While it’s easy to get near a public figure to assassinate with a gun, or bomb, or the like… getting someone “Captured” to enact one of these elaborate plans is much more difficult - especially when that person knows you can’t hurt him. You can’t abduct him at gunpoint. You can’t knock him out with impact, or sleeping gas, or whatever.
I’m not saying it’s impossible, just difficult… and one knowing that John Doe down the street will live forever inspire you to make that kind of effort?
This is the classic Faustian plot. You’ll live forever, but everything you know will pass away in time. The very human race has to go extinct sometime, unless there are other immortals to hang out with after everybody else is dead.
Even then, some current cosmological theories propose that the future of the universe is “heat death”, a kind of end to the flow of time, or possibly a recontraction of the universe into a black hole. The science is beyond my understanding, but it’s creepy nontheless. Faced with that kind of a future, I might well go crazy, even if it doesn’t happen for four billion years. Although I might find some way to come to terms with the idea that I will someday consciously experience my molecules collapsing. Plus, if what Una Persson says is true, I’d eventually forget I ever learned about the end of the universe. Then, when the universe became overpowered by entropy and all the matter started to decay into x-rays (or whatever the hell is supposed to happen) it would be a complete surprise to me. Still, then I’d have to spend untold millions of years floating around, watching time end before my eyes. Immortality on these terms would be a terrible curse.
On the other hand, if we’re willing to accept that a shotgun blast to the face has no effect, why should Una’s theory of bit-rot even apply? The OP didn’t specify whether we’d remember everything the way we do in our normal lifetimes in this scenario, but if we would, and we believed that the universe would end in a way that’s terribly inhospitable to human life, would we spend the next few billion years dreading that fate?
Harshly, in Weirddave’s version of events the immortality isn’t optional. Even Faust had the choice to buy into it, although once in he couldn’t buy out. At any rate, there are so many unknowns. The idea of “going crazy” loses all meaning after a certain point, but being faced with all this could hardly be healthy for the human psyche.
Forgetting stuff is part of the same set of processes (i.e. changes of neurological state) that allows us to experience and remember new things - if you lock the neurons so they can’t change, you won’t forget, but you won’t experience or learn either.
Dave, since this is your thread, and since you’ve stipulated that suicide is impossible, what sort of invulnerability does the immortal person have? For instance, what happens if s/he jumps into a high-powered shredder? Can this person cut his/her hair, fingernails, toenails - or do they never grow, even in infancy?
Just wondering what we’re working with, here.
Personally, I think I’d have a great time with immortality, for several centuries anyway. It would be easy enough to save up enough in the first ‘lifetime’ or so, to be able to live off dividends and interest as long as the world’s financial system didn’t totally collapse. I’d enjoy jumping unreservedly into new interests, knowing I had the time to become as good at them as I wanted to be. I’d enjoy shedding an old life at regular intervals, going back to school and starting an entire new life.
But forever is a loooong time. It’s impossible to know how one would feel about immortality if one had lived ten thousand years, and could not end one’s life. I think it would get a bit crazy-making after enough centuries beyond centuries.
I think the question needs some tweeking, otherwise we are left with the spectre of someone floating alive in nothingness after the univerese collapses. How about practcal immortality in that you heal instantly from wounds? Shoving yourself into a wood chipper would do it, as would a bath in molten metal a la’ the Governator in T2, being at ground zero for a nucular attack, or flying a space ship into the sun, but gunshot wounds, cuttings and the like would heal before one could die. So I guess you could die, but you’d have to really work at it.
That would be true if we were refering to an individual acting unlawfully. But an immortal would be a peculiar case. I wouldn’t take as a given that a government would offer him any protection, or that an angry mob wouldn’t jump on him at the first chance they have, for instance. So, I’m sure there are cases when people could act pretty openly. As for the means? That would be easy. Except if the immortal is granted too some superman-like powers, you just have to send two or three strong people, or wait until the person sleep and tie him up, etc…
As for the motives? What about people thinking you’re the antechrist, or any other claim which wouldn’t be that weird given that you’re indiscutably not an ordinary human? What about people who are just plainly pissed at you for any reason (over the course of a couple century, there will certainly be a number of them). Or just envious? Or affraid?
And even if it were difficult, after 1000 years or so, someone is going to succeed.
Thinking about governments, an invulnerable immortal would be a prodigious asset. And I’m sure plenty of people would do anything to be able to use him. Do this or that or else…
No, definitely, I would try to stay anonymous.
