# Why doesn't SF talk more about likely Immortality and automation?



## JoanDrake (Feb 23, 2013)

As I examine the way the world is changing now I see two trends which will  likely have the most effect on the way people's lives will be led a century or more hence. The first is immortality and the second is automation, (and by automation I mean nearly total automation of nearly everything, where humans will be able to have nearly anything made cheaply and quickly. The result being a "post scarcity" economy where anyone will be able to live at a very high standard with very little or no work at all)

Make no mistake, most scientists I read say that both are coming and within a generation, maybe two at the most.

Now to say that either of these things will have a profound effect on mankind is so obvious a truism that to me it seems that anyone who writes about our possible future(s) is completely ignoring reality to speculate much on the future of anything else.

Why is this? And/or what do you think that the effects of such developments will be?


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## Harpo (Feb 23, 2013)

Developments might include a fall in the birthrate - to prevent overcrowding of an immortal-peopled world.  And a post-scarcity economy might mean that we can indeed build city-sized spacecraft in which to explore the galaxy, with our immortality allowing us the luxury of seeing everything along the way of a millenia-long space voyage.
James Blish's "Cities In Flight" series shows one of the possibilities that might follow.


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## Steve Jordan (Feb 25, 2013)

I think most scientists that believe we will achieve either immortality or a "post-scarcity" economy within 1-2 generations are being overly optimistic and ignoring the realities of the modern world.

Despite medical science's advances, there are many areas of life extension research that are proceeding at a snail's pace, if at all... and all of them will need to be conquered in order to indefinitely extend life.  And if that can be done, the impact of an undying population on a planet already overcrowded with very demanding humans (by a factor of 10,000, at least) would be catastrophic.

Also, I wouldn't want to be around in a world where a lucky few people obtained immortality and lived on the backs of us mortals.  The riots would be _epic_.

The "post-scarcity" economy also assumes products being made for nothing, which is patently absurd.  Raw materials have to be gathered from somewhere.  The energy to run the machines must come from somewhere. The energy to run all the toys made by the machines must come from somewhere.  Equipment must be maintained... usually manually.  Presently, the most valuable of production materials come from places like Afghanistan, where locals do not largely share in the value of the resources being pulled from the ground around them.  How long do you think countries like that will stand by while New World countries get "free" products for comfy living?

In our real world, neither idea is strong enough to overcome the practical and ideological mountains that block them anytime soon.  Maybe in 1-200 years.  1-2 _generations_?  Don't see it.


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## Sourdust (Feb 25, 2013)

JoanDrake said:


> Make no mistake, most scientists I read say that both are coming and within a generation, maybe two at the most.



The imminence of scientific immortality is a fantasy dating back over a century: John Gray's recent book _The Immortalization Commission: Science and the Strange Quest to Cheat Death_ gives an interesting account of this history, and the crypto-religious hopes driving it. Some would dismiss Gray as a reactionary pessimist who refuses to believe in the concept of progress, but he's worth reading.

As for fiction, arguably the most significant story about immortality is Borges's 'The Immortal' (1949), which effectively posits that unending life would lead to the disintegration of human identity. There are intimations of similar ideas in certain sf works, notably Cordwainer Smith's Instrumentality of Mankind and its cyberpunk descendant, Bruce Sterling's Shaper/Mechanist universe (the novel _Schismatrix_ and its satellite stories), in which the characters try to extend their lives indefinitely through the competing options of genetic enhancement and technological augmentation, with sometimes gruesome results.

This of course leads to the question of 'posthumanism' - brains uploaded to computers, etc - thoroughly explored in the 90s stories of Greg Egan, and probably many other authors I haven't read.

Back to the question of real-world implementation, while I am sure that the next few centuries will see the development of various biotechnologies attempting to halt or reverse the ageing process, it will be a long, probably quite ugly and ungainly struggle, and I would suspect that any significant extension of human life would be accompanied by the growth of a euthanasia industry (voluntary or otherwise). As Steve points out above, the political implications would be vicious.


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## Stephen Palmer (Feb 26, 2013)

Steve Jordan said:


> I think most scientists that believe we will achieve either immortality or a "post-scarcity" economy within 1-2 generations are being overly optimistic and ignoring the realities of the modern world.


