civilization will probably use up a lot less space/energy/raw material than our own. My own (very rough) calculations indicate that if we could store one bit/atom we could store/simulate the equivalent of over 100 billion planets in a computational substrate made from Venus's atmosphere (or an equivalent mass or carbon). This will not eliminate the Malthus argument but it should slow it waaay down. 2)While thinking faster with sharper senses alone might not prevent boredom, other things can. The most direct approach (not necessarily the most desirable by any means) would be to simply erase memories of past experience so that it seemed new again. Another method would be to rewrite ones mind so that the infinite became engaging. Mathematics is said to be infinite and philosophy never seems to go out of style. The creation of virtual worlds and eventually universes would also be a good way of passing time. I believe Tipler has calculated that there are something like 10e10e106 possible universes that could exist. His Physice of Immortality actually addresses the issue of boredom or repetition at the Omega point in a closed universe. Some subpart of that might be relevant here. Finally, I believe that any society that achieve immortality would also eventually have to legalized suicide (even by death by old age) as a final option if the sheer weight of years just got to be too much. Ian Bainks' Culture novels address this rather well.

I've noticed that a sort of unspoken assumption whenever anyone speaks of modifying ourselves to live in space, underwater etc. is that the changes will be irreversible. With nanotech capable of generating the change in the first place, it should be no big deal to change back or change again if the mood strikes. I think that such changing would be much faster to be accepted then if it was a permanent one time thing.

I wish I could write them like that. Great link.

Most of my friends want to see in UV, but most don't want to lose their primitive 'assets' – although since we already are happy to engineer those for more fun already, it seems inevitable that it will happen.

That's an interesting choice of an enhancement… The retina can see UV. The lens of our eyes is yellowish, and blocks UV but people who has had cataracts removed can see UV (I don't know down to what wavelength). (Note: UV causes retinal damage, so this isn't prudent, but it is possible with current technology).

jbash writes

Ascending to the recent Judeo-Christian-Islamic concept of the unlimited, illimitable, and all-encompassing Godhead is pretty clearly not going to happen, but you might be able to make it rain pretty well in a certain valley…

Demi-godhood is immature, going the whole hog may be impractal (impraticable?) but is surely the obvious sight to aim for?

"Bigger than God" sounds good to me, warts and all. If it can't be done, we'll find out – but I defy you to prove that in our current, limited state.

Constraining yourself to this mode of being, or something similar but with greater control, just seems limp. I personally am intruiged to see if this form of universe, with 3D space and chronological event-chains is the only possible one. If not, why not be the creator (or at least, an explorer) of a different mode of existence?

Ambitious, perhaps. Immature?

Malthus was wrong because he failed to take account of new technology or information.

Immorbiditty is not the end result but a step along the road to universal power (or at least information), the getting of which does not require us to become monsters.

You assume Malthus was right because of the constraints of this universe. You may be right, but I intend to escape this place.

I want to be so informed that I can break free of the constraints of this this universe* or die trying. If this place is 'all' there is, I expect to do both sequentially.

It does not follow that the process makes men into monsters, any more than any other form of education does. The "Men who chase monsters should beware lest they become one" idea only applies in that I am chasing the very creation/fundamental itself – with the inevitable consequence for myself or like minds.

NB – on lack of dissimilar activities – self-similar paradigms may be boring to be inside, but appear to me extremely interesting when viewed as wholes – as ever, it is a question of perspective. Having read the thread your post started, I find the idea of narrowing of perspective unlikely to be useful – broadening of it strikes me as a much more interesting, and fruitful. I believe we currently refer to this as 'art'.

–

*(I use the term 'universe' loosely, since it it by definition encapsulates all)

Not just the kind of friends you have. Although most people appear shocked at first at the idea of transhumanism, (my friends seemed to imagine a boring time swanning around Earth being pretty forever), it a base concept for society as we know it – we currently try to do it through operations, even sports/training and education to some degree..

I think more people would be happy at the idea of something like a polymorphous body, so they could remain humanoid if they wished to.

Although transhumanists promoting redesign for space get jibes about brains in fish-bowls attatched to rockets, the re-engineering of the human body is a must if our current mortal shell (coil?) is to withstand the more exciting environments available, or even just for sheer information and experience processing powers.

Most of my friends want to see in UV, but most don't want to lose their primitive 'assets' – although since we already are happy to engineer those for more fun already, it seems inevitable that it will happen.

If it comes relatively slowly to social acceptance, the in-between stages should be quite amusing to watch, considering the extremes of fashion (ie peircings &c) and of cosmetic surgery (espially implants) currently undertaken.

It would appear the original link for the Telegraph story "Why science may bring curse of immortality" by Roger Highfield (#1778, 7 April 2000) doesn't work. This link here seems to work on 29/09/2000.

More interesting than the Telegraph story, is the original story by John Harris in Science (registration required probably) Intimations of Immortality [288(5463):59 (7 Apr 2000)], the subsequent Immortality, Anyone? [288(5470):1345-47 (26 May 2000)] and eDebates.

John Harris works at the University of Manchester. That is where Tom Kirkwood, one of the world's leading gerontologists, and the creator of the disposable soma theory of aging is also located. His recent book, Time of Our Lives , is one of the best books available discussing why aging occurs and how the process will become understood and interventions may be developed. Perhaps Kirkwood's book has prompted the comments by Harris.

Of course, I've been on record since 1994 (here) that lifespan extension will happen. (Nice to see others are finally catching up… ). People should not however, be seduced by projections that immortality is around the corner (the medical approvals for some of the processes may take decades) or even really feasible for humans in their current form. Given the accident rate currently prevalent in the U.S., if premature causes of death and aging were eliminated, accidents would limit average longevity to ~2000 years. The only way to go past the accident limit is by significantly altering the "form" in which your "self" is maintained, creating distributed, replicated intelligence. That will require significant human reengineering, such as continuous mind-state backups (by in vivo nanobots monitoring neural transmissions and high-bandwidth uplinks to save the experience data, "Borg-tech"), or full mind uploading so you are located virtual space.

However, if as Robin Hanson discusses uploads come first, effective "immortality" may only go to the early risk-takers. Alternatively, if a morality for conscious minds is developed (Greg Burch and perhaps JoSH Hall are working on this), then perhaps everyone will have a place for their mind and backup copies. My work on Matrioshka Brains has shown that the solar system seems to have resources sufficient to support a trillion trillion (>10²⁴) human mind equivalents.

It is worth noting, that at the current time it looks like immortality would be limited by the lifetime of protons, which is currently unknown but is certainly in excess of trillions of years.

The better URL for the Dyson Sphere/Shell FAQ is:
http://www.student.nada.kth. se/~nv91-asa/dysonFAQ.html.
It provides a list of the people who contributed to it.

I maintain a slightly enhanced copy of the FAQ, located here. I've also organized a Dyson Shell Reference Page, a more complete reference list for the many papers and sources about Dyson shells. (Depending on where you are working from, you may need to request personal permission to access these files.)

Will is correct. Dyson Shells built out of nanocomputers would have the processing capacity to hold on the order of a trillion trillion human minds. (Easily demonstrated because the brain is pretty poor 10W processor, while the sun produces ~10²⁶W.) If uploading is possible, and you don't allow endless copies (10-100 per person should be more than enough), then there is ample room for humanity to slowly grow and for humans to live trillions of years (until the protons decay).