I’ve had this question for a long time, and a recent documentary on science developing trats for ultra-longevity reminded me of it. Though the cocnept of ultra-longevity is more obvious, the same applies to current medicine’s attempts to prolong life.
Is it such a good idea? While saving someone’s life is a Good Thing ™, I’m not entirely convinced that dragging it out for as long as possible is a good idea. For one, it is extremely uncomfortable for the patient, and many live out their lives in hospitals. For two, it is EXTREMELY expensive, both fiscally and socially. We are supporting more people with more health problems for longer - they need housing, food, medicine, treatment, etc. This stresses the medical system and drains the coffers of either private or public systems. My great grandmother lived to be 94, but for her last 15 years she didn’t know who any of her family was, and was shuffled between homes, since she couldn’t care for herself. I remember her from my youth as a bright, vibrant, independent woman, but I remember her now as a zombie. My grandfather chose to die at home quickly instead of spending a long time in a hospital, and he passed quetly in his sleep. I can’t say that I disagree with him.
So, is the tremendous investment worth it? Even if we can stop the aging process, what do we do with people living to be 200? 300? Won’t overpopulation strike and destroy out society? What is our carrying capacity?
It depends on what you mean exactly by ‘longevity’ I suppose. If you could increase the average human lifespan to 200-300 years, but that only the last 10% of that time would be ‘old age’, then over all it would be a good thing. Of course, it would necessitate very radical changes in our society so I’m not sure we are ready to just jump into it…but overall it would be good I think. And thats the ultimate goal afaik…extending QUALITY life, not just extending life. And I think they’ve done a pretty good job. If you mean simply keeping people alive but with no quality to their life then thats a bad thing IMO.
Look around though, especially at your parents and grandparents if you still remember them…or even older generations. My grandfather died at 57 (grandmother at 80), and he was pretty enfebled when he went…and old man at 57. A life of backbreaking dirt framing will do that to you. My dad is nearly 70 and still working…and still golfing and even skiing. I wouldn’t consider him ‘old’, just older…he’s still very active. And I can expect to be as active even later in life (if I don’t die suddenly of course) if I take even minimal care of my health…and my children even more so.
Hell, my children might be the first generation to make huge leaps in longevity if what I’ve read about genetics and microbiological engineering and gene treatments is even close to being accurate.
Well and good, but - is that a good thing? For the individual people, yes. But Terra has a carrying capacity at some point, and it is one we are reaching rather rapidly in some areas. Not only will it become difficult to have that many people economically (imagine the job market!), but just providing food for people who live for 300 years and are healthy enough to reproduce. Living space.
Socially, it would create a very real divide between classes and nations - the rich who can afford this, who become immortal demigods, and the poor, who are left scrubbing for the remainder.
I’m viewing a dystopia in a future with immortality.
The classic “is this a problem…or an oppurtunity?”. Personally I don’t think we are near the ‘carrying capacity of earth’ whatever that means, nor would increased life spans necessarily put us there. Things would radically change, no doubt about that…but that doesn’t necessarily mean it would be a bad thing. But think about it this way…the guys and girls with the big forheads will have a lot more time to solve such problems when they start to crop up.
I don’t see that it makes much difference in any case…if someone comes up with a way to do it, you can bet your bottom dollar it WILL happen…and we’ll have to learn to deal with it, like we learned to deal with every other radical change thats altered society in the past. There is simply no way to stop it, if they figure it out…there will be a HUGE market for such a thing. So, unless you plan on freezing all scientific studies of biology where they are today (as well as all other scientific advancement) and stagnating, we’ll just have to lear to deal with it.
And ya…I think it COULD be a good thing. IMO ALL advancements are a two edged sword, but they are neutral from a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ persepective.
This is actually part of what I think will be some of the most intriguing questions for humanity looking into the future: the ability to radically alter human life. Will we choose to change who we are? How do we even think about doing such things given that what we will be changing is the very person who is (hopefully) making the decision?
In this case, what we are talking about is length of life, which is actually something that I think is the most banal of all the possibilities we’ll need to start thinking about.
In short, I don’t think prolonging life will have that much affect on the people who do it aside from a couple of interesting categories.
The possibility of unknown psychological developments. In short, people go through different stages in their lives, and these stages are roughly in accordance with the changes their bodies are going through as well as just the general effect of the accumulation of a long life history and memory.
Increase in stress: people who think the all important thing is to extend life will stress out much more about doing so, and likely stress out more about accidental death, given that it could cut short their investment in a longer natural life. As smoe psychologists have found, an increase in choices can sometimes make life a lot less satisfying. This is a definate trap.
Those aside, I have a hard time seeing what an extension of my natural life would get me aside from at the very end of my natural life when maybe I want to live to see a movie that’s coming out in a year or so. Of course, all other things equal, I would like to extent my life. But in the present, it’s not clear what direct advantages that would have other than conceptual ones, and many of those are, I think, mistakes. The basic issue is that I am who I am only in the present: the person who will exist in the future is in many ways like me, but is not me now. I can’t experience what they experience, and they only have a memory of me. And while I can perhaps save a particular future me from a particular moment of death (or a whole slate of mes from the ravages of old age), at some point there is going to be a future me that goes through sickness and death, and perhaps the knowledge of death.
So how much effort am I supposed to make on behalf of these future individuals? And if I do, what does it get me, the real me, the now me?
I find the idea of people living to be 200 or 300 a little scary, actually.
It depends on if only a select few who could afford expensive treatments would be given the opprotunity, or if it would be available to everyone.
If everyone could live 200-300 years there would be an intense drain on resources. We can’t feed all of Earth’s people now, let alone having billions of extra people living past a “normal” lifespan, driving cars, polluting, and consuming goods made from non-renewable resources.
Sure it would be a Good Thing for the individual, but how about the species? The Earth would be so grossly overcrowded as to ruin quality of life for everyone.
How would Social Security cope? What would become of “lifetime memberships?” When would one be eligible for senior discounts?
I would think that if people were given a choice between dying and taking a little pill that allowed them to live to 300-400 years old with the caveat that they don’t reproduce. I’d be getting the boys snipped pretty quick.
I think of all the things I want to do, everything I want to learn, and places I want to visit but don’t have the time to in this life. Imagine what could be accomplished by people who are experts in many things, not just one or two. It certainly would change the world probably for the better. Still, it would be interesting.