 
My thoughts too. Hasn't this been the way of it since technology got a grip on the Western world? "This device will reduce the time you spend doing stuff." Right. It never did, and it never will - it's just a way of making money by exploitation.


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## Nerds_feather (Feb 26, 2013)

JoanDrake said:


> As I examine the way the world is changing now I see two trends which will  likely have the most effect on the way people's lives will be led a century or more hence. The first is immortality and the second is automation, (and by automation I mean nearly total automation of nearly everything, where humans will be able to have nearly anything made cheaply and quickly. The result being a "post scarcity" economy where anyone will be able to live at a very high standard with very little or no work at all)
> 
> Make no mistake, most scientists I read say that both are coming and within a generation, maybe two at the most.
> 
> ...



Joan--have you read "Katabasis" by Robert Reed? It's in this issue of *F&SF*. Really interesting mediation on immortality and extended life.


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## Parson (Feb 26, 2013)

JoanDrake said:


> Make no mistake, most scientists I read say that both are coming and within a generation, maybe two at the most.
> 
> Now to say that either of these things will have a profound effect on mankind is so obvious a truism that to me it seems that anyone who writes about our possible future(s) is completely ignoring reality to speculate much on the future of anything else.
> 
> Why is this? And/or what do you think that the effects of such developments will be?



I doubt either of these in anything but an extremely long run. Our view of what life is like and could be like is extremely jaded by being privileged Westerners. (I don't believe you are thinking of some kind of spiritual immortality, and that for me is very different kettle of fish indeed.)

As to SF with immortality a basic plot premise, I believe that they are still being written. The most recent example for me is the " A Galaxy Unknown" series by Thomas DePrima. It is not a major thrust of the story yet. But I sense that it is coming.


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## BetaWolf (May 8, 2013)

I'd keep the door open on biological vs. spiritual immortality. The conflict there could create a lot of nice tension. The mad scientist works to resurrect his lady love so they can both live forever, but she was rather enjoying the afterlife. . . . 

Some of the more interesting approaches IMHO (also decent films incidentally) are Asimov's Bicentennial Man and Richard Matheson's What Dreams May Come. I saw the latter movie a few years ago, and I want to get the book now. It draws on theosophical ideas about reincarnation and so forth, which might fit well in a SF story--whether science and spirituality will meet together in the end if you will. I embrace the notion that they will.


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## Vertigo (May 9, 2013)

I think life extension rather than immortality is probably pretty close now within a couple of generations (just look at how far genetics has come in the last 50 years). Implications on population are obviously enormous but in general I'd say this has been explored and is still being explored in loads of books. Off the top of my head, some books with it include: Hamilton's Commonwealth/Void, Moon's Serrano, Robinson's Mars and so many more. I'm sure it will come and I'm equally sure we will have some major social issues to overcome when it arrives.

Free everything for everyone. This relies upon two things: free energy and unlimited resources. Free energy is a possibility, if we ever get fusion generators going (and efficient) and, believe me, we have to get that one sorted to continue our current way of life (at least in the developed countries). Unlimited resources is a bigger problem. Sure with unlimited free energy all farming could be done by robots and be theoretically free, so basic necessities like food and clothing possibly. But anything requiring limited resources - oil (plastics etc.), minerals etc. - are not suddenly going to find those resources unlimited (okay minerals possibly from space but I think that's more than a couple of generations away). So I think everyone _might _have free basic necessities in the near future but not free everything. You come across this one as background in masses of SF writing both old and new.


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## BetaWolf (May 10, 2013)

I admit that basic necessities could be free for everyone in coming generations. But will they? Not without a great change in wealth distribution, both among the nations and within nations--or whatever replaces nations. 

Another problem with your view, Vertigo, is employment. If farming is done by robots, along with most labor, what are most humans going to do all day? Asimov's vision (in his recommendations, not his science fiction as much) is that industry goes into space, and Earth becomes a more idyllic place, maybe good for farmers.


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## Bick (May 10, 2013)

I think life extension is waaaay, waaaay off, tbh.  Improvements in medicine and genetic/genome understanding and epigenetic therapies are going to enable many more people to reach the maximum age for humans (roughly 110-115), but it is not going to extend life beyond that in the foreseeable future.  That will require something wholly new in our understanding that we haven't even touched on yet.  There seems to be an absolute maximum age for all mammalian species beyond which life is simply not possible.  Some reptiles seem to be able buck this law to a degree, but this is probably linked to them being poikilothermic, and I don't see us going that route.


