X-Message-Number: 16649
Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2001 09:20:27 -0700
From: Lee Corbin <>
Subject: Re: Is Life a game?  How can you know?

Dave Pizer writes

>...if one is immortal beyond any power to cause one's
>destruction, and one has lived for trillions of years,
>what does one do to keep from becoming bored, perhaps
>to the point of insanity or wanting to commit suicide?

First, understand that *boredom* is not simply some kind
of default state that happens to a soul (mainly because
we do not have souls).  Boredom is an extremely sophisticated
process built into people for the express purpose of aiding
survival.  You may wish, in the far future, to turn off
boredom for certain things, just as for some of us it's
already be turned off for food and sex, and in just the
same way that you may wish to turn off pain for certain
conditions.

Second, I fear that your phrasing of the question "what
does an immortal do?" carries the subtle implication that
the immortal in question has reached a point of stasis.
This is very common among all us millenarianists, because
"Later" is always idealized as a Wonderful (but static)
condition.  But perhaps a static equilibrium never obtains;
one very well may be engaged in revolutionary growth at all
future times.

Therefore, two things are nearly certain to be perpetual
activities of an immortal:

1.  Gratification Research.  (Self re-design to accomodate
    enhanced experiences and capabilities.)
2.  Mathematics Exploration.  (It can be shown that there
    exist infinitely many mathematical theorems---very nice
    if physical explorations ever come to an end.)

Exercise for the reader:  What if one does not like math?
(Hint:  see above remarks about "boredom".)

Lee Corbin

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=16649