Well…Under these conditions I would sign up. Otherwise, indeed, the points ** cuauhtemoc ** mentionned make the concept positively frightening.
Well, we don’t know enough about the parameters of this immortality. Some immortals don’t require sleep. But even assuming one does, one can take reasonable measures to protect oneself - and you’re still a citizen of your country, and the government has a few obligations in that regard for basic levels of protection.
As for the two or three strong people - two scenarios come to mind. Invulnerability often (but not always) comes with a degree of strength itself (such as the movie Unbreakable) … and I guarantee that even an average-strength guy who knows he can’t be physically hurt can put up a pretty good fight against fleshy mortals no matter how strong they are. You’d be better off sending trained martial artist types.
I would think religious zealotry would be one of the few factors in our world powerful enough to cause a group of individuals to directly oppose a foe who is demonstratably unhurtable. Envy? Yeah, there’d be envy, but I doubt there’d be a powerful enough envy to motivate someone to take such a risky course of action. And fear, I find, doesn’t lend itself to the kind of planning needed to subdue an unkillable being.
But let’s say they’re motivated, and they plan. What do they do?
Rocket into deep space? Well, they’d need major government support for that. Thus it’d have to be a substantial portion of the population against you.
Tossed into a volcano? Okay, more plausible, but, barring a lot of weight, you’re gonna float. And climb out. And kick their asses for trying.
Chains and concrete? Yeah, nothing wrong with that scenario - except that as a public figure, people are going to wonder about your disappearance. Someone will find you. It may be a decade or two, but heck, that’s chump change.
Or else what? What’s the government going to threaten you with?
Besides, I can think of only two ways such a being would be a tremendous asset - one, if they need a kind of living historian, to remember first-hand accounts of events through the ages - a function I’d happily go along with… or two, a combatant. Which means they’d have to risk the immortal falling into enemy hands.
I’ll let you know in a couple thousand years.
(Looks up toward heaven, down towards hell, and shakes his fist, shouting, “We had a deal!”
-Joe, already has his last words planned out
Being immortal means you cannot die, but you are still subject to time. When all energy in the universe dissapates and you are left floating in nothingness, you will lose all frame of reference and eventually your thought processes will slow down and you will stop thinking. You will not have died, but you will be in all senses “asleep” for all of time.
Re-reading that makes me think it could sound confusing, but basically all I am saying is that without reference points, your brain will do wierd things, like lose track of time. I think this could be supported with people stuck in isolation chambers and the effects it has on the brain. If the universe collapses on itself (probably not a widely held theory), all time will cease to exist, and though you will not die, you will simply not experience time anymore- no time, no you. You will have effectively been killed.
They wondered about Judge Crater, too. See all the good it did him.
Marilyn Monroe may or may not have thought that nobody would dare murder her, too.
Seen her around, lately?
The howling masses are fickle, & do not truly love anybody–not even themselves.
They can’t murder the immortal… I don’t know how the Marilyn example even relates to the part you quoted. 
(As an aside, I thought the conventional theory was that she committed suicide.)
Bodies turn up when you kill someone. They have to avoid discovery for a huge amount of time before they’re so decayed that they’re not even recognizable as bodies. Now put an immortal in that situation - not only does the “body” not decay - it’s alive, and thus can act to facilitate its discovery.
So in a few decades - the Immortal you bury in chains and concrete will be unearthed, and he’s gonna be ticked off. It’s inevitable.
I’m surprised nobody mentioned Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged from Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker trilogy. I honestly think that’s the most realistic portrayal of how an immortal would behave. If I were immortal, I may very well spend eternity insulting everyone in the universe, personally, one by one, in alphabetical order.
What would drive me nuts would be the development of an immortality pill that would let me live forever in this broken-down fifty year-old body. I want a twenty-year old one darn it.
And of course, if you have no grounding in the rest of the story and such, that’s just going to sound like some sort of weirdo thing.
And while it’s odd, in the context of the book it’s quite understandable.
You’re assuming other super-human abilities which aren’t implied by immortality. I could as well become an immortal when i’m a frail 70 years old man, for instance.
The government will protect you if it wants to. But knowing there’s an immortal around would be a major shock. Let’s assume it happens tomorrow (and in a democratic country). It would be obvious that you aren’t a human. At least not a normal human. As such, how could you be considered as a citizen? You could state “I’m ** CandidCamera ** , I’m a citizen of this country”. But why would they believe you? You could be something else which replaced CandidCamera. I doubt they would leave you alone and free. They would most certainly detain you, study you, interrogate you until they could make sense of the story. If people hear about you, they will have various theories, and some of them would picture you as a threat (an alien? a demon?).
