RE: Christianity and Immortality

Excellent article via Longevity First about Christianity and seeking to cure aging. I think this could apply in general to all religions, but I am not familiar enough with their concept of an afterlife to say for sure.

I've been thinking back to the article by Christian writer William F. Harrell, entitled "FIRST-PERSON: The death of death"

I originally linked to it because it made me think of "the Christian backlash against the healthy life extension movement". For example, from Harrell's article I've extracted the following quotes (leaving aside for a moment the religious portions of the message):

[Aubrey de Grey] is being heralded as the man who will "murder" death. I don’t want to throw water on Mr. de Grey’s fire, but "murdering" death just won’t happen.

Mr. de Grey is simply trying to do something that is impossible -- he is trying to solve a spiritual problem through medical and "mechanical" means. He is trying to do what man has been trying for thousands of years to do -- and that is to get back into the "garden of Eden" relationship with God. All of human history attests to this desire of man. … Mr. de Grey is trying to restore the eternal life characteristic to man without so much as dealing with the spiritual nature of the problem we now face with death.

…

But remember this: Death is still universal. Everyone dies physically, eventually. Mr. de Grey can postulate all he desires, but he is not going to solve the problem of physical death.

…

Mr. de Grey is trying to solve a problem the world almost universally wants to reject, and that is the problem of judgment. … So, Mr. de Grey and all others who might hold to his views are coming at the problem of death and eternal life from the wrong direction. They want life to continue by solving the medical and physical side of aging. They should be looking at it from a spiritual perspective. The solution to death is found when one comes at the issue from God's perspective

Leaving aside the thinly veiled ad hominem of referring to Dr. de Grey as Mr. de Grey, I'd like to say that this view isn't entirely controversial, depending on your point of view. He isn't advocating that we end medical research into healthy life extension, nor that we should ban the practice of life extending medical procudures. He's merely expressing his opinion that those who wish to do so through medicine are trying to solve the right problem in the wrong way. Just about everyone wants Eternal Life, but according to Harrell—and the greater portion of the pro-death Christian camp—Eternal Life can only be attained by following a spiritual path.

Pro-Death Bioethics

Like I said, this isn't terribly controversial, and it is here that I have a certain respect for Harrell. For that reason, I'll leave his essay behind, and move on to the more influential front of the pro-death movement.

Harrell doesn't seem to go nearly so far as Leon Kass and other conservatives who, in addition to thinking that seeking better medicine is a fool's errand, go so far as to say that it's wrong, so morally wrong that we must put an end to any and all such attempts. As Leon Kass famously said:

We are still early enough in the game, I think, that at least a certain amount of public discussion might be in order. We might try to hope to separate those interventions that deal with the degenerations that are not necessarily life-prolonging.

I mean, if one could do something about Alzheimer's, if one could do something about chronic arthritis, if one could do something about general muscular weakness and not, somehow, increase the life expectancy to 150 years, I would be delighted.

This is scary enough: at the time, Leon Kass was the Chair of the President's Council on Bioethics. This was a man in a position to advise the President on a variety of issues related to future medicine, based on possible restrictions on today's research. Months, perhaps years, of research time has already been lost due to this man's self-righteous politics, and with 100,000 deaths a day from attributable to aging, I'll leave it an exercise to the reader to figure out how much blood is on his hands. And you might be interested to note that the man is still active in his pro-death writings.

An associate of Kass's, Francis Fukuyama, also exemplifies the current dogma of pro-death bioethics.

Indeed, as Kass has repeatedly stated, "the finitude of human life is a blessing for every individual, whether he knows it or not." And frighteningly, when asked … if the government has a right to tell its citizens that they have to die, Fukuyama answered, "Yes, absolutely."

(emphasis mine)

Immortality and Eternal Life

Pro-death bioethics is currently in vogue in the Republican-controlled federal government, at least the "Religious Right" portion. So I'm left to wonder, what's the big deal? Why is seeking longer life so morally wrong? (Let's leave aside for a moment that the federal government's role should not be to legislate morality upon its citizens, but to derive its morality from them. The government should be a reflection of its people, not vice versa.)

