The date that’s automatically entered is when I would like to die (November 17th, 2067). That will be my 85th birthday, and if I’m not dead already by then, I’ll make it happen. Every single person and organism that has ever lived in the history of Earth....has so far died. Therefore this "dying" concept is something that warrants some conversation, and maybe even a more humane way of doing it.  

Benefits of knowing when you'll die:

It gives you an "end date" to either fear or look forward to.
Whichever way you look at this date, it at least gives you an "end date" so you can better plan out your living days.

It allows you to plan out the different phases of your life better:
Being realistic about dying but at least recognizing that your life will likely follow the normal distribution of a human life span.

You can can wrap everything up nice and tidy. Saying goodbye to family and friends can be done in a nice way.

By controlling the date of your death you can correctly forecast how much money you will need to live out your life.
If you don’t know the date, you could live for 1 year or 30 years more. Those two different options require vastly different sums of money and planning.

I equate the mental construct of "knowing my expiration date" to cramming for a test:
If you have a geography test in 6 months, you will probably not care too much at this moment and goof off. However if you had that same test in three hours, you will probably buckle down and study like crazy! For me personally, knowing the expiration date helps me do more things while I’m alive.

For some people it can "relieve the pressure" of thinking life goes on forever.
If someone's life sucks, then knowing that there's an end in sight could help some people.

Helps to understand what's important by knowing it will end.
Seeing family often, bumming around with friends, playing with puppies and kids...these are all important things compared to other stuff.

 

How to do it:

I can't recklessly kill myself at 85 though, there will be a small set of rules around it:

• Can't cause extra work or inconvenience for living people (no crashing a car at 120mph off a cliff...some team of people would have to spend money & time cleaning that up).
• Can't hurt anyone else in the process.
• Can't do it in a way that bums people out.
• Must completely wrap up all family and financial affairs.

The coolest way I can think to do this (and adhere to all rules) is:

Skydive into an active volcano:

I was born Zoroastrian (a really small religion), and a neat thing about the ways Zoroastrians in India handle dead bodies is they leave the body out for vultures to eat. The theory behind this is your body goes back into the Earth. I always thought this was a neat solution.

By skydiving into an active volcano I would:
🌋 Go back into the Earth. 🌋 Wouldn't hurt anyone. 🌋 No remains. 🌋 Would get to SKYDIVE INTO AN ACTIVE VOLCANO which is not something you get to do whilst living!  

 

Where this idea came from:

1.) I read a lot of books in middle school and high school that discussed this subject, especially sci-fi books, and it made perfect sense that people should plan for their death. It almost sounds silly NOT to.

2.) In high school I read 3 different books about the male mid-life crisis and why it happens. It seems that by planning out life with proper time expectations could solve a lot of the problems correlated to having a mid-life crisis.

3.) On trips to India I’d see people being kept alive that in all honesty should just be put down. If someone’s life is full of misery and pain with no end in sight (in fact it’ll probably just get worse), why not put them down comfortably and in a humane way? We put down our beloved dogs like that because we want them to be comfortable, why not us?

4.) In high school I had to volunteer in an Alzheimer's ward every other day for 12 weeks. It truly showed me how humans are mechanical machines that like all other machines tend to break down, require more and more maintenance, and at some point, need to be decommissioned. I was heartless enough NOT to be affected by the patients with Alzheimer's. I could handle that. What I DID feel was when the families of those patients would come to visit the Alzheimer's ward, and the patient wouldn’t even recognize their own daughter or son or grandkids. Watching those people break down in tears from their loved ones not even recognizing them...that was brutal.  

 

Common retorts to this argument:

Whenever this topic is brought up, I inevitably get these same 3 questions every single time. Here's the answers:

 

"What if medicine advances and at 85 years old it's like you’re 20?"

In that case I would modify the decision based on those new life circumstances. The equation I’d use is simple: If life is sucky = Get ready for the volcano jump! If life is great = Maybe keep on going.  

 

"Don’t you want to live forever?"

Meh. Not really. I’d like to enjoy my time on stage, and then exit when the time feels right. It’s like a vacation that lasts forever...at some point it no longer feels like a vacation.  

 

"How do you KNOW you won’t chicken out and not do it????"

This is an action I intend to take ~50 years into the future, there's no way to know for SURE this will still be my decision at the time. The iPhone came out 10 years ago, and has since caused a massive shift in the way the entire world works....and no one predicted it. Clearly it’ll be tough to predict what the world will be like in 50 years. However at the moment, with the current state of technology, I’m leaving at 85! This concept of leaving at 85 is more of a "mental construct" rather than a plan.  

 

Male Life Expectancy Chart:

Death Probability: Probability of dying within one year.
Number of Lives: Number of survivors out of 100 born still alive.
Life Expectancy: Average number of years left.
Source: SSA.gov life expectancy actuarial data  

 

Female Life Expectancy Chart:

Death Probability: Probability of dying within one year.
Number of Lives: Number of survivors out of 100 born still alive.
Life Expectancy: Average number of years left.
Source: SSA.gov life expectancy actuarial data Sincerely, Neville Medhora (1982 – 2067)

 

P.S. When do YOU want to die?? Lemme know in the comments!