Live Long Enough to Live Forever
Scientist Ray Kurzweil is planning on living forever. In his book : "Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever”, he urges us all to do the same so that we can be around to take advantage of the coming explosion in technology that he claims will make it possible to extend our life span indefinitely.
He writes of tiny robots the size of blood cells that will patrol your body repairing bones, arteries and brain cells and Internet downloads to upgrade your DNA. The idea is as far fetched as his desired life span.
Banking on a Questionable Future
Do you know anyone who died soon after they retired, with a head full of plans left unfulfilled? Me too.
To wait until you are in your 60’s to do what you want to do with your life is just too risky. And to preserve your health now so that you can be around for the nanobots to carry you off into inestimable longevity is plain ridiculous.
No matter how many supplements we aim at our innards (Kurzweil apparently takes 250) everyone eventually gets old, or sick and dies.
Someone told me 10 years ago that by now his heart condition would be totally curable due to the incredible advances in stem cell technology. Yet here we are, the ten years are up, and the cure didn’t come. It’s not even close.
The time to live is now. The time to act is now. This is the material world, and we, it’s residents are temporary. We always have been and we always will be. We cannot change the rules.
Kurzweil states "Death is a tragedy - a process of suffering that rids the world of its most tested, experienced members -- people whose contributions to science and the arts could only multiply with agelessness.”
Death is not a tragedy. It is the unavoidable end of a journey that will come to us all. A tragedy is when, at that inevitable time of death, someone has not contributed to the world in a positive way. To die having wasted the gift of time is a tragedy. Nowhere is it written that longevity or immortality is a guarantee of greatness. I’ve met people who would be a living nightmare if they were still rattling around at 150! And I’ve met others who have achieved wonders by their forties.
Time is only part of the equation, it’s what we do with it that defines whether we are contributors or not.
“Live as if you will die tomorrow, learn as if you will live forever.”
--Mahatma Gandhi--