Is it selfish to want to live forever?

Answer 1

A good question...I'd like to respond from a Buddhist perspective if I may...your use of the term "selfish" in this context has prompted and interested me...perhaps other may find some wisdom from my poor insight on the Buddhist concept of Self and the self serving desires it thus generates within our consciousness...

Self, to Buddhists, is a characteristic of the consciousness which arises in the consciousness whenever we interact with our environment. When we do interact, our senses are the thing which does this interaction...our senses then cause feelings which in turn cause thoughts to arise...without awareness and concentrated effort to recognise this quite normal reaction, we then miss the arising of the Self part of the consciousness as a result of these thoughts.

Self, the identity that we generally associate with that entity which we think of as "us"..is just a manifestation of these filters within the consciousness which we have learned to associate with since birth. These filters include Self but there are many many more of these filters within, which we use all the time without thought or method...for example, when we see someone who we dislike, the thought of such dislike arises...this thought of dislike arises because we have trained our consciousness to respond thus to this person in this way...this, to Buddhists is the basis of a concept called delusion...when we delude our consciousness about certain things and are deluded by our consciousness about these things all the time afterwards...the above example will cause us to feel dislike, even if the person no longer hurts us or has changed...

The feeling of wanting something for ourselves is likewise caused by this Self...to want to live forever is actually impossible..at least in the present day..to thus want an impossible thing is delusion and thus caused by the Self...the Self often wants things which are unreasonable...and it always wants things which only benefit ourselves...

To Buddhists then, to want to live forever is not only Selfish because it is caused by the Self, but is Selfish because it is unreasonable to want such a thing. I use the term Selfish to mean that it is caused by the Self....

Anything to do with the Self, to Buddhists is thus Selfish..and delusion...

Some thoughts on the Self from...

A Buddhist...

Answer 2

I wouldn't want to live forever, the world is a scary place. The way jobs are being eliminated and companies are downsizing, and pollution escalating, I'm scared for my children! But it's not selfish to want that. Besides, we don't have much control over that, anyway. And to look at "population control", people have smaller families than ever before. When death rates were higher hundreds of years ago, people could have dozens of children, because death in infancy was common, and living past 60 wasn't too common, either. Today, people are choosing to be childless or use birth control to have smaller families, so we see an aging population, but not much growth. Countries like Russia and France are encouraging families to have more children.

Answer 3

I salute you vegan, even though I am just a vegetarian. It is not selfish to want to live forever, if one could; however I would personally have some stipulations. If I could live forever and be 25, then fine; however if I continued to age and lived forever as a wrinkled crone, then I'd rather die.

I don't think it would be selfish unless you had to steal someone else's life to do it, like vampires.

Answer 4

It's not selfish at all. You wouldn't be depriving anyone else of anything so how could it be selfish?

I would love to live forever. I'd like to just go on and on like one of the immortals, experiencing the world, seeing the changes come and go, learning, growing as a person.

Answer 5

It is not "selfish" to want to live forever, but it is only the young and innocent who do so. (Or the old and greedy, I have to admit).
When you reach your "three score and ten" the Christians say is the allotted span, you tend to realise that each body can only last so long, and you appreciate the need to move on.

Look on Life on this world as a year at school. You work, you suffer, you laugh, and you learn all there is to learn in that year. But at the end, you know that to grow any more, you must move on.

Answer 6

Well, yes by the very nature of the thought it is "selfish." It isn't a widespread wish like, "I wish everyone could live forever."

But take a reality check here.

We all gonna die!

And from "Dust in the Wind" from Kansas...

"And all your money won't another minute buy"

So you might as well get over the desire to live forever and make the best of what you got with your 100 years on earth.





g-day!

Answer 7

No it's a pretty normal attitude for most people, especially the young.
However it would get a bit crowded especially on this dear little Island I call home, if everyone could live forever.

Answer 8

No, I don't think so. If by "living forever" you mean that you do not want that part of yourself you identify as "you" to end. By that, I mean, your consciousness, your soul, or whatever term you want to use to describe the essence of who you are. In fact, for most of us, the idea of completely ending is terrifying. So, I would say that it is human nature to want to live, or continue on in some form forever. I can tell you that I do.

Answer 9

I don't think so. I don't want to die. I'd love to be able to stay here forever, and be with my family and friends. I don't want to leave this beautiful earth, even though it's full of violence and hate most of the time. But I know eventually, we all will die, and there's nothing we can do about it, but to accept it and live life to the fullest!

Answer 10

Yes - it's not going to happen (that is sure) and death always makes way for something new, so by wishing you lived forever you are in fact preventing change (in a way).