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## Bick (May 10, 2013)

By the way, there is a species of life that _is[/s] immortal.  Or at least has the caapcity to be: its called the immortal jellyfish.  There is also a fungus in the US that's probably more than 2000 years old.  There's not any "immortal sauce" to be had from grinding these fellas up though!_


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## Mirannan (May 10, 2013)

One problem that will have to be solved to crack the problem of immortality (IMHO) is memory space. However much memory space there is available in the human brain, one thing for sure is that it isn't infinite and sooner or later will fill up. Perhaps unfortunately, the fact that old memories decay is actually not going to help with this. Why? Because there is strong evidence that the problem with recalling something trivial from 40 years ago isn't the info disappearing - it's retrieval.

Evidence? Well, under hypnosis people have proved able to remember such things as the precise shape of a particular brick in the corner of a building, seen once three years previously. And I have actually participated in a fascinating experiment. The setup was that a room full of students (about 50 people) were shown 200 slides for about half a second apiece, and then about an hour later the same was done again. We were asked to say, for the second set, which of them we had seen before; the students were better than 90% accurate in this task, despite the fact that none of us could describe more than 10% of the first set of pictures.

Which means the info was stored somewhere. IMHO in the not-too-distant future we will have to figure out a way of editing memories to make room, or storing them externally, or of course both.


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## Vertigo (May 11, 2013)

Agreed Mirannan, I think memory will become a major issue with longevity. The other thing to consider is the finite number of ovaries carried by women. I suspect longevity will also be combined with removing ovaries to cold storage at a young age. And then all conception being IVF.

As for work, BetaWolf, yes I suspect that will be an issue. If we were ever to achieve such a society then I suspect that, assuming everyone has everything they need provided for free, then many will work because they want to and will probably focus on things not easily produced by such automation; hand crafts, art etc. maybe even unnecessary work like food production simply because that is what interests them.


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## Parson (May 11, 2013)

Vertigo said:


> Agreed Mirannan, I think memory will become a major issue with longevity. The other thing to consider is the finite number of ovaries carried by women. I suspect longevity will also be combined with removing ovaries to cold storage at a young age. And then all conception being IVF.
> 
> As for work, BetaWolf, yes I suspect that will be an issue. If we were ever to achieve such a society then I suspect that, assuming everyone has everything they need provided for free, then many will work because they want to and will probably focus on things not easily produced by such automation; hand crafts, art etc. maybe even unnecessary work like food production simply because that is what interests them.



I'm too much of a Calvinist to believe this scenario. If (A hugh if in my opinion) we ever achieve significant longevity in a land of plenty where work is not necessary, I suspect we will see a much darker future than this. I think people will become more and more wrapped up in themselves. There will be every kind of diversion kinky or not, available and life will be composed of only the increasingly banal and base hoping for a newer and greater thrill. (Think pornography)


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## Vertigo (May 11, 2013)

I confess, Parson, that your more pessimistic view is probably equally as likely as the more optimistic one. Actually I suspect a blend of the two is most likely.

As to the likelihood of both longevity and free resources for all. I'm not too sure on it to be honest. However looking back on how far we have come in technology in the last 50 years, I think it would be extremely rash to assume it is not close (as in within the next 50-100 years), at least the longevity. 

Notice I am not saying immortality. I think people's lives will be progressively extended. You could argue that it is already the case; people living in the developed countries live considerably longer than those in the undeveloped ones and also considerably longer than people did several hundred years ago. So you could argue that we have already achieved a level of increased longevity. Now I'm not saying someone born today might live to 500 but they are much more likely to live to a 100 than when I was born. This will continue. It will probably be through a variety of techniques such as genetic treatments and the more topical one of heart valves and other organs being replaced with new 3d printed organs made from your own cells.

This is already happening, currently for clinical reasons, but it is only a matter of time before it is used to replace worn out parts and so extend life.


