How many People would actually do this?

So a lot of my plot revolves around how society reacts to the ability to attain immortality. For world-building purposes, I'd like to know how many people would actually choose this

• You can live for an infinite amount of time and never age
• You can never be injured/crippled permanently
• You can choose to end it at any time

• You can't keep your original body and need to change bodies about every 5 years
• There's a chance that some of your friends/family won't choose to become immortal
• You aren't protected from emotional injuries and can develop PTSD, addictions and other emotional problems

I just want to know how many people would (hypothetically) be willing to do this.

To be honest, I don't really see the difference between this and simply "how many people would become immortal if they could?" The body-switching thing doesn't make a difference unless the person has no say whatsoever about their new body, and everything else is pretty much the usual pros and cons.

I have no idea what the answer to that question is myself, mind you, but I suspect there's probably been research about it somewhere. My hunch, though, would be that a majority of people would take the treatment (or whatever it is), but most of them would eventually "opt out". Forever is an awfully long time.

Given my aim for immortality is to get my brain transplanted into a cybernetic body (I self-identify with my actual physical brain it being the matrix of neurons that make up my personality, memories etc, so if the brain was gone I would view "myself" as gone), I'd be up for it. The need to swap bodies is no different from the idea of possibly trading up to a more advanced model of cybernetic body, which is a possibility.

And yes, I've made it known that if at all possible at the time of my death, I want my brain kept oxygenated then removed and placed in some form of life support that supplies it with oxygen and nutrients with permission given to experiment on how long it can be sustained and whether or not it can be interfaced with artificial senses, limbs etc - I'm not foolish enough to think I could afford to buy a cybernetic body, so I'm willing to be one of the "guinea-pigs" used to test the technology for those who could afford it if it were proven to be viable. I'd be happy to prove it. Worst case scenario, I die, or rather finish dying. Best case scenario, the systems work and I become one of the early "full cyborg" prototypes, gradually improving as new stuff gets tested out...

But the scenario you describe would depend on other factors as well - like how those bodies were obtained (are they artificial?), how much choice I had over the bodies and whether my brain went with it intact.

57.204%, with a margin of error of about 0.001%.

It's your story. I don't know, say that those who chose immortality were the majority at first but it slowly declined, or vice versa.

edited 27th Aug '13 8:14:00 PM by Rem

93.14% of all statistics are made up on the spot...

40% of people know that.

By changing bodies every five years, do you mean: stealing one belonging to someone else; involuntary transformation e.g. Time Lord regeneration; voluntarily exchanging with another immortal; transplantation into a new artificial body; none of the above?

The version in mine is closest to a voluntary body swapping of immortals. It's not like a black magic type thing, and simply BEING immortal doesn't hurt anyone else. (except for the occasional lack of resources) But the idea itself is deconstructed a bit

• And to clarify: No, you cannot choose your body, and less experienced immortals often end up 'undesirable' (do not match your gender, are sickly or disabled, etc.) at least once

edited 4th Sep '13 2:54:06 PM by TheMuse