Will We Ever Live Forever?
Many people interested in staving off the effects of aging will mainly be so for vanity reasons. They don’t actually want to be immortal but rather they’re just interested in looking younger for longer and perhaps having a few less aches and pains.
But there are those with greater ambitions. There are those who want to slow their aging so that they can live forever and then enjoy all of the existential changes that would come from that.
This is completely impossible of course. Right?
Well, not if you listen to certain thinkers. In fact, most scientists believe that the first person to live forever has already been born.
The argument goes that someone born today who lives for 120 years will get to benefit from all of today’s modern medicine and lifestyle/health knowledge. In 30 years time, we might have even better medical technology and be able to cure a lot of life-ending diseases. 20 years later and we might be able to extend the average life span with gene doping (perhaps by rejuvenating the telomeres). 30 years later and we may be able to perform a brain transplant…
250 years later and we might be able to upload our consciousness to the computer.
It sounds far-fetched but so too would the internet, were you to explain it to someone alive 100 years ago!
The Top Methods for Extending Lifespan Greatly
To demonstrate just how possible this is, let’s take a look at some of the best options we have for extending lifespans in the near future…
Gene Doping
Insertional gene doping is already being used by doctors and essentially allows you to permanently alter your DNA through a single injection. Among other things, this could someday enable us to strengthen cell walls – extending our lifespans by approximately 30% and making us less susceptible to fire or toxins.
In the distant future, we may be able to emulate the abilities of some species of jellyfish that can actually restore their entire bodies by returning to a polyp state.
Consciousness Uploading
Right now, we don’t know if it is truly possible to upload our consciousness or even if we would want to. One speculated methodology though, involves potentially replacing each brain cell or brain structure with mechanical parts, one piece at a time.
Brain Transplants
Think this sounds like something out of science fiction? Actually, such a procedure is being attempted in the near future. Hitler experimented with head transplants during WW2 as well!
Not ready for a head transplant just yet? Don’t worry! In the meantime, the best you can do is simply to live as healthily as you possibly can…
