The Immortality Project (needs critique)
Created | Updated Mar 11, 2013
Immortality can be seen as either a blessing or a curse, in the same way that death can dependant on your worldview. In this writer's humble opinion, immortality is by far the lesser of two evils as nobody wants to cease to exist, but other people are not so solely driven by survival instinct as I am. Eternal boredom is, in a lot of ways, much better than either eternal oblivion or being led off somewhere by Samael, Angel of Death. And as most sensible people don't want to go and off themselves in order to discuss it personally with him, it is likely to remain a mystery for quite a long while yet.
The idea of immortality, as well as the question of what truly happens after one shuffles off this mortal coil (or in some cases, flies off at high speed well before their alloted time, leaving Mr. Reaper with a short bit where he can put his feet up before the next bloke pops his clogs, maybe have a cup of tea and a chat to Mrs. S) have puzzled mankind since they first looked at a tiger eating a rabbit and wondered 'What truly is life?'
That is not what this entry is going into. There are plenty of people a lot more philosophically qualified than I am that are more than welcome to dig in to that particular rotting carcass.
What this article is going to dig its filth-encrusted teeth into is the $5-million grant the University of California has been given by the US Government to answer the actual Big Question: 'What happens after we die?' They have also, curiously enough, been asked to answer several questions that most people could probably answer after some serious pondering:
- Is it irrational to desire immortality? (Depends on your viewpoint.)
- Could a belief in immortality affect an individual’s character? (It most certainly does.)
- Would an afterlife existence be boring or monotonous? (Again, depends on your viewpoint.)
- Does death provide a meaning to life? (Once again, this one totally depends on one's personal views.)
- Can we learn about the meaning of life from pondering about immortality? (This one is a little trickier. Many people have been pondering these questions for years but have come up with no answer to the Ultimate Question apart from the obvious '42'. And since they knew the answer anyway, there was no need to be pondering the question.)
As far as I am currently aware, there are no results of this project despite the fact it has been going for about six months at the time of writing. I am aware that scientific queries generally take a long while, but in my opinion philosophy isn't so much a science as its own entity completely. And trying to philosophically debate whether a lot of things which are totally up to the individual anyway is about as productive as trying to stick your big toe up your own left nostril. Another thing that they have completely neglected to mention about all this is what they actually want to achieve from this study, which is quite an important thing to mention if you want anyone to take something like this seriously.
One thing that is to be commended about the Immortality Project is their choice of individual to spearhead this study as a whole. John Martin Fischer, Professor of Philosophy from the University of California, is more than qualified enough to tackle this, the hardest of all studies, but even he might have his hands full with this one. This is a real turlingdrome of a study into the one thing which affects everyone on Earth but nobody knows really anything about.
In summary, this is an interesting project (if slightly ambitious in this researcher's opinion) and I for one will be following this study until its final triumphant conclusion in July 2015. That or mine, whichever comes first.
The idea of immortality, as well as the question of what truly happens after one shuffles off this mortal coil (or in some cases, flies off at high speed well before their alloted time, leaving Mr. Reaper with a short bit where he can put his feet up before the next bloke pops his clogs, maybe have a cup of tea and a chat to Mrs. S) have puzzled mankind since they first looked at a tiger eating a rabbit and wondered 'What truly is life?'
That is not what this entry is going into. There are plenty of people a lot more philosophically qualified than I am that are more than welcome to dig in to that particular rotting carcass.
What this article is going to dig its filth-encrusted teeth into is the $5-million grant the University of California has been given by the US Government to answer the actual Big Question: 'What happens after we die?' They have also, curiously enough, been asked to answer several questions that most people could probably answer after some serious pondering:
- Is it irrational to desire immortality? (Depends on your viewpoint.)
- Could a belief in immortality affect an individual’s character? (It most certainly does.)
- Would an afterlife existence be boring or monotonous? (Again, depends on your viewpoint.)
- Does death provide a meaning to life? (Once again, this one totally depends on one's personal views.)
- Can we learn about the meaning of life from pondering about immortality? (This one is a little trickier. Many people have been pondering these questions for years but have come up with no answer to the Ultimate Question apart from the obvious '42'. And since they knew the answer anyway, there was no need to be pondering the question.)
As far as I am currently aware, there are no results of this project despite the fact it has been going for about six months at the time of writing. I am aware that scientific queries generally take a long while, but in my opinion philosophy isn't so much a science as its own entity completely. And trying to philosophically debate whether a lot of things which are totally up to the individual anyway is about as productive as trying to stick your big toe up your own left nostril. Another thing that they have completely neglected to mention about all this is what they actually want to achieve from this study, which is quite an important thing to mention if you want anyone to take something like this seriously.
One thing that is to be commended about the Immortality Project is their choice of individual to spearhead this study as a whole. John Martin Fischer, Professor of Philosophy from the University of California, is more than qualified enough to tackle this, the hardest of all studies, but even he might have his hands full with this one. This is a real turlingdrome of a study into the one thing which affects everyone on Earth but nobody knows really anything about.
In summary, this is an interesting project (if slightly ambitious in this researcher's opinion) and I for one will be following this study until its final triumphant conclusion in July 2015. That or mine, whichever comes first.