One answer I came up with is that seeking longer life is like playing God. Or perhaps, more to the point, it's a vain effort to seek Eternal Life, that most glorious gift which is God's, and God's only, to give. The thought, so it seems, is that God has cornered the market on Eternal Life and will accept no competitors.

But this thought is almost immediately, self-evidently wrong. Perhaps it's a weak imagination that thinks that talk of 1,000-year lifespans, or even one million year lifespans, is somehow treading into God's territory. God has the monopoly on Eternal Life, and nothing Man could ever attempt to do will obviate this. You see, there is a very fundamental difference between immortality and Eternal Life.

Finite Versus Infinite

Immortality literally means something along the lines of "without physical death". An immortal is unable to die a physical death, and perhaps we should clarify what Aubrey de Grey's research aims for: an end to aging. Aubrey de Grey is not talking about making us both unaging and completely indestructible. A nuclear bomb, a bullet, or even just a speeding car can all still kill an unaging person. (Of course, with future medicine, the latter two will become less and less of a problem.)

Immortality is frequently confused with spiritual eternal life, but we must make the distinction: Eternal Life is a spiritual blessing. Eternal life is to the spirit or soul as immortality is to the body. Part of the confusion comes from the literary use of the term "immortal" to describe the gods and other beings who were not mortal as we humans are; indeed, humans are often referred to in religions as "mortals".

But eternal life makes a more clear point: eternity is outside of time as we know it. An immortal might never die and yet not live for eternity, depending on your view of the math involved. Take for example the following German poem, roughly translated as I recall it from memory:

There is a jagged mountain, miles tall,

And once each millinium there comes to call

A passing bird, which sharpens its beak,

Way up upon the mountain's peak.

Yet when the mountain is worn away

To a low valley of serenity,

It will have been as though a day

When compared to God's Eternity.

You can google and find dozens of versions of the original poem (I made this version up, if you can't tell by the cheesy rhyming), some with the birds coming once every ten thousand or million years, some with the mountain being a thousand miles tall or made of diamond, some comparing the time it takes for the birds to wear down the mountain to a mere second.

The point is, no matter how big of a number you can think of, it's no closer to infinity than the number one.

You might object that … the numbers are so astronomical that it would make no difference if they were infinite. This objection illustrates what might be called the "fallacy of the virtually infinite": the conflation of the distinct concepts of "arbitrarily large" and "infinite". That we humans regularly commit this fallacy is understandable: the ability to distinguish between, say, eight goats and ten goats undoubtedly carried an evolutionary advantage, but a prehistoric human who pondered the difference between 10^1000 goats and infinitely many goats would only be wasting valuable hunting time. And in informal remarks about the vastness of space or of Bill Gates' wealth, we all understand "virtually infinite" means. But in serious discourse, the fallacy of the virtually infinite can only create confusion. …

The ancient Greeks were suspicious of infinity because of �paradoxes’ related to the Fallacy of the Virtually Infinite, and because of their suspicion humanity had to wait two millennia for Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz to discover differential calculus. But you can avoid the fallacy by remembering this simple rule: that for every whole number N, there are infinitely many whole numbers larger than N. This rule implies that 2, 17, and the number of possible human life experiences are all equally distant from infinity.

No period of mortal time, whether it be a second, a day, a year, a century, a millenium, a million years, a trillion years, or a googolplex of years, would be any closer to Eternity than any other period of time. In this sense, attempts to live longer are definitely not attempts to attain Eternal Life. To reach that route, one must take the spiritual path, or transcend this universe entirely. Attempts to live longer are merely that: attempts to live longer. For the same reason a person with an infection takes antibiotics, to avoid an early death (rather than to defy the will of God and seek Eternal Life through penicillin), one would seek an extended lifespan to avoid a death that comes all too early for us mere mortals.

