Immortality! And all it will cost are your "family jewels"

[Firia]

Suppose that the mad scientists working in their labs one day stumble across the elixer of eternal life. Its easy to mass produce, and drinking it will make you BIOLOGICALLY immortal. This means you won't age or die from disease, but if you get cleaved in the head with an axe, you're pretty much gone. Think elf immortality.

There's a problem however. If everyone is immortal, and having kids who are also immortal, who will also have kids that are immortal, we're gonna run out of room pretty damn fast. So, the catch is that you have to get a vasectomy if you're a man or your tubes tied if you're a woman and be completely unable to have children for the rest of your ungodly lifespan.

Would you take the offer? Would you take it if it instead came not just at the cost of being able to have children, but at the cost of never having sex again?

I'm already the worlds most undersexed lesbian, so, sure, whatever. Not having kids anyway, so lets live forever! I can live on the rest of eternity not having sex, and not procreating. Sure, why not

 

[TilMorrow]

I already have plans for the year 3000 so I'll be making my own way there and won't be needing any of your Elixer. Bet the effect wears off after awhile anyway... Anyone I should be expecting to see then in the year 3000?

 

[SenseOfTumour]

Yeah, I think you'd have had different answers if it was losing your sex organs completely, and with it, your sexual urges and pleasures.

For me, I'd happily trade in reproduction for immunity to disease and aging.

However, immortality in exchange for any future sex... that's a tougher one, as the way I see it, if I have forever, then I need entertainment to fill that time, and I know of one particular thing I can do which never gets boring, and if you take that away, well, I'll have read, watched, heard, listened to and played everything eventually.

 

[CoL0sS]

I make it a official rule of mine, not to trust mad scientists.
But yeah I'd take it. Think of all the things I could do with time just standing still.

 

[tzimize]

Suppose that the mad scientists working in their labs one day stumble across the elixer of eternal life. Its easy to mass produce, and drinking it will make you BIOLOGICALLY immortal. This means you won't age or die from disease, but if you get cleaved in the head with an axe, you're pretty much gone. Think elf immortality.

There's a problem however. If everyone is immortal, and having kids who are also immortal, who will also have kids that are immortal, we're gonna run out of room pretty damn fast. So, the catch is that you have to get a vasectomy if you're a man or your tubes tied if you're a woman and be completely unable to have children for the rest of your ungodly lifespan.

Would you take the offer? Would you take it if it instead came not just at the cost of being able to have children, but at the cost of never having sex again?

Yes and yes.

Kids...I have NO problem living without them.

Sex...bit harder, but there are a LOT of other fun stuff to do besides having sex. I'd manage. The future is too exciting to miss.

 

[Chaos-Spider]

I follow the Highlander 1 rules of Immortals. Don't know what they are? Well look them up.

So the entire world would become a big free for all where everyone is trying to cut off each other's heads and be the single strongest (and remaining) person on the planet?

Eh, could be interesting.

As for the actual topic of the thread I Probably wouldn't pick immortality anyway as it is likely to go horribly wrong and cause psychological breakdown.

 

[Unspeakable]

but at the cost of never having sex again?

WHOAH WHOAH WHOAH there captain biology, that's not the same thing as having your tubes tied. Sex is definitely still a viable option here. I was about to say I'd do it (I've got nothing to lose at this point), but as long as we're clear that non-reproductive sex is still ok.

 

[TheDarkestDerp]

Yes, yep, uh-huh, sure and you betcha. If I were to be biologically immortal, chances are the inborn biological drive to reproduce would fade away as well, so no big loss there. Never going to die, little need to pass on genetic characteristics.

 

[Apollo45]

Definitely.

I figure that in 10 years or so we'll be headed to Mars. After that, the goal is a base on the moon, and at that point we'll have a viable commercial space exploration/tourism business. Even if no one ever figures out a way to truly make interstellar travel a "run of the mill" experience, eventually we'll have to start sending out colony ships of some sort. Even before then, if humanity gets its collective ass in gear and starts doing things right, we should actually have room on Earth for a population of 25 billion at a bare minimum. So, even if I get a vasectomy now, there's an extremely good chance of being able to reverse it in the future. So it's not giving up having children forever, its giving it up for a while. If I'm going to live forever, I might as well, right?

On another note, immortality would be awesome. There's always someone who says living forever would suck, but with technology advancing at the pace it is, and with literally an entire world to see and plenty of time to do it in, I highly doubt one would ever actually get "bored" unless they decided to live as a recluse.

