Evolution and will it be possible to live indefinately??

Question

We are at a cross roads of science fiction/fact.

We have the knowledge now to play god.
(Doctors decide if you live or die etc)

We have the knowledge to grow new hearts ears and other body parts. (Not too successful in mass producing YET!!!!!)

We have developed human / robotic interfaces.
Only recently in the news was a cripple who has had implants into his brain and can control a computer via thought.

NOW HOWS THAT FOR EVOLUTION>>>>>>

BEAT THAT GOD.
he didnt make us perfect, but we can make our selves perfect.
(Well not really, you will still have a ss es like me chundering on.)

We can make designer babies, we can clone things.
We will choose our next evolutionary step.

We have mapped the genome.

It should be possible to reference genes from animals such as salamanders which can regrow body parts, and adapt/modify genes to suit. I am not saying its easy, but its the future, not far away

DO NOT DISMISS THIS.

DO YOUR O

We will replace organs and body parts like servicing a car.

Salamander
http://eric.stamen.com/net/nyTimes_092302a.html

Brain Power
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/5167938.stm

Regrow body parts
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/1949073.stm

I can go on and on and on with refernces.
These are the news.

Read up on it. It WILL consume you.
We are human We are brilliant. We can make the difference.

Raymo ur an idiot, this guy was made a cripple through accident.

OI GOD FREAKS. YOU ALL SOUND A LITTLE BITTER ABOUT THIS. VERY NEGATIVE. CAN YOU NOT SEE THE UPSIDE???????

You have been given everything you have today by man not god. OK except the earth. PLEASE DONT GO ON ABOUT THAT AGAIN.

Im on about vaccines, TV COMPUTErs roads bridges airplanes, oh and I guess I must put some negatives in there like chemical weapons etc. But lest not dwell on war mongers lets be positive lets move forwards lets be progressive. Lets learn and be wonderful.

OK OK OK Some people will mis use this intelegence, but it will happen, and you must be part of it, so answer in a meaning ful way

Answer 1

not forever, but science will be able to some day slow aging so people could live up to 200 years, well the rich people will. Talk about your overpopulation.

Answer 2

You are an innovative thinker and love to brainstorm ... but I think you are missing the point about life. Everything you touch on is physical, isn't it? Everything is life is governed by natural laws ,,, I believe it is the second law of thermodynamics that states 'energy can neither be created or destroyed, but merely transformed from one type to another' . Life is energy and nothing else ..... but the cost of life is death ... in every case. Sure, as we mature through generations, science, technology advances in leaps and bounds ... but the very human soul, psyche, spirit, call it what you will ... always remains the same. And think about it, immortality is not in the scientific dictionary ... sure it has a meaning, but only in myth. We are born, we learn and we die. Learning is continuous and will always be ... can you imagine the exciting new things that lie ahead that we have absolutely no conception of? We ask ourselves why we are here .... that is a man made question. isn't it? Plants don't ask, nor do animals or any other living organism. IN some ways, living forever means no beginning and no end ... we would never need to procreate then would we and the world would burst at the seams if we did!
Life can be exciting, magical ( particularly as we grow through childhood ) and special .... but all these things have a price .... our eventual demise. We judge ourselves daily against experience ..... if we were immortal, we would simply run out of room and the mind, in my opinion, would collapse with trauma. Death is necessary, and a primary law of life. Think about it ...

Answer 3

You asked for a sensible answer. Do you remember how quickly Dolly died? Cloning experiments are far from perfect.

The use of robotics to aid people with problems does not make the people less human.

And as for the salamanders (especially the much touted axolotl), I worked for the scientist who did the study that gavethe evolutionary community so much joy, and he would tell you himself the mutation/adaptation is no proof of evolution at all. None is. A mutated animal is still the same sort of animal.

The things you think have happened haven't. A lot of it is just still hypothesis and theory that people are still working on with no proof it will ever come to pass.

Let me ask you a question? Who is superior, the robotic part or the man who designed it? Who do you think gave man the capacity to design and think and plan and bring many wonderful things to pass? Chance? Even statistically, God is a better bet than that.

Answer 4

I should very much like to answer your question, but I have yet to determine what you are asking. Whether humans as a species will begin to live longer? Undoubtedly. Whether we can live forever? Decidedly not. The cells of any living body must constantly renew and rebuild. Cells wear out and the body must make new ones to replace the old ones. That means re-copying and re-copying the strands of DNA. If the original genes never wore out, it might be possible for this process to continue indefinitely, but when you make a copy of a copy enough times, it is just no longer viable after a while. Procrastination can always be put off until tomorrow. Start living now!

