We're all going to be dead in 100 years.

Wow, that's really impressive, good luck with the PhD. And of course saving the environment!

I read on the previous posts that you'll be doing a PhD in Environmental Science? That's brilliant, I hope it goes well! I think as an Engineer I'll do my best to increase the efficiency of whatever I'll be working with, so to reduce the impact it'd have on the environment.

Here's to the future!

Because it's your life. May as well enjoy it while it lasts.

Why though? I'd rather dedicate it to making life enjoyable for other people.

One minute you're complaining about living your life with other people in mind and the next you're saying you don't want to live it for yourself.

Think whatever you want. Have whatever goals you want. Have whatever sense of purpose you want. I'm just giving my perspective.

I find this a really comforting thing to think about - it helps to remind me that nothing really matters.

There's so many people on the planet, and you only interact with a tiny proportion of them. You only have to walk down the street to realise how insignificant you are. Most people have no idea you exist or give a **** about you anyway. Give it a couple of generations and chances are you'll be completely forgotten.

Do you ever just stop and think how tiny and insignificant the Earth is in relation to the universe? We're just one planet of eight in our solar system, all orbiting the sun. The sun is just one of billions of stars in our galaxy, which is just one of billions of galaxies in the universe, all billions of miles away from each other. It's so strange to think that right now there's galaxies colliding and supernovas and stuff happening.

Nothing matters in the grand scale of things.

Thinking in this way helps me not to get stressed and to stop worrying about things.

Not really sure what the point of this thread was, but oh well. Thoughts?

I find this a really comforting thing to think about - it helps to remind me that nothing really matters.

There's so many people on the planet, and you only interact with a tiny proportion of them. You only have to walk down the street to realise how insignificant you are. Most people have no idea you exist or give a **** about you anyway. Give it a couple of generations and chances are you'll be completely forgotten.

Do you ever just stop and think how tiny and insignificant the Earth is in relation to the universe? We're just one planet of eight in our solar system, all orbiting the sun. The sun is just one of billions of stars in our galaxy, which is just one of billions of galaxies in the universe, all billions of miles away from each other. It's so strange to think that right now there's galaxies colliding and supernovas and stuff happening.

Nothing matters in the grand scale of things.

Thinking in this way helps me not to get stressed and to stop worrying about things.

Not really sure what the point of this thread was, but oh well. Thoughts?

I think what Ummm's trying to get at is that while in our relatively short lifetimes our actions affect those around us, in 'the grand scheme of things', i.e. the planets stars and the galaxies that make up the mass of the universe around us, our actions have no effect. We've been on this planet for less than a fraction of the Earth's lifetime, we may be grabbing at every resource we can reach, but the sun is still shining as brightly as it had been the day that humans first evolved.

When coming to things down on Earth then the things we do do matter. Ummm is not talking about an apathy to humanity and her surroundings, but of a comforting realisation that no matter how badly she could mess up, the planet still turns and life goes on. Nothing matters when you speak about celestial scales, everything matters when you speak about home.

Contrary to the title of the thread, scientists believe that the first person to live to be one thousand years old is alive today.

Do you live under a rock or something? Ofcourse we aren't the only life form in the whole universe... That's an extremely self-obsessed thing to say. So you think that out of billions of galaxies, the earth is the only habitable planet?

Saying something and believing it are two very different things. You of course, have made gross assumptions on my motivation for saying it which was counterbalancing the OP's apparent existential futility implied by her statement. Which opens up more questions than the face-value reading of the statement indicates.

From your opening ad-hominem line, I would suggest it betrays your lack of inquisition and understanding of scientific process.

That life exists elsewhere in the universe is only a preposition. That it must be intelligent is a proposition with only our own existence and limited knowledge as a guide. Hypothesis is currently thwarted by all manner of technical hurdles and although humanity has begun the journey, finding evidence to prove the hypotheses still relies on overwhelming serendipity and luck. I cannot be certain no life exists without searching the entire universe. You cannot be certain that life exists without searching the whole universe until you find it.

By the first half of the last century, many scientists still believed there were canals on Mars made by intelligent life. Today the search for even microbial life on Mars goes on and still with no answer. Without that evidence, we cannot even begin to verify the Drake equation - itself based entirely on speculative probabilities.

So to make sweeping generalisations that life exists elsewhere is grossly scientifically unreliable at the present time - a guess based in faith at best. No different to religious faith in this instance. Until we actually find it or it comes visiting us with a bunch of Arcturian roses and a box of the finest Betelgeuse chocolates, it remains as such.

My mind of course still remains open to both possibilities.

Sarcasm? If not I call *******s - cite source.

Interesting...source, id like to see the discussion surrounding that

It is a theory proposed by Aubrey de Grey, English theoretician in gerontology (the study of ageing). It is his most famous statement so there is a lot of stuff about it online, including this article from the Guardian.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/aug/01/aubrey-de-grey-ageing-research

Interestingly, he believes that the first person to live to be a thousand isn't a very young person, but somebody who is actually in their fifties, or even sixties today, which I am a bit suspicious of, but would love for it to be true.

If this prevention of physical deterioration ever takes off can you imagine how depressing our centuries-old descendants are going to find it that most of us only lived to 80-90...