It may be that the future is really already determined, as firmly unchangeable as the past. We have tools to conquer nature, but not the wisdom to merge into it. SF probes alternative possible futures by means of reasoned extrapolations in much the same way that good historical fiction reconstructs the probable past. If a race lived long enough it would learn everything there is to know. We'll all shut up before long.
Dead beings are all pretty quiet.
The bad thing about dying, is that you leave someone grieving. The Animal part of man always frets under discipline. Human belief is seldom related to truth. Search Web site created by Andre Vandal in Montreal, Quebec on an Apple iMac.