Is Eternal Life Even Desireable?

[Hatshepsut]

There is however an asymmetry here, because it's not the nonexistence itself we are talking about, but our attitude toward nonexistence past and future while we exist now. I'm not too  bothered by my nonexistence in 1800, but for some reason I find the idea of not being there to see Kirk and Spock fire their phasers at the Horta...a bit disappointing.

• Foolish, therefore, is the man who says that he fears death, not because it will pain when it comes, but because it pains in the prospect. Whatever causes no annoyance when it is present, causes only a groundless pain in the expectation.... (Epicurus)
  

If your feelings are asymmetrical, that is something in you, not the situation.

Agreed my sentimentality toward Kirk and Spock, and lack of ardor toward 1800, are in me and not in the situation. Careless of me to drop personal comments while not explaining the asymmetry itself: It is between existence and nonexistence themselves. Epicurus is fine to say that something won't pain us once we've lost the ability to feel pain, but he rather severely demotes the ability of prospects to cause annoyance. The fact that nonexistence is painless sheds little light on the matter, as from our own perspective we've always existed; we've known no other state.

In the broader scheme, I'll grant that death is not an evil. If all those souls from 1800 had their turn and are gone now, what's so unfair that I have to go as well? Death is likely the price for being a multicellular organism given the way biology works. But granting that death isn't evil hardly declares its prospects a nothing.