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Elok
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Land of Ramen Dragons
Mar 2003
time: 00:17
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Don't worry, the choice will never present itself. Even if you want to prevent death by aging, there will probably be all sorts of lovely side effects to this process that can cause fatality, similar to the way cloned animals almost always have severe health problems.
Plus this will do nothing to prevent murder and war, which end human life independent of age, but will rather accelerate both by exciting envy and widening the gap between haves and have-nots. And, as many have mentioned, this is potentially an overpopulation disaster of vast proportions. People are not going to want to give up having children.
This technology, even if it works, will merely allow us several milennia of existential crises, wondering wtf the point is of it all, if life is nothing more than a perpetuating chemical reaction. The current trend in arguments about bioethics is to focus on quality of life rather than quantity. I'm not sure that I agree, but the changes this makes to human life will not necessarily be good. A thousand years is long enough to get sick of anything, perhaps even life.
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Sandman
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Sinister Penguin
Aug 2001
time: 05:17
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Pill to extend life by 30 years
Sounds like a step in the right direction.
An ageless society would be very, very different from our own. Probably better.
Of course, it depends on the cost of the treatment, and so on. It had better to be available to everyone, preferably everybody in the world.
I also don't want to see the patent-holder's rights honoured, if it's developed by someone who wants to use them. Why? Well, firstly, I am not going to let a measly social structure stand in the way of me not dying. Secondly, think of aging as a disease which everybody suffers from. Under existing legislation in most countries, patent-holder's rights go out the window when there's an epidemic. And aging IS an epidemic. So is AIDS, incidently, so the poor countries may well expect to get shafted... again.
By all means reward the patent-holders with a big pile of money. But no-one should be able to have 'the rights' to eternal youth. No-one.
The sociological and economic changes would be enormous. Here's some I can think of:
A massively shortened working week. Few children and old people means more economic efficiency. Less work = more leisure = good.
Universities become purely focused on research. There's hardly anyone to teach, after all. What teaching there was would be unrecognisable to us; I forsee multiple teachers per pupil per subject. An ageless society can afford to spend almost unlimited amounts on the few children who do get born to make up for suicides, accidents and voluntary age-death.
Less social mobility. At least, on the face of it. A concept like retirement gets completely turned on its head; people could still 'retire' for a few decades having earned enough money... but they could also stay at the top for centuries, untouched by age. How would long would it take to get promoted at an ageless company?
Social conservatism. There'll only be one generation, or maybe current generations 'frozen' forever. No teenagers or students to rebel and challenge people's attitudes.
Social wierdness. The opposite to the above. With no age identity, people will either expand on other identities, or invent new, wierd ones. One possibility is that of 'students' or 'teenagers' emerging as groups undefined by age, but by lifestyle.
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MRT144
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Seattle Washington
Oct 2002
time: 21:17
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****, living forever would get boring.
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Solver
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Apolyton Duke Of Something
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Latvia, Riga
Sep 2000
time: 07:17
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quote:
but you have other examples, such as cellphones, that had offered something so strong, and the preparation relatively simple that the product made it to the market in a couple of years.
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Still not really. I can't speak for other countries, as the timescale there is different, but I remember cell phones here in 1999, when important businessmen and just dirty rich people had them. Granted, everyone has them now, too, but it still takes some time. If you consider that the costs for a life extension operation is likely to be about a thousand times higher than to produce a cell phone...
Sandman  . Some of the problems with life extension are indeed daunting, but I believe that life extension should be indeed done, as long as it can be provided to everyone. I can hardly think of anything worse than diving society into those who live a normal lifespan of 70 years and those who live for 300 years. That will be much worse than the current situation in Africa.
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Solver
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Apolyton Duke Of Something
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Latvia, Riga
Sep 2000
time: 07:17
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quote:
If it's cheap enough for the middle class to purchase, I believe that including this in the medical cover will be done on simple economical grounds. Face it, it's a great investment in the country's future. |
I can also see a problem there. Surely, we can expect the most advanced countries to do it first and best. The US government invests in this, over the course of the next several years after it all starts, US citizens are all free to receive life extension. To a degree, the same is done in Canada, UK and other advanced countries. However, in developing European countries, not to mention third-world countries, no such thing happens. Then we have a huge gap, again. You know, Latvian government doesn't provide any free health care (which causes problems currently), they won't provide that. Ditto for many other countries in Europe. So then we can have - 2040. US life expectancy: 280-320 years. Eastern Europe life expectancy: 70-80 years. Africa life expectancy: 40-50 years. Terrible, eh?
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13-04-2005 00:54
@ people who actually think that this stuff will be non-purchaseable. 
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