I suppose my question needs some clarification.

In my mind, the topic of practical "life-extension" almost cannot be
meaningfully discussed apart from the context of a
desireable "quality of life".

[Absolutely! This is why MoreLife continually emphasizes life quality just as
much as life quantity. It is also why a major amount of my time is spent on the
Self-Sovereign Individual Project and its surrounding philosophical ideas.
--Paul]


IOW, if for some reason(s) (other than age related disability or
disease), life became subjectively "unbearable", i.e., you find you
can derive little or no net pleasure from being alive, it seems to me
that "life-extension" would then become a purely academic matter,
generally not worth practicing.

[Again I agree. This is the reason why I have always stated that suicide can
actually be a rational action (when one's estimated future contribution towards
total lifetime happiness is negative) and that there should be no prohibition
against it. However, in that respect, I do not understand why you excepted "age
related disability or disease" since they are an integral part of what would
make life "subjectively unbearable". --Paul]

[I think the reason he excepted those is because scientists are working on
curing age related disabilities and diseases, so even if your life is unbearable
because you suffer from either of those it may still be worthwhile to practise
life-extension if the chances of a cure being found in your lifetime are not too
low. -°Olafur]

[This is true and that is, in fact, the basis of proceding with cryopreservation
even for those who commit suicide. However, the same notion of "unbearableness"
applies to all reasons for possibly not wanting to live. For example, now that I
more fully understand how a society can and should work, I often find the
current workings of society to be unbearable. That is why I am working so hard
to try to explain how things should and can work far better to as many people as
possible so that I can hope to relieve my sometimes unbearable frustration by
living in a better working society. --Paul]


Thus to be precise, I have to say that I'm not interested in "life-
extension" per-se, but in life-extension with "adequate" quality of
life.

[By the definition of "lifetime happiness" within my theory of Social
Meta-Needs, "adequate" would mean that one estimates that one will be able to
continue to increase one's lifetime happiness.
http://selfsip.org/fundamentals/socialmetaneeds.html --Paul]


A related concept, in my mind, is that of "survivalism".

According to a typical definition found on the internet: "A
survivalist is a person who anticipates a potential disruption in the
continuity of local, regional or worldwide society, and takes steps
to survive in the resulting unpredictable situation. Some
survivalists take an interest in survival in the wilderness or at
sea.

The specific preparations made will depend on the nature of the
anticipated disruption. The natures of the disruptions most commonly
planned for among survivalists include: natural disasters, such as
tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, blizzards, and severe
thunderstorms; disasters brought about by the activities of
humankind: chemical spills, release of radioactive materials, war;
collapse of the socioeconomic structure resulting in the
unavailability of electricity, fuel, food, water, and other goods and
services".

[My major problem with the normal survivalist view is that for me, survival
either in the wilderness or at sea without access to a technologically advanced
civilization and a society of philosophically minded people would not provide me
with an adequate quality of life (ie. after knowing what life could be like, it
would be essentially unbearable to live under such primitive circumstances.
--Paul]


As I see it, "life-extension" and "survivalism", as typically
defined, are really like the two sides of the same coin. IOW, why
should I, as a life-extensionist, only be concerned with "endogenous"
threats? And why should a so-called "survivalist" only be concerned
with "exogenous" threats?

[Actually most life-extensionists are also concerned with exogenous threats to
health such as pollution and radiation. But it is true that they are generally
more concerned about chronic threats than about acute ones. --Paul]

[I agree with Paul. I became more concerned with exogenous threats when I got
into life-extension a few years ago. At that time I realised that if I take good
care of my health I might have good chances of being alive when/if technology
will allow humans to live much longer than what is currently normal. If I have
the potential to live much longer than what is currently normal I also
potentially have many more years of my remaining life to lose if I die.
Therefore it is only reasonable for me to be more concerned about exogenous
threats than a person that either does not plan to live for so long or does not
have good chances of being alive when extended lifespans will become available.
But I admit that as a life-extensionist I am currently more concerned about
endogenous than exogenous threats. -°Olafur]

[You left out a third reason why a person would not be a life extensionist and
therefore, might not be so concerned about exogenous threats. Many people simply
do not know about the possibilities of radical life extension or do not think
there is any real evidence that such a thing is possible. Also your own lack of
concern about exogenous threats is likely related to your age. It appears that
it is much harder for young people to strongly and seriously consider their own
personal fragility. This may be related to less experience with the death or
major disabling of those who they know well. --Paul]


A bullet, or starvation, or other severe deprivation, or severe loss
of freedom, etc., will end my "adequate quality-of-life, extended
life" as much as the biological processes that life-extensionists
would normally be concerned with. Likewise, why should a survivalist
make herculean efforts to survive a natural disaster or breakdown of
society by preparing to maintain a reasonable quality of life in the
face of widespread deprivation, looting, radioactive fallout, etc.,
only to be dropped at a relatively early age by some
pathophysiological process that most life-extensionists would
probably avoid?