And that would be in a modern, democratic country. But I was thinking more generally. A dictatorship. Europe at the time of the inquisition, things like that…
I really wouldn’t count on a government benevolence if I were an immortal.
You’re not particularily powerful in this hypothetical. And someone would surely come quickly with an idea to deal with you. It took me, alone, 5 whopping minutes to think that one could easily get rid of an unvulnerable immortal.
People maight react immediatly to fear, but they can also hold this fear for a long long time (you’re supposedly around, assuming your status of immortal, in public view). People could certainly think about it, discuss the issue, plan something, etc… quite easily.
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Rocket into deep space? Well, they’d need major government support for that. Thus it’d have to be a substantial portion of the population against you.
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I gave this example as a possibility if people really wanted to make sure that you’d able a very miserable existence for a very long time.
Dubious. you’ll probably be caught in the movements of the lava, and eventually be entrapped in the rock when it will cool down. Once again, I gave this example because it would be particularily awful to be trapped in a bedrock for the eternity.
Nope. You’re not superman, you’re just immortal. Hence, it would be easy to subdue you and tie you up.
But that’s once again assuming that people would have an issue with you dissapearing. Not obvious at all. Even in you become you immortal life in a place and time where you’re enjoying protection, even if most people like you for some reason, over the course of the centuries, you’ll eventually find yourself in a situation where a lot of people want dearly to get rid of you and will have the means to do so.
As a public figure, more extraordinary than any public figure ever, you 'll be tracked down by all sort of people, anyway, for hundreds of different reasons. With hundreds of different motives. Some nefarious. Day after day, year after year…
Anyway, let’s assume they only manage to keep you in this chest under concrete for a couple decades, as you assumed (but if you drop the block of concrete or metal in the middle of the ocean, it could take way more time before you’re found). You say it’s only chump change. Well…remember, you’re still a normal human despite being immortal. 20 years is a loooong time. I don’t know about you, but i’m pretty certain that if I were under a block of concrete for a couple decades, when they will dig me up, I would be plain crazy…
The kind of things I mentionned. The block of concrete, for instance. Or plenty of other things designed to make your life unbearable. You might be invulnerable physically, but the OP question implies you aren’t psychologically.
I was indeed thinking about a combattant. Or a spy. I’m sure they could come up with plenty of creatives ideas about how to use an immortal.
One thing at least I’m sure : If you were an immortal and people knew about it, they wouldn’t ever leave you alone. Never. The military. The historians. The religious. The scientists. The stalkers. The paparazzi. The conspiracy theorist. The Dopers. Etc, etc, etc… And it in itself would be a good enough reason to stay anonymous.
I’m really not. And that has nothing to do with the age at which one becomes immortal, either.
I have a birth certificate… DNA, dental, and fingerprint matching … burden of proof’s on them.
And “more generally”, today? Big chunk of the world is democratic.
Well, I was only counting on the government’s basic obligation to the welfare of one of its citizens. Not exactly ‘benevolence.’
Not particularly powerful? Says who? We don’t have the parameters of power.
And I’ve yet to hear an idea that “easily” “gets rid” of an invulnerable immortal.
Just one that “temporarily detains”.
And they may plan something - I even allow that they may try something - but without broad public support, they are doomed to fail eventually, causing the immortal to suffer, at worst, temporary inconvenience.
Yes, but it’s not feasable unless the majority of the country’s against you.
Rock is heavy. Human body, not as much. Lava is still very heavy and very dense.
Further, you wouldn’t be trapped ‘for an eternity’ - and it wouldn’t be in bedrock.
I’m sorry, are you the OP? Did you define the parameters and change your name when I wasn’t looking? No? Huh.
Well, let’s go with your assumption. Please describe how it is easy to subdue someone who cannot be harmed.
In this incredibly politically diverse world of ours, there’d probably be a bunch of conspiracy nuts looking into the disappearance… concerned civil rights activists worried about how your rights had been abridged, and considering that you’re immortal, you’d probably even have a cult to boot.
As for your ‘eventually’ - well, I’d ask you to prove that, but you can’t.
So says you.
That’s you, then. That’s not me. I’d just be bored.
Pfft. Let’em try, then. If the best they can muster is psychological torture, they can’t break me if I know they can never do me physical harm.
Immortality isn’t of any special help as a spy.
