Immortality
Immortality is the ability to live forever, or eternal life. Biological forms have inherent limitations which may or may not be able to be overcome through medical interventions or engineering. Natural selection has developed potential biological immortality in at least one species, the jellyfish Turritopsis nutricula.
Many scientists, futurists, and philosophers, have speculated and theorized about the immortality of the human body, and advocate that human immortality is achievable in the first few decades of the 21st century, while other advocates believe that life extension is a more achievable goal in the short term, with immortality awaiting further research breakthroughs into an indefinite future. Aubrey de Grey, a researcher who has developed a series of biomedical rejuvenation strategies to reverse human aging (called SENS), believes that his proposed plan for ending aging may be implementable in two or three decades. The absence of aging would provide humans with biological immortality, but not invulnerability to death by physical trauma. What form an unending human life would take, or whether an immaterial soul exists and possesses immortality, has been a major point of focus of religion, as well as the subject of speculation, fantasy, and debate until this present times.
In religious contexts, immortality is often stated to be among the promises by God (or other deities) to human beings who show goodness or else follow divine law (cf. resurrection).
The Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the first literary works, dating back at least to the 22nd century BC, is primarily a quest of a hero seeking to become immortal.
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Eternal life can also be defined as a timeless existence, which is also not known for certain to be achievable, or even definable, despite millennia of arguments for eternity. Wittgenstein, in a notably non-theological interpretation of eternal life, writes in the Tractatus that, "If we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present."
Essence of Biotechnology in Immortality
In a very primitive way we are on the road to Immortality.
Within the nucleus of nearly every one of the 100 trillion cells that make up our body is a Computer Program of enormous complexity. This Computer Program is our DNA. We can now for the first time in Man's history read the message this Computer Program produces.
We can read this message by so-called DNA sequencing. What is DNA sequencing? DNA sequencing is the process of determining the exact order of the 3 billion chemical building blocks which make up the DNA of the 24 different human chromosomes. This sequencing revealed the estimated 20,000-25,000 human genes within our DNA as well as the regions controlling them.
What are Genes? Genes are segments of DNA that are the basic functional units of heredity. Genes are determined by an ordered sequence of chemical bases found in a unique position on a specific chromosome. Their "blueprint" guides protein production, which determines how different cells in the body function. Inherited genes also control our unique set of physical traits.
Think of your genes as a blueprint for cell growth and function. Abnormalities in the DNA are like typographical errors. They may provide the wrong set of instructions, leading to faulty cell growth or function.If there is an error in a gene, that same error will appear in all the cells that contain the same gene. This is like having a blueprint in which all the copies have the same typographical error.
Our behaviour in most cases can influence to what extent a gene is expressed as a disease. Smoking, drinking, drugs, overeating can all cause a gene or a combination of genes to express as a disease.
There are now tests available using cells collected either from a simple mouth rinse procedure or from a single blood draw that measure selected segments of the genetic code that differ from individual to individual. These are called single nucleotide polymorphisms, or SNPs for short.
So by looking at the exceptions we can now see where we might be at risk in future.
These exceptions are not certainties but possible risk factors which could affect our health if we do not use preventative measures. Historical Medicine treated a person only after he developed the disease.
We now have the ability to not only know to what unique diseases we are at risk, but to know all of them, so we could theoretically protect ourselves against all of them and as healthcare providers become more knowledgeable, better diets, vitamins and exercise programs will be developed that will form the basis of more longevity.
The animals that can possibly achieve immortality under ideal conditions, such as sea squirts, certain corals, Hydra, and Turritopsis nutricula (the immortal jellyfish), often activate telomerase. Helen Nilsson Sköld of the Department of Marine Ecology, University of Gothenburg, and colleague Matthias Obst are studying sea squirts and starfish to learn more about how these marine creatures seem to ward off aging.
Out of the animal immortality A-list, sea squirts and starfish have genes that most closely resemble those of humans.
Animals that clone themselves, in which part of an individual’s body is passed on to the next generations, have particularly interesting conditions related to remaining in good health to persist.This makes it useful to study these animals in order to understand mechanisms of aging in humans.
Research has shown that sea squirts rejuvenate themselves by activating the enzyme telomerase, and in this way extending their chromosomes and protecting their DNA. They also have a special ability to discard ‘junk’ from their cells. Older parts of the animal are quite simply broken down, and are then partially recycled when new and healthy parts grow out from the adult bodies.
Starfish are also amazingly immune to problems that affect the rest of us. If they lose a body part, for example, many species can simply grow another one. Reproduction involves tearing apart their bodies, somewhat akin to growing a new plant from a broken off piece of a “mother plant.”
Eternal life, from an evolutionary standpoint, however, has a big drawback. Due to asexual reproduction, the species as a whole retains very low genetic variation. This means they could be particularly vulnerable to climate change and not enjoy immortality after all.
Scientists are therefore rushing to study such species, which may hold the secrets of increasing our own longevity. It would be a colossal human mistake if our pollution, habitat encroachment and other activities erased our chances of learning more about nature’s anti-aging secrets.
Issues on cloning; Immortality
The UN General Assembly in August of 2005 did adopt a declaration prohibiting all forms of human cloning. The vote was 87 in support, 34 in opposition and 70 abstaining or absent. But the edict was non-binding. The European Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine prohibits human cloning, but has not been ratified by most countries. There is, further, a Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, which bans reproductive human cloning, but it has no legal standing.
Someday human reproductive cloning is attained. The concern always comes up about what good this is, as I won't know this will be the real me. Well, it has been speculated that by the time all these bioethical hurdles are cleared, computer technology will be developed to the stage where your memory can be transferred to this new body. The field now exceeds 100 trillion calculations per second (1014 cps), and should be at least ten times faster in a decade, at which capability the brain can be simulated. Such a computer should only cost about $1000 in 2020.
That's not all. There are algorithms and biological interfacing challenges. This field is just beginning, but the odds are, this fantasy for immortality could be possible in 25 years.
Finally, the cost factor. Originally only billionaires might be able to afford eternal life. So if you were worried about exacerbating our already overpopulated world, economics, as they are already affecting birth rates, will also check the growth of human reproductive cloning. However, while we all know how Moore's Law has precipitously dropped the price of computing power, the reduction of genome sequencing costs has been a lot more dramatic, so immortality could well be closer than you think.
