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[Scood]

so i was thinking about time travel and then i somehow progressed to ways one might be immortal through time travel, then ways one might seem immortal, and then I thought, if someone isolated themselves from society and died and noone was left to mourn or notice his loss or pronounce him dead. would he then be legally immortal?


what other ways do you think one might seem immortal but isn't

[IronyOwl]

If immortality is defined according to people's observations or proclamations, he'd be dead from no one knowing about him before he could be immortal from no one declaring him otherwise.

[Something Evil]

noone was left to mourn or notice his loss or pronounce him dead. would he then be legally immortal?

That's why there's the legal status of "Missing, presumed dead" that automatically kicks in after enough time passes.

On the original thought, short of switching over to an artificial brain and backuping as often as possible, there isn't much one can really do.
A way to "seem immortal" but not be is by assloads of propaganda (see Stalin) or by leaving the after-image of yourself in your artwork. You can ascertain a good deal about a writer by reading their works.

Normal immortality is really bad business, however. Demographics and all that.

[Scood]

I wonder if theres a way around the "missing presumed dead" status, like maybe, every now and then people using his identity for various reasons. or maybe LOST style computer automatically verifying his existence legally and taking care of expenses like taxes and stuff like that. (lets assume he's extremely rich.)

[Cthulhu]

He's still dead, though.

[Something Evil]

every now and then people using his identity for various reasons

Illegal for real people, common occurence for sockpersons.

As for getting a bank acount to settle expenses by itself, that's still no good.

Of course, someone has to first report the "Missing" in "Missing, presumed dead". There are always some people who just vanish, never to be seen, heard or thought about again, but average life expectancy is another point in not being presumed that you've somehow found a way to live forever.

It's actually the way people's minds work: they assume the most likely outcome: that whoever vanished is either alive somewhere or has kicked the bucket in the meantime.

You don't assume that long-lost relatives from over a century ago are somehow alive and well, do you now?

[Scood]

He's still dead, though.

yes dead but no one thinks he is.

[Something Evil]

You mean that no one knows for certain that he is.
The normal assumption after hitting average lifespan +10 is that he's dead.

[GlyphGryph]

yes dead but no one thinks he is.

Because, like most dead people, no one thinks of him at all.

[Armok]

Fall into a sufficiently big black hole, time dilation will do the rest.

[Lagslayer]

No matter how you slice it, time travel poses a physical paradox, and therefor cannot exist. I propose that time is not something to be perceived or traveled through, but the perception itself.

[GlyphGryph]

No matter how you slice it, time travel poses a physical paradox

eh, only if you think about it the classic way. For another valid intepretation.

Picture a line drawn on the ground in blue. This is the timeline. Now, once you get to the end, go back and draw a blue line that overlaps some of the red line. Suddenly, the past is changed! But that's all that is changed, the past. The present stays just the way it is.

Boom, now there are no paradox problems.

[Simmura McCrea]

No matter how you slice it, time travel poses a physical paradox

eh, only if you think about it the classic way. For another valid intepretation.

Picture a line drawn on the ground in blue. This is the timeline. Now, once you get to the end, go back and draw a blue line that overlaps some of the red line. Suddenly, the past is changed! But that's all that is changed, the past. The present stays just the way it is.

Boom, now there are no paradox problems.

So in the past, say, the third President was J. G. Dipplewibble, but your present history books say it was [insert name of the third president here].

[GlyphGryph]

Exactly.

[Lagslayer]

But if you go back and change in order to that president, then there would be no reason for you to go back in the first place, thereby preventing you from changing the president, then you would go back and change the president because you haven't changed the president yet, then the president would be different and you would never have gone back in the first place... see where I'm going with this?