The fear or distaste we feel when we face our mortality is somewhat leavened by the realization that, after a while, life gets sort of repetitive and, as faculties decay, less interesting. I recall seeing William Buckley on Charlie Rose's excellent interview show, talking about his life and saying that he has become "weary". He had done so much and now life seemed to be wearing on him.
Then, of course, there is also the tendency of things in the long term to become disorganized. There's the end of the earth and perhaps the end of the universe to consider. I would certainly not want to live to that point, much less beyond.

I am the caller during the show on immortality who raised the issue that the current discussion on immortality contained two major assumptions that were not being mentioned: (1) the assumption that the self is real and could conceivably go into the indefinite future and (2) that time is a succession of instants from the past, to the present and into the future.
This note is a clarification of the second assumption concerning time that the radio format did not have enough time for. Ken Taylor stated that an athlete who is living in the now (an example I had brought up) still has to learn from the past and plan for the future and just can?t live in the now. This response is a common misperception of the position that we can only live in the now. When a person thinks about the future, he can only do this
in the present; likewise, when he thinks about the past he can only do so in the present. The activity of planning for the future or learning from the past is not excluded by the view that all we have is the present. We cannot jump into the future to think about the future ? it has to be done in the now.
The concepts of past and future are just that ? concepts - or mental constructs. They are much like the constructs of longitude and latitude. These are not strings girdling the earth ? as depicted on maps and globes. They are constructs that help up to navigate the earth - and therefore are useful tools - but we can?t stumble over them in our trips from point A to point B. In exactly the same way, the ?past? and ?future? are mental constructs, mental boxes, which help us to order our experiences. But, they are no more real than latitude and longitude.
I would like to know what others think about this concept of time.
In any case, in a philosophical investigation about any subject, it is useful to at least state what the big assumptions are behind the discussion. Clarification is a major function of philosophy and, concerning the present discussion about immortality, these two assumptions above are at least worth recognizing as such, even if one comes to difficult conclusions regarding them.
Regards,
Don DuBois

Donald has raised intriguing issues that, for me, highlight the limits of western philosohical discourse.
This notion that time is but a mental construct has been developed in western thought only recently by theoretical physicists. While some physicists have found "the arrow of time" to be a fragment from the first moments of the big bang, others find no good evideence in the material world as to why we should expect that our actions today shoujld have effects in the future.
Eastern philosophy and religion, however, has developed this notion of time for millenia. Without launching into a dissertation, suffice it to say that certain Hindu and Buddhist thinkers maintain that there is only the "now" and that thoughts of the past and future take one (to quote Eliade) one out of the "sacred" space and into the "profane" space of the world. Buddhists call this "mindfullness."
Western neo-platonists, and followers of "new age" figures such as Eckhert Tolle have begun developing this motion of the "now" as the only meaningful measure of time.
As to immortality, I find that western discourse on eastern ideas focuses only on the Hindu notion of reincarnation. Buddhism (generally) advocates rebirth, and there is an importatn difference. reincarnation implies the tranmigration of a distinct soul, while rebirth does not.
To illustrate this point, the Buddha aked his followers to visualize a candle being lit which in turn lit another candle and in turn another, repeated millions and millions of times. Which is the original flame (of consciousness)?
I found this notion that I (there is no "self")am not here very comforting when I took this woman I was dating to a Celine Dion concert.

I am seventy three and its almost two years now since being diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer. I was told then that I had 3 to 6 months to live unless I had the Whipple Procedure, a major operation where the survival rates are very low and resultant suffering very high. I fully expected to die during the operation and accepted it calmly, perhaps because the symptons of the disease are awful. I survived the "procedure" well, but Chemotherapy was now required and took the essence of my life away.
I do not believe in a "higher power" (except perhaps women in general) or an afterlife. I have been off Chemo now for six months and have felt truely alive, I have felt true physical and spiritual "joy" for the first time in my life. I understand that I am a part of Nature in the whirling circle of all life - not an observer of Nature.
My Oncologist has just informed me that the cancer had returned, but now inoperable and terminal and associated with much physical suffering. I was also told that I am to go back to a life of Chemotherapy.
Frankly, I don't understand why I feel so calm about it all. Perhaps its because of my intertwining with Nature (I lived alone along the Great Divide in Montana for nine years)and my place in it. I now doubt that Nature really intended or desires Humanity. That evolution somewhere along the way missed a beat and created animals that are suicidal and the antithisis of Nature. Although I'm not sure, I think that I am comfortable with the fact of mortality. Hey, I've had a fantastic ride and at some point you have to get off!
George
Lowell

Thanks, Lowell. I'm touched. I think that says it all.
God bless.

Everybody wants to be in heaven, but nobody wants to die....

Having a finite life is necessary because it gives us a timeline in which to operate. We know that by a certain time we should meet a partner, perhaps have children, embark on a career, take vacations, and so on. If we lived forever then there would be no rush to do anything and the world would slow down to an almost unbearably slow rate that would cause boredom.

Great post Ken.
Things are made such that we will not stop our activities despite our ultimate extinction.
We all have the option of ending it now. Instead, the little bird of hope perches singing on our shoulders and we go on. Maybe we will be fulfilled before the end comes--we will have a "successful life". We remain
narrowly focused on the path ahead of us---as the cliff
gets closer and closer.
The Yogis see the whole thing as a form of play --
he eternal dance of Shiva---forms eternally being created and being dissolved.
When things fall apart in our world, when there is a fundamental crisis, and we are inconsolable, then is an invitation to
see our bodies, our lives, as participants in this coming and going of form and to identify with the
source of this process of forming and dissolving.

I agree very much with Adam, who wrote that having a finite life is necessary because "If we lived forever then there would be no rush to do anything and the world would slow down to an almost unbearably slow rate that would cause boredom."
I feel it is as if we can only accept life fully after we have accepted our mortality. To accept the possibility that I might die any second now (which is improbable, but nevertheless a possibility) leaves no choice for me to accept my life as it is right now. To wait for 'more life' is a terrible waste of time - even if I die an old woman. Nobody gains more life, we only lose it.
As James Dean once said, "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today."