Talk:Immortality/Archive 1

message: If anyone is good at resizing the pictures that would probably help.  Right now some pictures are much bigger than others.
: I agree that the pictures need to be resized and layed out better. But before that, I'm a bit concerned about their copyrights. None of their descriptions contain copyright info, and some of them are retrieved from message board posts, so it's difficult to determine who took them and whether they allow them to be used. For the bristlecone pine, it would be nice to find a photo by the Forest Service, because that would likely be public domain (a work of the federal government). For the symbols of immortality, old scetches would be certain to be public domain. Without valid copyright info the photos would likely have to be removed, although I don't think it would really hurt this page too much if they're missing. The ones that I think are the most relevant are those regarding the symbols of immortality. Eisnel 23:14, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I tracked down copyright information for four images. One is a definite copyvio and I have removed it. Two are probable copyvios, I will leave them a bit to see if someone wants to contact the owners for permission. The fourth is free for non-commercial use, which means it is not a copyvio but also that it is not suitable for WP, and a replacement should be sought. Securiger 14:33, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pictures 

message: Wow, I wrote this article as a proto-effort at a conference paper I later gave.  People have really taken it to town by evolving it into something really nice. -- Brinticus
I agree the article is getting much better.  I will try to complete some of the stub paragraphs.  My only concern before submitting for a feature article is the pictures.  They are good but as the poster above mentioned there may be copyright problems.  It would be a big help if someone who understands wikipedia's copyright rules could replace or fix the current ones.  Chubtoad 10:30, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article 

message: Right now there are two separate sections with overly long titles ("6 Unending existence is too simple a condition for immortality" and "7 The freedom from concerns of annihilation and death is insufficient for immortality"). I think we should instead create a section on what it means to be immortal and what conditions are necessary / sufficient. It should be more general than just giving these two particular concerns. Paranoid 11:02, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sufficient and necessary conditions 

message: If this does not occur, then one unexpected side effect may be that humans become extremely risk averse. For example, being a soldier and risking one's life to defend something they believe in may seem reasonable if one only expects to live another few decades in their full capacity. However, if you expect to live 1000 years in prime health, unless you run into an unfortunate accident, then the desirability of even slightly risky activities will drop precipitously.
:This makes a number of odd conclusions which are by no means NPOV or even likely to occur to all reasonable persons. Lets be very careful of POV in this article, it seems to have crept in. Sam [Spade] 22:24, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: It is however a common speculation that arises in science fiction and futurologist discussions on the implications of immortality. I think it should be included, provided it's properly qualified as being a speculation and placed in the appropriate section of the article. Bryan 16:27, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Removed from article

message: :Before the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the only seriously considered methods of achieving immortality involved a continued existence of a person in one form or another after physical death.
I may be not understanding but what about simply not dying? --Error 00:57, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Earlier

message: I think that Taoism gave a lot of importance to the quest for immortality. --Error 00:57, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I wonder why the Eight Immortals aren't mentioned, even briefly, in the article?--T. Anthony 15:02, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

text: That's a verry good question.--Eternal Imortal 21:19, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Very good suggestion for inclusion.  It's likely not here because the contributors to this article have thus far been focusing on Immortality in Western Culture, suggesting that to have other cultures included in this article, someone with more knowledge in that area would have to contribute... or someone can do research if they want to make this article really great. --Balrog30 08:11, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Tao

message: Having come to this article by way of the VfD page on Physical Immortalism I was struck by the difference in tone between the two articles.  Immortality is longer, has more info (and a section on Physical Immortality, but it had a subtle POV to it that bothered me.  I recommended that the two articles be merged and Immortality be re-worked to make it NPOV.  Now it is up to me to point out what I find objectionable POV about this article.  
1. Christian Bias - Christianity is listed first, followed by Judaism, Islam, and then other, older world religions.  This is neither alphabetic nor chronistic arragement:  What is the principle at work here?  Catagories at the bottom only list "Christian eschatology"...  Do I need to do more to make my case?  Christianity should not have this pride of place.  That is a distortion of knowledge.
* I've taken the liberty of putting them in alphabetical order. Teflon Don 00:30, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV Dispute 