You’re sure of that, are you? Well, good thing everybody agrees with you. :rolleyes:
Yep. That’s the first thing I though of when I saw the thread title. It is reasonable to assume that everyone has a non-zero probability of going insane. Given an infinite amount of time, anyone would eventually go insane. Of course, every insane person has a non-zero probability of becoming sane again, so it appears you’d oscillate between periods of sanity and periods of insanity.
Maybe it was suicide. Or maybe not.
My intuition always made the hairs on my neck stand up, when I heard about the circumstances.
I’m not much for conspiracy theories, but somethings not righjt about this one…
Physical strenght has nothing to do with your age?
Yes. And there’s an enormous, blatant evidence that you’re not this person : the fact that you’re an unvulnerable immortal. Actually, it’s not only an evidence that you’rte not this person, but an evidence that you aren’t even human.
And you assume that even in a democratic country, there would be not debate about the status of an unvulnerable immortal?
The basic obligation to the welfare of the nation citizens would definitely include to protect them of a potential major danger. An unvulnerable immortal is definitely a potential danger as long as you don’t know who or what this “person” is. Once again, nobody would care about your (alleged) constitutionnal rights. Only about what you are and what could be the consequences of the existence of someone like you. Once again, in this situation, you wouldn’t even be assumed to be a human, let alone a citizen.
The Op never refered to anything else than immortality.
For most people, a couple century of detention would be quite enough. They would be rid of you for the rest of their life.
Given enough time, someone will succeed, even without public support. And you’re optimistic if you take as a given that someone who is immortal will necessary get public support. People genrally don’t like much what is different. Even less so what is mysteriously different to an extent never heard about before.
And concerning suffering a temporary inconvenience, if I were an immortal, I would rather avoid that, if at all possible. And as I already said, if a “temporary” inconvenience" like sensory deprivation, no contact with anyone, and no clue if you’ll be ever freed and when last long enough, you’ll get plain crazy, immortal or not.
Most certainly. But as I already pointed out, I waouldn’t take for granted that such a thing couldn’t happen. Nor that the country will forever stay democratic, etc…You’re going to have to plan for the long term, if you’re immortal.
I assume that we could begin a thread in GQ on this topic, but I don’t think that this hypothetical is worth it. An erupting volcano is quite agitated. it’s not a still lake. My assumption would be that you’d be engulfed in the lava.
Indeed, the word “eternity” was poorly chosen. But an undetermined lenght of time which could range from some years to some millions years until you’re freed isn’t an appealing prospect for me. Maybe I’m mistaken about the meaning of “bedrock” in english, but lava definitely become rock when it cools down.
The OP only refered to immortality. So, you’re the one adding arbitrarily extra powers.
Gather two or three people (or even one will suffice if he’s strong enough of if you’re frail enough). Jump on the immortal. Block his limbs. Tie him up/ handcuff him. He’s subdued. You can want to keep him away from the afforementionned woodshredders or fires, in case he would be strong willed enough (or wouldn’t feel pain) to say, put himself in a fire to burn the ropes or something similar. A cell or basement should suffice.
And a lot of conspiracy nuts thinking you’re a scout preparing the soon-to -come alien invasion? (a theory which wouldn’t even be particularily absurd, in such circumstances).
Like if an immortal popped up out of nowhere, the first concern of the public would be his civil rights…
You might. Or you might frighten everybody the first time you appear on TV, depending on your personnality/ charisma, etc…Both would be likely, I would assume. But if an immortal creates a cult tomorrow, you can bet that he will be branded as the antechrist by a lot of people.
Besides, once again, you’re going to be around for a looong time. You can’t assume that civil rights guarantees or such things will last as long as you, assuming that’s they would be granted to you.
Easy. If the probability is non-zero, given enough time, it will happen.
So, you’re going to tell me that an immortal living publically wouldn’t attract attention. Even a minor star’s life is scrutinized, but an immortal would let everybody indifferent?
You should have mentionned from the beginning that you’re already gifted with surhuman powers allowing you to stay sane after 20 years of sensory deprivation.
So, threats to people you love let you indifferent? Confinement, sensory deprivation, humiliations, etc… don’t have any effect on you? Once again, how did you acquire your surhuman talents?
Spy wasn’t the correct word. but your unvulnerability could certainly be very useful for many special operations.
I don’t see many people disagreeing with me, either. So, you’re thinking that an immortal whose status is well known wouldn’t be tracked by journalists, scientists, stalkers, etc… Yeah, sure…who would have any interest in a mere immortal when there are people like Leonardo di Caprio around…