For behold, this is [God's] Work and [His] Glory

Some Christian religions are more aware of this distinction than others:

For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. (Moses 1:39)

Here we see a view that God's plan for humans is not only that they attain immortality, but that they gain Eternal Life as well. There are two deaths that we humans face: the first death, being the physical death of our bodies, and the second death, being a death in the spirit. This second death might more accurately be called Hell, an eternal torment, bound by Satan's evil, and completely and forever removed from God's loving presence.

Immortality seeks to prevent the former death, but in a strict physical and mathematical sense, it cannot prevent the latter. Even if we never physically die, we can't live as long as an eternity. There always remains the possibility of physical death, of returning to a judgment before God, and potentially the second death, the death of the spirit or soul. In this sense, Harrell was right on the money when he said, "…that is the problem of judgment. But judgment is no problem to those who … have trusted in God’s way…"

The Same Goal?

In that sense, seeking immortality is not even in the same ballpark as seeking eternal life. They are two very different goals. As Vincent and Jules might argue in this situation:

VINCENT: It's seeking immortality. Is it as bad as seeking eternal life?—No, but you're in the same … ballpark.

Jules stops Vincent.

JULES: Whoa...whoa...whoa...stop right there. Seeking an artificial Eternal Life, and seeking medical immortality, ain't even the same … thing.

VINCENT: Not the same thing, the same ballpark.

JULES: It ain't no ballpark either. Look, maybe your method of living longer differs from mine, but trying to add healthy years to your life, and sneaking uninvited into the Holy of Holies, ain't the same ballpark, ain't the same league, ain't even the same … sport!

You Cannot Compel a Man to Enter Heaven

The scriptures give the religious a guide on how to live. But one thing that seems almost obvious, and yet is underappreciated by many who would force their morals on others, is that you can't compel someone to be good.

Yes, you can compel someone to do outward acts of "goodness". But it is what is within our hearts that defines righteousness or a lack thereof. Just as an untruth spoken with no knowledge of its falsehood would not be considered a lie, an act of telling the truth could be considered a lie if the teller had honestly believed he was lying. It is the intent to deceive, and not so much the act of deception, that makes someone a liar.

More to the point, a person who intends to commit a crime and is prevented from doing so is not viewed innocent in the same respect as someone who never had the intent.

For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he… (Prov. 23:7)

But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. (Matt. 5:28)

For behold, if a man being evil giveth a gift, he doeth it grudgingly; wherefore it is counted unto him the same as if he had retained the gift; wherefore he is counted evil before God. (Moro 7:8)

The Gospel of Christ attests to the fact that a person is judged by his thoughts as well as his actions. Because of this, you cannot force people to be righteous. More to the point, forcing others to act righteously is in itself a sin, for you are taking *away that person's God-given right to choose Eternal Life or Eternal Damnation. When you interfere in that right, not by gentle persuasion but by virtue of your political, financial, or physical power, you are as a slavemaster, a tyrant.

I speak this point especially to those in political power who would legislate bans on medical research solely because they think that it is not God's plan that human beings live longer than threescore and ten years. If it is God's plan, then HE will be the one to disrupt such research. And don't give the tired "How do you know that God isn't disrupting the research through me?" routine, as if you were God's instrument. If God does not want man to live longer than 120 years, he will prevent it from happening. But if such lifespans can be attained in the coming decades through the marvels of biotechnology, then is this not God's plan?

Remember, a man could live a thousand years, a million years, and he wouldn't be one day closer to Eternal Life than any of the rest of us. Attempting to prevent that man from pursuing that goal is no different than compelling someone to give to the poor when he has no such desire in his heart: it profiteth him nothing. Worse, it makes you a tyrant. If you don't want to live to 150 or 300, fine, don't support medical research, and don't use the fruits of such research. But attempts to prevent such research are morally wrong, tantamount to murder, for you are denying that choice to millions of others, and you are not God.

[Via Longevity First]