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How long do you want to live?

Discussion in 'General Discussions' started by Tully Mars, Aug 19, 2011.

  1. Tully Mars

    Tully Mars Very Tilted

    Location:
    Yucatan, Mexico
    Several years ago I saw a segment on (60 mins. 20/20, can't remember) regarding research on extending human life. This was nearly 20 years ago and the story I saw focused on research being funding by one or two extremely wealthy men who were basically looking for the "fountain of youth." At the time I remember thinking "what a folly." Turns out maybe they were onto something. Over the years I've read several stories about such research and I think there's even a "X prize" contest that is on going. This morning I found this article from the Boston Globe-

    [​IMG]

    If you could would you extend your life?

    If they do develop a way to extend your life do you think it's price will be in the reach of average people?

    If it were in available to average Joe's and Jane's what would happen to the worlds population?

    What about pension plans. If they thought you were gong to live 10,15 or maybe 20 years after you retire what do they do when you live and extra 40-50?

    What about the playing God issue? Do you think major religions would have a problem with it?

    Myself, as long as my quality of life remained good I think I'd do it but I also think the price would be out of my reach.
     
  2. Lucifer Slightly Tilted

    Location:
    The Darkside
    Personally, if they could find a way to freeze me at my present age for the rest of eternity, I would be up for it. I've always had a desire to see how it all turns out.
     
  3. issmmm

    issmmm Getting Tilted

    in order
    yes..., um maybe...not sure
    not at first only the Warren Buffets and the Bill gates in the beginning
    when the unwashed masses get it we'll have to colonize another planet or two
    If we are going to live longer then i'd hope we'd be useful longer and could work longer
    a bunch of years ago life expectancy was in the 30s and 40s science changed that, is this, if it happens playing God any more than that?
     
  4. Plan9

    Plan9 Rock 'n Roll

    Location:
    Earth
    I'll answer your damn questions:

    No, I don't want to extend my life, I'm looking for quality of life up until the end. Suicide is always an option. Death before incontinence, I say.

    "Average people" is a little vague, huh? The average income in North America vs. the average income in Africa? I guess black people don't count.

    As far as pension plans are concerned, I'm quite sure that they'll find a way to put a "realistic life expectancy" cap on all of us 105-year old freaks.

    Religion has problems with anything new and I don't expect this to be any different. That and little pockets of religious crazies are gonna love this.

    My inner pessismist:

    Meh. Time doesn't equal quality. Even if you're not all Flowers for Algernon at an advanced age, you're still going to be pretty useless.

    That and for every way we find to extend human life, we develop a way to shorten it. When is the next crazy world war? Soon I hope.

    They've found some magical compound that allows modern Jabba the (Pizza) Hutts to live for 120 years? Wow, that's quality of life.

    Fun with ethics:

    What if this pill was hoarded and given to "worthwhile" people, the "Better World Elite," like scientists, doctors, artists, soldiers, etc.? Conspiracies!

    How I wanna go:

    Like I said, I wanna hit 70, write my memoirs and sew a bunch of steaks to a bathrobe. I'll don said bathrobe and wander out into the Alaskan woods with a baseball bat in one hand and a metal garbage can lid in the other. I shall bonk the first bear I find on the noggin and let nature take its course.

    *cliche proverb about how everybody longs for immortality but doesn't know what to do with themselves on a rainy day*

    *cliche about everybody dies, not everybody lives*
     
    • Like Like x 3
  5. Fremen

    Fremen Allright, who stole my mustache?

    Location:
    E. Texas
    I'd like to live a few hundred years, at least.

    Let me axe you this, have we got any medicine out there that we currently use, that doesn't have some kind side effect? You know, like anal leakage?
    If we can't get everyday medicine with no side effects, then I'd hate to see the side effects of something like this.
     
  6. wolf Evil Grin

    Location:
    Right Behind You
    I would like to live until I can no longer care for myself. I don't have any plans for living out my days in a nursing home some place eating tapioca and playing checkers with someone who can only drool. Assisted living, fine, but beyond that give me a bullet to the head. As far as a number, I don't happen to care if that day comes at 77 or 107, numbers are relative. How old would you be if you didn't know how old you are?
     
  7. Jove

    Jove Slightly Tilted

    Location:
    Michigan
    If you could would you extend your life? No. Why would I want to spend more time working? I think the reason for retirement is to enjoy some free time before one dies.

    If they do develop a way to extend your life do you think it's price will be in the reach of average people? They will probably make it super expensive so only millionaires/billionaires can purchase the drug.

    If it were in available to average Joe's and Jane's what would happen to the worlds population? Probably decrease because everyone who took the drug would go insane and start killing everyone.

    What about pension plans. If they thought you were gong to live 10,15 or maybe 20 years after you retire what do they do when you live and extra 40-50? Live in a different country every 10 years.

    What about the playing God issue? Do you think major religions would have a problem with it? Yes. Major religions have problems with everything.
    Myself, as long as my quality of life remained good I think I'd do it but I also think the price would be out of my reach.
     
