Immortality

Thanks to Andro for accepting. This should be interesting. Observation:1. The heat death of the universe (when the immortal finally "dies") will take over 10^100 years. Thats trillions of trillions of trillions of years. 2. Remember, by definition immortality cannot be given up. Even if the person becomes dissatisfied with their life, they are forced to live on. I've balanced this for Pro by ensuring that her immortal person won't get any permanent disability or illness. C1: Infinite probabilityThe probability of any bad thing happening is 100% over a time period of infinity. So caught inside a tornado - 100%. Engulfed in volcano eruption - 100%. Get trapped under an avalanche - 100%. You can TRY to avoid unlucky things like this, but even if the chance of any of these things happening is 0.000000001% in a normal human life, that becomes 100% over an infinite timeline. To show the implication, I'll specifically pick out the volcano example. Note that Earth won't be around forever (covered later), but assuming it did, over infinity the chances of being caught in a volcano eruption are 100%. After the lava cools it will form a solid cement that will seal off any exits. You would be trapped under hundreds of pounds of volcano cement which would sizzle in heat for weeks. Sleep would become impossible, and the pain and would quickly cause insanity. Apply this to any other low-probability disaster.C2: Eternal boredomAssume you use your immortality wisely. You've got to make the MOST out of your time, right?So you go out, go skydiving, go see the Grand Canyon, visit the Statue of Liberty, meet the president, whatever. You fulfill your entire bucket list. Unfortunately, there's only so many things the universe has to offer. Over an infinite time period, you'll eventually do all there is to do. Entertainment is finite. How do you enjoy life after you've done everything? An immortal person would eventually go into a state of eternal boredom, as all forms of entertainment the universe has to offer have been depleted. C3: Human extinctionHumans as a species will not survive for 10^100 more years. Scientist Frank Fenner speculates that humans might be wiped out in as little as 100 (1). Even if thats too pessimistic, anything beyond 1000 seems unlikely. At some point, Earth won't sustain the human race anymore. This will be a big problem for the immortal person who has to live on. Almost every single thing we enjoy relies on other humans in some way or another. For instance, all our electronics rely on people working at the electric company. Most of our food is processed by machines controlled by other people. Transportation devices (cars, planes) require fuel thats controlled by industries run by humans. When humans go extinct the immortal person will have none of these. So the optimistic thought of someone living a life of luxury for all time is an illusion.With no modern technology and no human interaction, the immortal will eventually revert back to caveman status as there will be no human race to sustain energy sources. No human interaction will quickly cause depression, loneliness, and feralization. The result will be something similar to a Feral Child, which is a human who is basically turned into a wild animal due to lack of exposure to human civilization (2). A study by the US National Institute of Health finds that face-to-face human contact with other people is strongly associated with a lower probability of depression (3). So take that away and depression becomes infinitely more likely. Finally, someone who lives forever will be forced to watch as any person they ever love or have connections with dies around them. C4: Planetary destructionEarth isn't going to last 10^100 years, and neither will any other planet. There are currently 186 asteroids that have an impact risk of hitting Earth, any of which would cause a "global calamity" (4). There's also the possibility of a nuclear war, making the planet uninhabitable. Over a time period of infinity, a black hole would at some point approach our solar system and consume it. Then its really going to suck that you can't die. When the planet is destroyed then you'll be stuck floating in oxygen-less space for hundreds of years before you ever hit something. The suffering from being unable to breathe and having no food or water would drive you insane. This applies to any other method where the planet doesn't survive. And the sun is going out in 5 billion years (5). That means no light, no trees (and thus no oxygen), and no life, since every food chain starts with plants. But the immortal still cannot die, he is forced to live and suffer in a world with no food, light, or oxygen. C5: Universal timelineA planetless universe (whereby an immortal person would have no pleasures to gain and would merely be stranded in space) is inevitable. By 10^14 years from now, star formation will end. The only things remaining in the universe will be "compact stars" which already existed (6). Life on these is NOT pleasant as they are millions of degrees hot. There are several other phases the source describes that the universe will go through before it ends, but all of them have one thing in common: no life. Which makes immortality pretty pointless as there's nothing left to enjoy, and they're just stuck floating around in space for trillions of years as the universe collapses on top of them. Thus, acquiring immortality would not be a rational choice for an individual to make.1. http://www.smartplanet.com...2. http://en.wikipedia.org...3. http://gateway.nlm.nih.gov...4. http://www.theatlantic.com...5. http://www.universetoday.com...6. http://en.wikipedia.org...