 

[floppylobster]

(1) You're not going to be so worried about not having sex by the time you're hitting your 50's anyway.

(2) I wouldn't take the offer. Not because I don't want to sacrifice having children, but by being immortal I'm sacrificing our ability to evolve. The human species would remain forever at this level? No thank you. We've come from the oceans and we've got a long way to go.

 

[Chefodeath]

(1) You're not going to be so worried about not having sex by the time you're hitting your 50's anyway.

(2) I wouldn't take the offer. Not because I don't want to sacrifice having children, but by being immortal I'm sacrificing our ability to evolve. The human species would remain forever at this level? No thank you. We've come from the oceans and we've got a long way to go.

You do realize that human evolution has pretty much ground to a standstill yes? Given the loss of selection pressure, the only way humans can evolve now is through artificial means.

 

[Abengoshis]

I don't want kids anyway. Video games would be my sole entertainment...as they pretty much are currently.

 

[Abengoshis]

(1) You're not going to be so worried about not having sex by the time you're hitting your 50's anyway.

(2) I wouldn't take the offer. Not because I don't want to sacrifice having children, but by being immortal I'm sacrificing our ability to evolve. The human species would remain forever at this level? No thank you. We've come from the oceans and we've got a long way to go.

You do realize that human evolution has pretty much ground to a standstill yes? Given the loss of selection pressure, the only way humans can evolve now is through artificial means.

Agreed. We already do pretty much everything we need to with equipment anyway. I don't think we'd benefit from any evolutionary changes other than being immune to every disease but wait, this immortality grants that anyway

 

[Hazard09]

I hardly use them anyways, so ya maybe.

 

[Lazzi]

Why would you want to live forever, that would be horrible.

 

[floppylobster]

(1) You're not going to be so worried about not having sex by the time you're hitting your 50's anyway.

(2) I wouldn't take the offer. Not because I don't want to sacrifice having children, but by being immortal I'm sacrificing our ability to evolve. The human species would remain forever at this level? No thank you. We've come from the oceans and we've got a long way to go.

You do realize that human evolution has pretty much ground to a standstill yes? Given the loss of selection pressure, the only way humans can evolve now is through artificial means.

And of course you're aware that evolution is a process that spans millions of years? Our brains, breasts, hands, eyes and legs are still showing widely varying fluxes in shape and size and are extremely susceptible to disease indicating they are still under modification. Despite very few predators (apart from other humans) we are still under strong pressure from sexual selection and it affects our ability to find a partner to produce offspring and our means to support more than one child. We're still largely at the mercy of our environment too. Changes to the food balance or temperatures could cause rapid change in any number of directions. We can artificially try to balance it but we have limited resources and cannot counter every influence we are under. Are you saying Africans, Asians and Europeans are all different species? Come back in 100,000 years and tell me again that human evolution is at a standstill.

 

[theultimateend]

I don't know why people think this. I mean, do you know how long it would take to find a planet suitabe for colonization, let alone the ungodly amount of times and resources to terreform it?

I think biological immortality and the threat of mass overpopulation it implies will be upon us long before we can colonize planets fast enough to deal with it.

So basically your point is "I don't know why immortality would make colonization work! I mean it'll take forever to get there!"

Oh wait...what was that from the audience? Oh someone just said "Derp. That's why immortality would be a boon and not a problem."

But, you imply, the Earth would be overrun with trillions of people before this happened!

Oh so wait...we can hypothetically assume that something as unlikely as immortality is going to happen immediately. But then it's ridiculous to assume we couldn't teraform mars.

Yeah. This is why hypothetical discussion never work. Someone starts setting up arbitrary rules and makes it extremely boring.

In universe where humans have immortality I presume they'll also discover the methods to transforming planets into hospital planets. Or even scuttling planets for minerals to keep building ships to populate. Either way it doesn't require a transgalactic excursion.

EVEN then you presume that we'll make no further advances in quantum theory and act like we'll be taking a sedan from here to Alpha Centauri.

Anywho. Very boring. You'd be a total buzz kill during any thought experiment.

"But I say! SANTA ISN'T REAL!" ... cool thanks.

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

I follow the Highlander 1 rules of Immortals. Don't know what they are? Well look them up.

I immediately thought Highlander when I read the title, too.
OP: Make it like Highlander and I'll do it. THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!