The fear or distaste we feel when we face our mortality is somewhat leavened by the realization that, after a while, life gets sort of repetitive and, as faculties decay, less interesting. I recall seeing William Buckley on Charlie Rose's excellent interview show, talking about his life and saying that he has become "weary". He had done so much and now life seemed to be wearing on him.
当然，从长远来看，事情也有变得杂乱无章的趋势。还要考虑到地球的尽头，也许还有宇宙的尽头。我肯定不想活到那一刻，更不想再活下去了。

I am the caller during the show on immortality who raised the issue that the current discussion on immortality contained two major assumptions that were not being mentioned: (1) the assumption that the self is real and could conceivably go into the indefinite future and (2) that time is a succession of instants from the past, to the present and into the future.
This note is a clarification of the second assumption concerning time that the radio format did not have enough time for. Ken Taylor stated that an athlete who is living in the now (an example I had brought up) still has to learn from the past and plan for the future and just can?t live in the now. This response is a common misperception of the position that we can only live in the now. When a person thinks about the future, he can only do this
在当下;同样，当他思考过去时，他只能在现在这样做。“我们所拥有的只是现在”的观点并不排斥为未来规划或吸取过去的教训。我们不能跳到未来去思考未来吗?必须现在就做。
The concepts of past and future are just that ? concepts - or mental constructs. They are much like the constructs of longitude and latitude. These are not strings girdling the earth ? as depicted on maps and globes. They are constructs that help up to navigate the earth - and therefore are useful tools - but we can?t stumble over them in our trips from point A to point B. In exactly the same way, the ?past? and ?future? are mental constructs, mental boxes, which help us to order our experiences. But, they are no more real than latitude and longitude.
I would like to know what others think about this concept of time.
无论如何，在对任何主题的哲学研究中，至少陈述讨论背后的大假设是有用的。澄清是哲学的一个主要功能，而且，就目前关于永生的讨论而言，上述两个假设至少是值得承认的，即使人们对它们得出了困难的结论。
Regards,
Don DuBois

Donald has raised intriguing issues that, for me, highlight the limits of western philosohical discourse.
This notion that time is but a mental construct has been developed in western thought only recently by theoretical physicists. While some physicists have found "the arrow of time" to be a fragment from the first moments of the big bang, others find no good evideence in the material world as to why we should expect that our actions today shoujld have effects in the future.
Eastern philosophy and religion, however, has developed this notion of time for millenia. Without launching into a dissertation, suffice it to say that certain Hindu and Buddhist thinkers maintain that there is only the "now" and that thoughts of the past and future take one (to quote Eliade) one out of the "sacred" space and into the "profane" space of the world. Buddhists call this "mindfullness."
Western neo-platonists, and followers of "new age" figures such as Eckhert Tolle have begun developing this motion of the "now" as the only meaningful measure of time.
As to immortality, I find that western discourse on eastern ideas focuses only on the Hindu notion of reincarnation. Buddhism (generally) advocates rebirth, and there is an importatn difference. reincarnation implies the tranmigration of a distinct soul, while rebirth does not.
To illustrate this point, the Buddha aked his followers to visualize a candle being lit which in turn lit another candle and in turn another, repeated millions and millions of times. Which is the original flame (of consciousness)?
I found this notion that I (there is no "self")am not here very comforting when I took this woman I was dating to a Celine Dion concert.

我今年73岁，被诊断为胰腺癌已经近两年了。当时我被告知，我只能活3到6个月，除非我接受惠普尔手术，这是一种生存率非常低，导致痛苦非常高的大手术。也许是因为这种病的症状太可怕了，我完全预料到自己会在手术中死去，并平静地接受了它。我很好地挺过了“手术”，但现在需要化疗，它带走了我生命的精髓。
I do not believe in a "higher power" (except perhaps women in general) or an afterlife. I have been off Chemo now for six months and have felt truely alive, I have felt true physical and spiritual "joy" for the first time in my life. I understand that I am a part of Nature in the whirling circle of all life - not an observer of Nature.
我的肿瘤医生刚刚通知我，我的癌症又复发了，但现在已经不能手术了，已经到了晚期，并且给我带来了很多身体上的痛苦。我还被告知，我将回到化疗的生活中。
Frankly, I don't understand why I feel so calm about it all. Perhaps its because of my intertwining with Nature (I lived alone along the Great Divide in Montana for nine years)and my place in it. I now doubt that Nature really intended or desires Humanity. That evolution somewhere along the way missed a beat and created animals that are suicidal and the antithisis of Nature. Although I'm not sure, I think that I am comfortable with the fact of mortality. Hey, I've had a fantastic ride and at some point you have to get off!
George
Lowell

Thanks, Lowell. I'm touched. I think that says it all.
God bless.

每个人都想去天堂，但是没有人想死....

Having a finite life is necessary because it gives us a timeline in which to operate. We know that by a certain time we should meet a partner, perhaps have children, embark on a career, take vacations, and so on. If we lived forever then there would be no rush to do anything and the world would slow down to an almost unbearably slow rate that would cause boredom.

Great post Ken.
事情是这样的，我们不会停止我们的活动，尽管我们最终灭绝。
We all have the option of ending it now. Instead, the little bird of hope perches singing on our shoulders and we go on. Maybe we will be fulfilled before the end comes--we will have a "successful life". We remain
narrowly focused on the path ahead of us---as the cliff
gets closer and closer.
The Yogis see the whole thing as a form of play --
he eternal dance of Shiva---forms eternally being created and being dissolved.
When things fall apart in our world, when there is a fundamental crisis, and we are inconsolable, then is an invitation to
see our bodies, our lives, as participants in this coming and going of form and to identify with the
source of this process of forming and dissolving.

I agree very much with Adam, who wrote that having a finite life is necessary because "If we lived forever then there would be no rush to do anything and the world would slow down to an almost unbearably slow rate that would cause boredom."
I feel it is as if we can only accept life fully after we have accepted our mortality. To accept the possibility that I might die any second now (which is improbable, but nevertheless a possibility) leaves no choice for me to accept my life as it is right now. To wait for 'more life' is a terrible waste of time - even if I die an old woman. Nobody gains more life, we only lose it.
As James Dean once said, "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today."