message: Should this article maybe include a section on the various people out there who claim to be able to sell you immortality for a fee, such as Alex Chiu with his "immortality rings"? In terms of evidence and results, such devices are no less successful than the immortality promises of the various religions etc. already listed. --StoatBringer 00:02, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Non-mainstream immortality 

message: I'm not completely sure but I have heard that the production of nanobots is impossible. Is anyone sure?
:Why would it be impossible?  From what I understand, people are already working on nanotechnology (especially for medical purposes).  It's not impossible, it's only a matter of having instruments small or fine enough to assemble them.  From what I understand, the smaller a microchip is, the better it works.  I could be mistaken, though.  MasterXiam 18:13, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: You're right, smaller microchips work better, simply because there's less distance to travel and you can fit more stuff in the same area. (Er...maybe. That's just common sense talking, which has little say in the real world.) If nanobots were impossible, surely Star trek and suchlike would stop using them? since one of their secondary purposes is to convey a possible, if improbable future...(once again common sense, which doesn't apply in the Real world. I felt like replying.)Vimescarrot 23:29, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a limit to how small a microchip can go though, which is when the tracks become thinner than an electron (because the electron is obviously too big to pass along the track). Because of this I believe that alternative forms of data transmission are being researched, such as using light. Hellfire83 13:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  nanobots 

message: I noticed that the page was underrepresenting the view that immortality is either impossible or unlikely, which is a majority point of view in the scientific community and the atheist or skeptical school of thought.  This is something that editors should consider as well in making the article NPOV. Shawnc 21:31, 21 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Is the possibilty of immortality really a minority opinion in the scientific community? I would think most scientists would be agnostic about it.  KHM03 22:47, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, it is definitely a minority position.  This is because immortality is theoretically impossible, as dictated by Entropy and the Second Law of Thermodynamics.  A more rational position than immortality would be indefinite lifespan, one in which we may have acquired some control over mortality, but with the admission that full control is impossible (again because of the Law of Entropy), and that life could be snatched away from us at any moment.  Even if you can keep rejuvenating a person so that he could live on and on, it's not going to help him much when he gets smashed between a careening bus and a tree, or his airplane is highjacked by 19 suicidal terrorists who fly it into a skyscraper, or if he gets hit by lightning, or if his home is hit by an earthquake, avalanche, mudslide, wildfire, flash flood, hurricane, tornado, tsunami, volcanic erruption, meteor, comet, or nuclear bomb.  On the other hand, if you manage to upload your consciousness into a computer and backup your mind onto 10,000 subsystems, it would take a doomsday device to kill you, unless you managed to get off this rock before it was launched by the Unholy Jihad.  Actuarial analysis of death rates has determined that even if you remove all other causes of death, the average lifespan would level out at around 600 years (given our current level of safety) due to accidental death.  You could of course improve your odds by always wearing a helmet.  :o)  Go for it! 16:16, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

text: OK.  KHM03 16:52, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Er...well, you can survive being hit by lightning.Vimescarrot 23:28, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Skeptical POVs 

message: *Please see Talk:Succubus#Regarding_addition_of_erotic_stories.  If it gets put to a debate, it should probably affect my edits to this article as well. Danny Lilithborne 21:42, 4 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Addition of erotic stories from ASSTR 

message: This article is awfully long, and the Fiction section seems to be the on which would be best spun-off into a sub-topic - just a thought. KillerChihuahua 16:50, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Fiction section

message: I edited the Buddhist views on immortality a bit, mainly because it was somehow different than a buddhist's view. And for buddist rebirth being similar to hinduism and jainism, please check again, as it is different. Reincarnation, something that reincarnates (as in immortal soul), for hindusim and Rebirth, something that is (not immortal, but rather a rebirth... a bit more complicated), for Buddhism. Monkey Brain 02:50, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Buddhism 

message: This article needs to be incorporate the idea of immortality as exhibited by the Borg. Specifically, the Borg is a superorganism, made by cybernetically linking multiple biological intelligences into a single mind. There are no "individuals" within the Borg; there is only the Borg. Parts of the Borg may die, but its consciousness and intelligence is eternal. --Amit 07:44, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Borg 

