Immortality Through Technology Is Still On The Horizon

It is the season of Advent as I write. We are busy preparing to celebrate again the birth of our Lord Jesus. As we make such preparations, we are also reminded about those who do not have the means to celebrate. Churches and various non-profit organizations appeal to us on behalf of the poor, the sick and the homeless. We Christians also pray to our Lord to rescue and restore them. And this he does—often through us, the members of his body (Rom. 7:4).

One such prayer reached Jesus (John 11:1-3). Two wealthy women of the village of Bethany, beloved friends of Jesus, appealed to him on behalf of their brother Lazarus. He was deathly sick and no matter how wealthy they were, they were helpless in the face of his illness. They needed Jesus, the Great Physician (Luke 5:31) who had healed many (Matt. 8:16; 12:15; 14:14, etc.). Jesus responded to their prayer in a strange manner.

But when Jesus heard it he said, "This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it." Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. - John 11:4-6 ESV

I call this response strange, because Lazarus did die. His illness did lead to death. However, it did glorify Jesus, the Son of God, as he raised Lazarus from the dead. An important question arises at this point. What death or what type of death is Jesus speaking about? Its an important question, because modern science now suggests that we are in sight of conquering both illness and death within the next generation. And if that is so, we won't need Jesus any longer.

Here's a quote from the Postive Futurist:

Cutting-edge science and technologies, experts say, will one day provide everyone with radically increased intelligence, futuristic healthcare that prevents sickness and disease from ever happening, and a lifespan approaching immortality. . . 

Futurist Ray Kurzweil, in The Singularity is Near predicts that between 2025 and 2030, nanobot "cell-repair machines” will cruise through our bodies to prevent aging and stop pathogens before they cause harm. Nanobots will reprogram DNA where necessary keeping us forever young and in perfect health. . . 

In the 2040s, our 100% non-biological body will boast a zero failure rate. Even if a destructive accident were to occur, molecular nanotech would immediately construct a new body, retrieve our mind and memories, and allow life to continue; dying would be about as disruptive as a bee sting, and would take even less time to forget it even happened. 

Can this "magical future” without death become reality? This positive futurist believes it can!

Actually, I've examined this future in previous blogs over a year ago.

• Fear Not, The Technium Will Save Us! 
• Ray Kurzweil, MIT graduate, futurist and inventor believes that we're approaching a moment when computers will become . . . more intelligent than humans and that science will ultimately discover the causes of biological death and eliminate them. . . Information defines your personality, your memories, your skills. And it really is information. And we ultimately will be able to capture that and actually recreate it. So then we will back ourselves up.

Michael Lindvall, a theologian and pastor of Brick Presbyterian Church in New York, pegs Mr. Kurzweil’s Singularity dogma as a modern iteration of the Gnosticism prevalent in the second and third centuries.

Gnosticism “was basically the idea that people save themselves by being smart,” Mr. Lindvall said. “By knowing these secret things, you would become cognoscenti, one of the few, elitist. Gnostics looked down on the hoi polloi Christian masses.”

As you may have guessed, Kurzweil and his followers are atheists. They don't need any God. Their technology is their god. So we are back to the days of the tower of Babel and human hubris.

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly." And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth." And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the LORD said, "Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. - Gen 11:1-6 ESV

More on this in my next post.