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The oldest person alive right now was born in 1907 and is 117. Depending on how well her memory has held up, she might be able to remember a time that nobody else in the whole world can.
My grandfather was born in 1910. He was a bombardier in WWII for the US Army Air Corps, since the US Air Force didn’t exist yet. He’s no longer with us, but his life was so very different than mine. He grew up on a farm with a horse and carriage. I grew up in an apartment playing Atari.
This will happen to all of us if quantum immortality is real.
It’s not.
Really? Do something to prove it.
“Quantum immortality” is magical thinking for people that aren’t comfortable with their own mortality. It’s functionally no different than belief in an afterlife.
Meh. Solipsism is lame. Way more fun to believe in a world where my actions have consequences
I like dualipsism. There’s two of us across infinite lifetimes and we have no idea who’s who
Nice. I like the one where I’m Batman and you’re Joker
Wait I thought those were both you…
It really is. My great-grandfather was born in 1898 and died in 1999. He almost lived in three different centuries. He rode a horse and buggy in his youth and played Windows Solitaire in his later years.
Same for my Great-Grandfather, but it was much more than that when I look at his life.
Went from horse and buggies and steam trains, lived through 2 world wars, saw rural electrification - 1930s for him - bring lights and washing machines and telephones, survived his own pandemic - Spanish Flu 1918-1919, saw the invention of automobiles, radios, and TVs, heavier than air flight, the Great Depression, the beginnings of the digital world, and watched the Moon Landings with me sitting in his favorite chair in our living room.
When he died, no one really knew how old he was - there was no official record of his birth certificate since he was born at home in a very rural area. While I’m old myself now and have seen some few changes, I cannot fathom the sheer number of societal upheavals and disruptions he went through every decade of his life.
Well, let’s see. Depending on your age, you were alive when JFK was assassinated. You watched the moon landing. You were alive during the Vietnam War. You remember 9/11, the Great Recession, and the spread of Facebook. You were alive when America elected its first Black president. You witnessed the explosion of technology, namely, smart phones. You’ve driven on roads alongside self-driving electric vehicles. You survived an international pandemic. You have access to the largest library of human knowledge to ever exist. If you’d like to, you can have a decent conversation with something pretending to be human.
I’d say you’ve lived through a decent chunk of history as well.
Everyone lives through history. But few live to see so many wrenching changes as his generation did. The best I can say I lived through was the beginning of the internet and the inter-connection of every person on the planet.
I remember on New Years Eve 1999 the local newspaper ran an article that was interviewing people who’d been alive for the last turn of the century and comparing the two New Years’ celebrations. In hindsight I wish 10 year old me had had the presence of mind to save it, it was pretty neat.
I have a recording of interviews I did with all my living grandparents for a school project when I was a kid. One thing that stood out was the level of abject poverty they experienced. They were teenagers during the great depression and it definitely had a major impact on all of them.
Would you be willing to digitize that recording and upload it to the Internet Archive for preservation? You certainly don’t have to add the link here, but I believe it would be a wonderful thing for the next generations to watch one day.
I love watching old restored footage so I can vicariously experience that moment in time and reflect on how far humanity has progressed.
I love this idea! I have videos of my grandparents where my dad interviews them about their lives. And then one of my dad when we interviewed him about his life after he was diagnosed with cancer. Can’t really bear to watch that one but some day I should save them online somewhere. I like the idea of them being part of an archive and part of searchable history fo future generations
I think it’s a noble thing to preserve these digital recordings. It’s tough, because they’re the individual person’s memories. But long after we’re dead and our names and lives are forgotten, it would be an important artifact for our future generations to have access to.
Now I’m thinking about all the old VHS tapes my parents have. If they haven’t already degraded, I’m going to ask for those tapes and see what it costs to digitize them myself.
I’ll settle for 50, i don’t need more of this madness we call life.
Oh shit, 50 comes a lot faster and is a lot younger than you might think.
I get it, i’m only 14 years away from it. The first 14 felt a lot longer than the last 14 up until today.
I don’t really know how to explain my reasoning, i think i’m just done and i’ve been done for a long time.
From my perspective i’ve given all i had to give and apparently it’s been the opposite of what i had to do.
I promised the wife i wouldn’t step out and that’s basically why i’m around today. I like to think i’m here for her, but i basically pay the bills and help her with information on how to reach the next step on the ladder of her plans. But tbh i could give so much more if i wasn’t the way i am, i’m always looking for something to silence the constant noise and it usually involves spending money on things that keep me busy while that money could be used to help her buy the things that make her progress faster.
I’ve tried getting help, but i have this thing where i keep shutting down at the worst possible time and instead of pushing through the help i contacted basically pulled out and pushed me away. I gave up looking for answers.
I don’t mean to intrude or push in any way, but your story sounds familiar and I found Running on empty to be an interesting read, if you ever feel inclined.
Good luck.
This might not be helpful, in that case sorry, but the idea that came to my mind first was:
Do something every day that’s a little uncomfortable and out of your comfort zone that helps your own progress. Do it every day, even if just a little bit, like study or work out or some bit of work on a personal project. If you do it every day you can build up to something.
I had a boss who was older but studying for her masters, and was lamenting it was discouraging being the oldest person in the class doing it. The prof told her “well, you’ll either turn 50 with the masters degree or without it, which do you prefer?”
Doing something out of my comfort zone has been my baseline for the past 12 years.
I don’t believe it’ll build to something tho. I’ve been trying to build airbrushing, 3d printing and fusion360 into something for the past 15 years…where 3d printing came in 5 years ago.
If i managed to pull this off like 7 years ago or something along that time i might have found some success, but i feel like i need another 12 years before i reach the point of being knowledgable anough.
Wow sounds like a cool niche and activity!
Oh absolutely not. No thank you. The world at large has my permission to smother me with a pillow if I hit 90 and don’t die. But it’s fine, I’m sure the microplastics/ultraprocessed food/climate change/whatever will take me out before that.
People say wild stuff like this when they’re young. The 89-year-olds in this scenario change their minds. Every time.
Speaking as a nurse that’s done a lot of hospice and goals of care discussions: it’s absolutely not every time. Lots of folks primarily want to die with dignity.
You seriously overestimate climate change unless you’re already old, infirmed, live near a coast and are poorer than dirt.
Everyone else is pretty much going to be fine.
Oh, you sweet summer child.
Oh you doomer zoomers…
I mean even if you aren’t old now you’ll be old eventually. And then the heat’s gon’ get you
That’s not how climate change works lol. Some areas become cooler, some become warmer. On average it gets hotter by 2.5 degrees or less now.
That means unless you live somewhere that can’t stave it off like near a lowlying coastline or in other heavily affected areas already well predicted, then you will literally be fine.
Better people than the average Lemming listen when they hear people are going to die or have their lives severely affected.