message: i think some of the "immortality in fiction" need to be deleted, or at least consolidated into a couple of paragraphs instead of taking up  half the article. Because 
1.  Listing every reference in modern media to immortality will make a very boring article 
2.  its irrelevant? who is coming onto this page thinking "hmm, i wonder what popular tv shows or anime series have used the concept of immortality"82.21.150.24 01:55, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok I have removed some of the examples listed, based on the criteria: do they say anything about immortality, or are they just saying "In fiction X, the character is immortal". 82.21.150.24 02:01, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  irrelevant information 

message: This article suffers from an extreme lack of sources and an abundance of Original Research. The whole 'quantum thought experiment' for instance. Wikipedia is not a place for editors musings on given topics. All opinions must be sourced to notable sources. Ashmoo 01:23, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Regarding the Quantum immortality section, it's looking pretty gross.  An article should not blatantly contradict itself within the same section like that.  Either correct the statement that is in error, or remove it altogether.  That section just makes this article look really bad.--Balrog30 05:22, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Sources & Original Research

message: I don't mean to dampen your enthusiasm Eternal Imortal ([sic] Immortal?), but your contribution is full spelling errors, unwikified references and material that adds very little to the preceeding or following paragraph. Life extension and rejuvenation are touched on in those paragraphs and  following the wikilinks to the articles reveals much better and more accurate detail. This is not the place for such detail. For these reasons, I am reverting your entry. --GirlForLife 05:09, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Bad spelling and weak information

message: This morning I corrected the introductory sentence that equalled "immortality" with "eternal life" to read as follows:
"Immortality (in this place I deleted "(or eternal life)") is the concept of living for a potentially infinite, or indeterminate, length of time. (The following sentence I added:) It is distinct from eternal life which is the concept of an exceedingly superior qualify of life than the present that is not governed by time."
I stumbled across the article on "immortality" when I tried to create a link to the article on "eternal life" and found myself re-directed to the article on "immortality". Though only an infrequent contributor to Wikipedia, I am nevertheless aware of the possibilility that a correct point can be deleted by a later editor simply because a particular article happens to be on a subject on which emotions run high so that it sadly turns out to be a matter of who perseveres the longest and not who states the facts or truth. Could this also be the case with this article on "immortality"?
Admittedly, there is much scope for improvement of the sentence that I added after the introductory sentence in order to ensure that other visitors to the site do not perhaps swallow the equation of "eternal life" with "immortality". And so I hope that someone with more time and greater competence than I will take this in hand, and also write a Wikipedia article on "eternal life".
What I object to, however, is that a subsequent editor simply deleted the distinction as regards "eternal life" that I had added, and that obviously unlearned subsequent editor, at least on this subject, said that the deletion had been made because what I had added "seemed arbitrary without sources". For all I remember, it is among the basics that students of philosophy of religion are being taught, though as I already admitted, the point can surely be stated more accurately and eloquently than I managed.
As for my part, and many share this hope, I am not looking forward to immortality, nor everlasting life, which can amount to no more than an infinite drawing out of this present misery, but only to Life Eternal, the quality of which I tried to hint at with the description "exceedingly superior", which is the only hope that keeps me going here in time, and many with the same theological outlook.
This distinction is not shared by everyone; but in the Wikipedia spirit of fairness it must not be suppressed.
86.136.188.189 22:11, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It was reverted to comply with WP:LEAD#Provide_an_accessible_overview - specifically the bits that refer to specialized uses and citing sources. The most basic definition of "immortality" is simply "not subject to death." Your personal views on the distinction are not really encyclopedia quality and certainly don't justify changing the basic definition presented in the lead section. CovenantD 19:31, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

text: It is not just his personal view, it is a logical conclusion CovenantD. See the definition of eternity.--Eternal Imortal 20:59, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: What I see there is an article with no citations and only one philosophical and one biblical mention. Nothing indicates that it is a well-referenced entry that this one should depend on. Nor have you addressed the points I raised about the guidelines for the Lead section. Please read about Original Research on why this "conclusion" shouldn't be included in it's current form. CovenantD 21:15, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unhelpful deletion of an edit 

message: it looks much better this way!Starovoytov 15:57, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sorry!