Answer 5

I hate to tell you this, but we have not figured everything out in the universe. There are still many things we need to learn, many new things we find to take into consideration. Just recently, scientists have found a second DNA strand. Although our species has evolved greatly, we do not have the knowledge yet to do so. We probably won't ever. By the rate of the growing population of idiots, who believe any gullible guffaw that the earth won't ever run out of natural resources, that overpopulation won't happen, that destroying our mother earth and environment could never happen. It will, and if we continue, we will have to stop moving forward in scientific discoveries to keep our species alive. It will be soon. A dreary outlook on life, yes, but true and jaded. So, based on the humanity in humans, no. We will never live indefinately.

Now, my question: Who would want to?

Answer 6

Who made man, animals, trees, flowers, grass, plants, sun, moon, stars, birds, creatures of the sea, light, water, earth, oxygen, gravity, wind, rain, snow, frost, heat.....? God did. BEAT THAT MAN!
Humankind has been trying to reproduce the miracles of God since almost the dawn of time, and they have done a fairly reasonable job of it. Look in Exodus when Moses went to the Pharaoh to say let my people go. God sent plagues on the people of Egypt, and at the beginning the Egyptians actually copied some of the plagues. This was done to disprove the existence of Almighty God. God soon showed the Egyptians that he wasn't impressed and dealt with them.
How do you think God feels when he looks on the planet and sees humankind doing stuff like this? Here's a good line from the film Jurassic Park.
"You knew that you could. You never stopped to think that you you should."
This is typical man. I'm not saying some of the above aren't going to help humanity, but is it all necessary?

Answer 7

Humanity is imperfect, we cannot evolve to a perfect state - yes we can have all the medical knowledge and techniques in the world but we will never be able to alter human nature - our true imperfection.

The very things that make us great - our curiosity and willingness to learn have lead to moments of true darkness - anatomical knowledge was furthered by Nazi concentration camp experiments. Most of our technological leaps were born out of conflict - surgical techniques are pioneered on the battlefield, the jet engine was created during World War II.

I have so much optimism for the future, but I still know that for every MLK, Ghandi, Mandela or Suu Kyi we get a Hitler, Stalin, Amin or Mugabe.

We need our imperfection - we wouldn't understand or value love without hate, joy without pain, modesty without arrogance, charity without greed.

Answer 8

No, it is not possible to live forever.
For starters accidents occur. Even with all the science we have or will have, when we lose the knowledge we've obtained throughout our life we die. Even if your body lives on YOU as a person will not have survived the ordeal...
Similarly technology, no matter what fashion it comes in, breaks down eventually.
And finally, I don't care how great our technology gets when the sun breaks (however that may be), or the universe is destroyed (again don't really care how) then man will likely go with it.

Answer 9

There is no doubt that we have the power; Mankind has always been looking for a way to extend their life, to defeat Death and become immortal. The question, now, is not "can we" or "will we", but "should we". And not the "should we take God's place" or "should we mess with things we know very little about" but "should we really live that long".

Some people will want to live as long as possible, fearing death and the unknown and unable to comprehend a life beyound the physical. Others will want to live naturally, "as God intended", and face Death when "their time has come". Still others will want to live and extended life but eventually know what death is. The ability to life "forever", or as you say "indefinately", should be optional for people and not forced on them by the government of society.

As for one-uping God, just remember for every advancement we make on ourselves, Nature throws a new disaster or disease our way. There is a give and take to existance, a balance must be maintained, and if we choose to take "eternale life" than Nature/God will do his/her/its damnedest is ensure we work for it.

~~ Abaddon

Answer 10

You obviously have a blind faith in your priest in lab coats as most of the things you describe are only successfully happening in your imagination.

Amazingly God already told us about this too. Deuteronomy8:17
[You may say to yourself," My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me" But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth.....]

Yep, God knew that there would be insolent, prideful, and arrogant people like you.

How can any honest person praise the scientist who struggle to create a poor copy of isolated body parts and then downplay the significance of the original body and mock the designer?
You have fooled yourself.

Answer 11

Definitely man is acting on evolution (simply mentioning medicine preventing youngsters to die would have sufficed), but I can´t grasp why is it that you are SO surprised...
Anything you do to boost anyone´s probability of giving offspring in a non "natural" way (i.e. in contrast to what would have happened by letting things going their natural course), would relax natural selection´s stringency and impact the evolutionary pace.
There´s nothing weird about it!