[Again I agree with this idea. It is particularly evident in the area of
cryonics where many people who advocate cryonics make no effort whatever to
avoid either endogenous nor exogenous life threatening situations or, worse,
even participate in highly dangerous activities (such as crossing the Sahara
desert alone by camel). My only caveat is probably with the definition of
freedom and the source of life quality. If a world wide disaster is so great
that major technological infrastructure does not prevail, then one may have full
freedom to live adequately, but very little capability to do so. Although I
would still try to stay alive, I see little point in greatly prolonging my life
under such circumstances. It is for that reason, that although I have trained
myself to hunt and forage in the wild, I have not gone to all the expense and
effort to stock, maintain and cycle all the food and equipment needed for true
survivalism. My plan would be to scrounge, invent and manage with what I could
find if any global "dark ages" ever occurred (which I still think is unlikely
even in spite of the current US political situation). Part of the reason why we
have not fully set ourselves up for survivalism is also based on our limited
resources, some of which have already been set aside to fund our
cryopreservations. --Paul]


This kind of thinking has me wondering, where's the best place to
live?

If I believe I will be alive 50 years from now, as I see it, I must
make an effort to anticipate and evaluate external threats to my life
and/or quality of life.

[Since I think that I too have an excellent chance of being alive 50 years from
now (possibly much, much longer), I try to do just that also. --Paul]


This may sound ridiculous, but I see a potential usefulness for
a "survival retreat" somewhere besides North America or Europe (at
least most places in Europe), i.e., a place to either move to right
now, or perhaps "escape" to, if the need should arise.

[I have looked at other places, but right now I do not see anywhere that is
superior to the more open and less inhabited locations in North America. North
America is a very big and sparsely populated continent. I do not see that all of
it would be damaged by any global catastrophe (including the US dollar collapse
- see below) and such places as New Hampshire, Oregon and Montana (which
currently have good tax arrangements) would be good places to both move to and
arrange one's survival retreat. I and Kitty have our cottage in Ontario as our
survival retreat, although it is not ideal since the winters are far too cold
and long here. We are in the process of completing the insulation of the cottage
and will have an adequate wood burning stove for heating. Still I am fully aware
of the fact that we could not survive here (nor anywhere else, IMO) for long
with any reasonable quality of life without access to a civilization with
division and specialization of labor infrastructure, which is why I am working
to change the philosophical thinking of people to prevent such a total loss and
to ameliorate what exists now. --Paul]


It seems to me that not only are basic rights and freedoms under
attack all over the "West", but economic upheaval, consequences of
global warming, and the prospect of world war, seem like more than
just remote possibilities within my present potential life span.

[Again my view of these is they are so devastating of all that would make life
worthwhile for me, that I am best to spend all my efforts on preventing them
rather than on merely surviving if they should occur. --Paul]

[Although freedom is declining in North America, with respect to supplement
availability there is currently far more freedom in the US than in most other
countries. While this may change in the future, for now this makes some parts of
the US one of the best places to live in for life-extensionists IMO. This is
particularly true for older life-extensionists such as Paul and Kitty who really
need these supplements if they are to have reasonably good chances of being
alive when extended lifespans will become available. I for one am a bit tempted
to move to the US due to the limited availability of supplements here in
Iceland. -°Olafur]


For example, if the U.S. dollar suffers a catastrophic collapse in
the near future,

[This would certainly affect the overall standard of living in the US,
particularly related to all imported goods, but it would not nearly so much
affect the local supply of goods and service anywhere in the US, which is still
largely self sufficient wrt food and other basic life needs. To hedge against
this possibility and retain one's ability to purchase important imports, one
should maintain a reasonable supply of gold or solid foreign currencies (eg
Swiss francs). --Paul]


or U.S. rulers attack Iran and trigger WW3, where
would be the best place to live?

Nelson J. Navarro

[I really do not see how the US attack Iran would trigger a World War. IMO, this
is more likely wrt either Taiwan or North Korea. But once again if it did occur
and tossed the world into a kind of dark ages, then there would be no quality of
life worth surviving for.

BTW, the same kinds of considerations take place wrt cryonics. Yes, it may well
be that once cryopreserved, I will never be restored to life. However if I am,
then the world that I come back to is likely the sort of world in which I can be
happy and if I am not, then the world that does not or cannot restore me is not
likely one in which I would want to live in any case. --Paul]