Would You Want To Be Imortal?

Well, I have something to say. Ever read (or see) Tuck Everlasting? It deals with this kind of stuff. After reading that, I'd HATE to be immortal.

Oooh. I think I read that once.

I would be immortal on the terms that I could end my own life if I wanted.

if I was immortal I would rule a country or own a business and devote all my time into it. This will keep me unemotionally attached to any one because all my focus will be onto it. My business, country will be owned by me making it immortal just like me, meaning I would have an attachment to sanity. Thats just my idea of keeping sane if I were in an immortal position.

The alien ship was already thundering towards the upper reaches
of the atmosphere, on its way out into the appalling void which
separates the very few things there are in the Universe from each
other.

Its occupant, the alien with the expensive complexion, leaned
back in its single seat. His name was Wowbagger the Infinitely
Prolonged. He was a man with a purpose. Not a very good purpose,
as he would have been the first to admit, but it was at least a
purpose and it did at least keep him on the move.

Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged was --indeed, is - one of the
Universe's very small number of immortal beings.

Those who are born immortal instinctively know how to cope with
it, but Wowbagger was not one of them. Indeed he had come to hate
them, the load of serene b******s. He had had his immortality
thrust upon him by an unfortunate accident with an irrational
particle accelerator, a liquid lunch and a pair of rubber bands.
The precise details of the accident are not important because no
one has ever managed to duplicate the exact circumstances under
which it happened, and many people have ended up looking very
silly, or dead, or both, trying.

Wowbagger closed his eyes in a grim and weary expression, put
some light jazz on the ship's stereo, and reflected that he could
have made it if it hadn't been for Sunday afternoons, he really
could have done.

To begin with it was fun, he had a ball, living dangerously,
taking risks, cleaning up on high-yield long-term investments,
and just generally outliving the hell out of everybody.

In the end, it was the Sunday afternoons he couldn't cope with,
and that terrible listlessness which starts to set in at about
2.55, when you know that you've had all the baths you can
usefully have that day, that however hard you stare at any given
paragraph in the papers you will never actually read it, or use
the revolutionary new pruning technique it describes, and that as
you stare at the clock the hands will move relentlessly on to
four o'clock, and you will enter the long dark teatime of the
soul.

So things began to pall for him. The merry smiles he used to wear
at other people's funerals began to fade. He began to despise the
Universe in general, and everyone in it in particular.

This was the point at which he conceived his purpose, the thing
which would drive him on, and which, as far as he could see,
would drive him on forever. It was this.

He would insult the Universe.

(I love Douglas Adams)

LOL, a man with a purpose is probably the only type of person who could stand being immortal.

i would wat to have super powers :P and i want loads of aliens and war and i would become tyrant of the universe

It depends on how you view immortality like it has been said before. If you view it as you can't die, then it sounds bad. If you have ever seen Doctor Who, and view it like that it sounds not to bad. If it was like Doctor Who, and I could do things then it would alright. also since he has a time and space machine you could go where ever you wanted.

I dunno. With neighbours like mine, floating alone in space for a few hundred years seems pretty tempting.:rolleyes:

I view it as a man never being able to die, immortality as the gods of old. As that I would love it, attachments are what you make of them. For instance, friends come and go so do acquaintances. With that in mind I think as long as you don't constantly try to have a family your sanity would be fine.

As for a purpose, as someone detached from the short sightedness we all have as humans with limited time on this planet, your purpose could be to record history as it happens. This would give you a different view than anyone else. As someone who will be there until the end of time you would have a fuller scope of the universe and be able to see events for what they are and how they actually effect mankind.

With that in mind you would also be able to make additions to your observations of history and record the after effects. Such as, how a particular event shaped a nation or effected the world 20-50yrs after it happened. Or what particular events had unseen influence on mankind without anyone realizing it.

Also, you would be there when mankind expands their horizons beyond our own solar system. At some point you might just start to meet other civilizations on other planets. So no matter what happened to Earth in the future, you would always have a way of surviving and traveling. And if anyone ever saw the Highlander series of movies, you could literally learn every language and whatever you wanted. You could get a PHD in many different fields over time and become a god yourself in knowledge alone.