This article discusses the possibility of humanity achieving eternal life, linking it to the development of science and technology, and explores the external and internal happiness it would bring. It raises the question of whether eternal life can realize utopia, an ideal world that can provide humanity with both material abundance and spiritual maturity.
Eternal life. A word that means eternal life, or everlasting life. Just as Qin Shi Huang sought to find a herb that would allow him to never grow old and never die, humans in both the East and the West have made countless efforts to find a way to avoid death. This human instinct to overcome the inevitability of death has been expressed in various forms in myths, legends, and religious beliefs. Initially, people tried to achieve eternal life through rituals and religion, such as Christianity and Buddhism, but with the development of science and technology, we are now approaching immortality in a more scientific way.
Some scholars believe that humanity may be able to achieve eternal life by 2045 due to the increasingly advanced technology. These claims are promising in that many things that were once considered impossible are now becoming a reality. However, it’s worth pointing out something here. If the existence of “me” is unhappy even in eternity, then eternal life will only make me suffer more. So, would we be happy if we avoided death and lived forever? The answer to this question is yes.
Before discussing why we would be happy if we had eternal life, we need to define the concept of happiness. Happiness is not just about material satisfaction, but includes emotional and spiritual components that are deeply rooted in human life. I’ve divided happiness into two categories: external happiness and internal happiness. First, external happiness is the satisfaction we get from external factors such as other people, other things, etc. Examples of external happiness include eating delicious food, wearing beautiful clothes, being with loved ones, and having a lot of money. Internal happiness, on the other hand, is the psychological security you feel when your state, your ideas, or your values are realized. Examples of internal happiness include waking up tired after a good night’s sleep, doing your hobbies, working hard and achieving what you set out to do. Overall, it can be said that humans feel happy when they are in a better state compared to their previous state.
First of all, if human beings attain eternal life due to advanced science and technology, it will be a better state than the current state of death, so eternal life itself will initially lead human beings to happiness. On the other hand, if human beings attain eternal life, it will also bring about great changes in the basic structure and values of our society. Different ways of life and cultural diversity, which are not fully experienced in our current short life cycle, could be maximized, and these changes would have a positive impact on human happiness.
In order for humanity to achieve eternal life, the question of human consciousness living forever must be solved. This can be solved under the assumption that science and technology develop rapidly. If humans have eternal life, there will be a lot of research on resource development to ensure that humans can use them to live forever, so that there will be enough food resources, and somehow provide space for each individual to live. In this context, new solutions to resource distribution and environmental problems would likely emerge. Humanity would be able to consume as much food as it wants, and would have free access to abundant resources. Not only that, but our loved ones would be immortal, and we would be able to be with them forever, as long as our relationship with them is not broken. In that case, external happiness will naturally follow.
Internal happiness can also be achieved if humanity is immortalized. The cause of this lies beneath the infinite amount of time we are given. With external happiness fulfilled, and given infinite time, humanity would be able to live a very happy life, both mentally and internally. First of all, death would not separate family members, friends, or lovers, so they would be able to stay together for a long time and be happy. In addition, within infinite time, humans would constantly create new cultures, which would result in a much more diverse culture, and humans would be able to enjoy cultural activities in which diversity exists. In addition, with the barrier of time removed, humans would not be bound by material things, and humans would be able to make constant efforts to achieve the goals they set for themselves, and they would be able to constantly improve and become better. Eventually, humans will also achieve internal happiness.
Whereas in Greco-Roman mythology, immortality was represented as the domain of the gods and not available to humans, today, humans are getting closer and closer to eternal life. In 2011, a study showed that the aging process can be reversed by activating telomerase. Telomerase is an enzyme that protects the ends of chromosomes, which shorten each time a cell divides, and thus inhibits cellular aging, but Ronald Defino, a cancer geneticist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Center at Harvard University in the U.S., and a team of researchers have shown that telomerase can not only slow down aging, but also reverse aging that has already occurred. This study marks a major turning point in the scientific debate about extending human lifespan.
With these advances in science and technology, it is widely believed that sooner or later, we will achieve eternal life. Until then, we will need to solve many more problems than just longevity, which will require higher-level technologies and methods. If eternal life is achieved, mankind will be able to enjoy external happiness through sufficient consciousness resources, eternal relationships with those around us, and eternal happiness through self-improvement through unremitting efforts under infinite time. At this time, humanity will have achieved an ideal society in which material abundance and spiritual maturity can be pursued simultaneously. If an ideal world where we can enjoy eternal happiness in infinite time is realized, isn’t that what utopia is?