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## Parson (May 14, 2013)

I agree that there has been some growth in life expectancy, but I did recently hear that in the U.S. the life expectancy has actually headed lower, but I have found no data that confirms that assertion. But I would say that if this is so it is not modern medicine which is losing ground but rather the ability we have as individuals to say "no" to things that are not healthful for us. The obesity epidemic may have started to show itself in the death rate. 

Every time I think that humanity is getting more moral I remember the Nazi's, Stalin, Idi Amin, and suddenly we don't look so good any more.


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## Vertigo (May 14, 2013)

No, sadly, we don't treat ourselves very well, nor do we, as a race, seem to treat our fellow humans particularly well. And that's always going to be something of a stopper for immortality!


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## Bick (May 23, 2013)

Mirannan said:


> One problem that will have to be solved to crack the problem of immortality (IMHO) is memory space.


Yeah, I'm with Parson, I think memory space would be the least of our problems. And a better memory wouldn't be a prerequisite for solving the biological problem of achieving immortality, just a further difficulty if we got there.


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## Ted Cross (Jun 25, 2013)

JoanDrake said:


> As I examine the way the world is changing now I see two trends which will  likely have the most effect on the way people's lives will be led a century or more hence. The first is immortality and the second is automation, (and by automation I mean nearly total automation of nearly everything, where humans will be able to have nearly anything made cheaply and quickly. The result being a "post scarcity" economy where anyone will be able to live at a very high standard with very little or no work at all)
> 
> Make no mistake, most scientists I read say that both are coming and within a generation, maybe two at the most.
> 
> ...



My WIP is about the immortality angle (with automation in the background). I focus more on the near-term of when it is first developed, because I've read so many stories set in the far future and I was more curious about the origins of the technology. My take doesn't concern itself with prolonging life within the original body, but with enabling the translation of what makes you 'you' into digital form and progressing from there, first with AI forms and later with restoring such data into genetic clones. Many will say it's impossible, of course, but then scientists have been saying things are impossible for all of our existence only to be proven wrong later.


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## Ted Cross (Jun 25, 2013)

Steve Jordan said:


> I think most scientists that believe we will achieve either immortality or a "post-scarcity" economy within 1-2 generations are being overly optimistic and ignoring the realities of the modern world.
> 
> Despite medical science's advances, there are many areas of life extension research that are proceeding at a snail's pace, if at all... and all of them will need to be conquered in order to indefinitely extend life.  And if that can be done, the impact of an undying population on a planet already overcrowded with very demanding humans (by a factor of 10,000, at least) would be catastrophic.
> 
> ...



I agree with all of your points. In my book the group of scientists that have developed a form of immortality (not in their original bodies) are intent on not letting anyone else in on it.


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## Ted Cross (Jun 25, 2013)

Mirannan said:


> One problem that will have to be solved to crack the problem of immortality (IMHO) is memory space. However much memory space there is available in the human brain, one thing for sure is that it isn't infinite and sooner or later will fill up. Perhaps unfortunately, the fact that old memories decay is actually not going to help with this. Why? Because there is strong evidence that the problem with recalling something trivial from 40 years ago isn't the info disappearing - it's retrieval.
> 
> Evidence? Well, under hypnosis people have proved able to remember such things as the precise shape of a particular brick in the corner of a building, seen once three years previously. And I have actually participated in a fascinating experiment. The setup was that a room full of students (about 50 people) were shown 200 slides for about half a second apiece, and then about an hour later the same was done again. We were asked to say, for the second set, which of them we had seen before; the students were better than 90% accurate in this task, despite the fact that none of us could describe more than 10% of the first set of pictures.
> 
> Which means the info was stored somewhere. IMHO in the not-too-distant future we will have to figure out a way of editing memories to make room, or storing them externally, or of course both.



Personally I don't see memory space as an issue. We already see crude mind/data interfaces being used today, so I expect it to be perfected at some point. Once you have that then you have solved this issue (and created many new ones!).


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## Mirannan (Jun 25, 2013)

Stephen Palmer said:


> My thoughts too. Hasn't this been the way of it since technology got a grip on the Western world? "This device will reduce the time you spend doing stuff." Right. It never did, and it never will - it's just a way of making money by exploitation.



Not so much that, as that you'll spend the time doing different things. For example, up to maybe 1850 the majority (better than 90%) of England's population spent most of their time producing food; now it's maybe 5%. (Basic, not processed food, I mean.)


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