Do you think society would be a better place if we never died?

[Danny_dan92]

I definitely can see that greed could go away, since I personally think the reason why people are greedy is cause as the saying goes “YOLO” so people are more likely to do messed up shit and be selfish cause afterall they only got one shot at life.

Yes

No

[Soteris]

Oh it would be a disaster. First of all, one of the major limitations of wealth is our lifespans. Simply put, you only get so much time to accumulate wealth before you die and your wealth gets distributed to the rest of your family. In other words one persons wealth gets distributed between what is usually many more.

Why is this important? Because wealth makes it easier to gain even more wealth. A rich person who earns a lot of money would earn even more if they were even richer. This is a problem since wealth is a zero sum game. Someone has to lose money for rich people to get richer.

If a rich person has control of their own assets for, lets say 1000 years, then they would inevitably become insanely rich, beyond even modern examples. Billions upon billions upon billions of dollars. Apply that logic to every current rich person and the income disparity would mean there would more or less not be any money left for the rest of us.

Note, that this is just a tiny example. Lets switch and look at another.

Social progress. Not just in laws and such but also technology and everything between. What would happen if people from 500 years ago was still alive today and in the most senior and powerful positions in society? To put it simply, we would be screwed. Religious, political and other such ingrained beliefs do not tend to change as you grow older.

There is a common belief that people become more conservative as they get older. This is not true. What actually happens is that your beliefs while you are young might be progressive for the time but as you grow older and older the younger people will have even more progressive beliefs and even if you never changed your mind you will now be among the conservatives. Now take this phenomena and apply it to someone from 500 years ago. What sort of beliefs would they still hold on to? Slavery for example? Monarchy? And that is just 500 years. What would people 40 000 years ago believe? Would they even bother to learn the language of today?

So no. Society would be a horrible stagnant and unfair mess if people never died.

[GuyAnswersGirls123]

I actually think the opposite would happen and you might get way more of those YOLO types. Those YOLO types tend to be young and haven't come face to face with their own mortality yet. They say YOLO but think they're immortal at some level.

If the YOLO mentality was something that was accompanied by a growing awareness of our mortality, then I suspect we'd get jackasses converging to it more with age and not away from it. "Dude, what happened to your grandad?" -"He crashed his Vette into a gas station and exploded together with his hookers while geared up after lighting his hair on fire with Everclear. YOLO, you know."

Realizing on a deep level that we're very mortal along with everyone else is usually what causes us to wizen up a bit, each less junk food, do less drugs, do less jackass stunts, in favor of things that have longer-term meaning and value.

[FreyaRed]

There would be still only 4 billions years old archeo bacteria who never dies and doesn't make space for next generations. Evolution wouldn't exist or would be very slow. I don't think humans would exists on earth under eternal life condition.

[DaisyM23]

i think people would be MORE greedy if they couldn't die, then they could get and keep the most they could

[ShadezMcgee]

I disagree. People need to die for the world to progress. Think of it like this.

Let's say we could never die, but then we get another Adolf Hitler kind of person. Dangerous influence and ideology that can continuously spread and grow because he can't die or be killed. Would we really be better off as a society if that was the case?

Let's look at it from a space and resource perspective. We would have overpopulation and people suffering because there is not enough resources like food or water to go around and death will not be possible to be a method of release.

This would be a never ending nightmare for people. There is a reason why immortality is portrayed as a curse in literature. This would be a literal hell if it was a reality.

[NathanDavis]

let's say you're right... and our negative traits will die out

the positive traits will die even faster... because they would be meaningless now

I won't say which series, but the ending does reflect this very scenario... and I liked the ending precisely because of this approach, to the idea if immortality

[Dongie]

You ain't wrong

[CuriousMufuxka]

What? No! It would just be people trying to kill the shit out of each other, wishing that they could actually die. Society as we know it would crumble as overpopulation increases, hospitals and drug companies go belly up, therapists have to go get actual jobs!

[Dongie]

I don't know what YOLO means but I say both. Better in ways but not perfection, not without Jesus Christ here sitting on His Throne as King.

[electromagnetic]

Some people deserve to go to the afterlife.

[war_daddy]

good entertainment would become priceless