&gt; I&#x27;ve never understood people who believe this<p>You can think of your death as a hard-and-fast deadline to achieve all your dreams - this is pretty motivating for some people. Steve jobs had this to say in a 2005 commencement speech[1]: <i>&quot;Remembering that I&#x27;ll be dead soon is the most important tool I&#x27;ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important&quot;</i>.<p>Other people&#x27;s death&#x27;s can be a gift as well: tyrants don&#x27;t get to rule forever, and out-dated ideas die with their generations. Immortality would be a good thing in a &quot;Culture&quot;-like society: i.e. if we manage to solve all the other human problems (like greed and poverty) first<p>1. <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.stanford.edu&#x2F;news&#x2F;2005&#x2F;june15&#x2F;jobs-061505.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.stanford.edu&#x2F;news&#x2F;2005&#x2F;june15&#x2F;jobs-061505.html</a>