  8. snowy

    snowy so kawaii Staff Member

    I agree. I have no desire to live forever. I want to die peacefully in my sleep after a well-lived life with people I love and who love me.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  9. sapiens

    sapiens Vertical

    Location:
    Fort Worth, TX
    If it was available and had to make the decision today, I would extend my life. Ask me again when I'm older and I may have a different answer. If they find a way to extend life, I don't think that the price will be within reach of average people. I expect that if it was available, we would have worse overpopulation problems than we do now. Regarding pensions, I expect that if people lived indefinitely, pensions would be eliminated.
     
  10. Plan9

    Plan9 Rock 'n Roll

    Location:
    Earth
    I think time is such weird way to measure life when you get to those advanced years. What's the difference between 60 and 70, 70 and 80? How bad your knees give out? Bladder control? If I can still walk and talk and remember my name at 100, I'd probably be cool with being 100 year olds.

    I think people have X Y Z as life goals (rewarding education, satisfying career, wife-kids-house, travel, adventure, hold a baby tiger, punch a bear in the have, do the menage a trois thing a few times, get that cliche picture pushing up the Leaning Tower of Pisa) and after about 65, I'm guessing that's really it. As my father says (a man ready to go in the box any day now), the day I graduated college was it for him... he felt like he "did his job as a man" and the rest is just "time to read and watch old TeeVee shows on new DVDs." I want a lot more out of my life than he got out of his, though.
     
  11. KirStang

    KirStang Something Patriotic.

    80. Long enough to see my kids grow up and have grandkids. Any shorter and I'd be pissed off I missed retirement, and any longer I'd probably get bored.
     
  12. Plan9

    Plan9 Rock 'n Roll

    Location:
    Earth
    baised un wat NO-Bama is doin' to the ekonomee u'll be lucky to retire by 78 and a half, KirkSTANG!!!!1!!

    /couldn't stop myself
     
  13. KirStang

    KirStang Something Patriotic.

    Close. All you're missing is a couple of teeth and bad B.O., while claiming you were a silver star recipient with the Muhreen Coreps.
     
  14. Tully Mars

    Tully Mars Very Tilted

    Location:
    Yucatan, Mexico
    My dad spent his whole adult life working in an office. He often talked about retiring and traveling. I specifically remember he had several books on Italy and would often talk about seeing Europe. At about age 58 he fell over backwards in his chair at work and broke his back. It was a chair he's used for years and had broken nearly five years before he toppled over in it the last time. Being a governmental bureaucrat he'd sent memo after memo requesting it either be fixed or be replaced. Every few months a guy from maintenance would come half ass fix it and within a week or two it would either not lean back or would fall over. My dad actual fell out of that chair about 5 times before he suffered a serious injury. When that happened I was still in the Navy and was overseas. I remember returning home and finding my father in a hospital bed in our house. No one told me, didn't want to worry me I guess. Anyway for months lawyer after lawyer contacted my dad, he turned them all away and reached an agreement on his own with the State of Oregon. They'd pay his medical bills and let him retire as if he'd worked until he was 65. Could he have sued? I'd certainly think so. But my dad thought low life's and thieves sued to resolve their problems and he'd have no part of it. Financially he was fine but he was never the same physically. He finally got to where he walked again, something doctors told him would never happen. But he couldn't walk far and he couldn't sit for any length of time either. His travel dreams were over. The last 10-15 years of his life were not good. In fact they were horrible. He'd had polio when he was 2 (I always thought he didn't have polio until his teenage years, something I learned during his funeral service) and the polio returned. Had nothing to due with breaking his back, polio just returns in your later years. He was in so much pain it was hard to spend time with him. He would grimace and you could almost feel his pain simply by looking in his eyes. He passed away this last May, it was sad and yet a blessing too.

    If I had to live like that I'd rather die. But if the quality of life was such that I could get around and had control of everything (mind/body... bowels) I prefer to stick around a while. Just to see what the hell happens if nothing else. I figure the next 50-100 years are going to be pretty damn interesting. Look at the last 100 years. mankind went from outdoor plumbing and horse and carriage travel to men on the moon and the modern convenience being able to crap in your own house without the risk of the black plague returning. I once had a conversation with my grand mother during her last days. She said one the greatest things they invented during her lifetime was hot showers. I know I like hot showers. She was born in 93... 1893. She talked about not having any cars or phones in her town until she was nearly 30. She said when her town got their first phone there was just the one at the general store for several years, personal residences didn't see phones for another 10 years or so.

    Yes, I think the next century is going to be interesting. Interesting good? Interesting bad? No idea, but I'd like to watch the show either way.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  15. Zen

    Zen Very Tilted

    Location:
    London
    Yes. I choose longevity.
    My curiosity is insatiable, the territory for learning infinite.
    I want a vehicle fit for this journey.
    Immortality would not displease me.

    I forsee strong pressure for the means to be controlled and limited.
    I forsee a strong general backlash, for while people have put up with inequal distribution of wealth, I do reckon they will baulk at unequal distribution of longevity.
     
  16. KirStang

    KirStang Something Patriotic.

    Dude, if I could be a vampire and live forever...I totally would.

    I wonder if they'll have memory cards where you can store your sentient being forever in the future.
     
  17. SuburbanZombie

    SuburbanZombie Housebroken

    Location:
    Northeast
    I suppose if I had some burning passion for something, I'd want to hang around.
    But right now I don't so the remaining 30-40 years is plenty.
    The thought of adding additional years to just be a worker bee is just too depressing to contemplate.
     
  18. BadNick

    BadNick Getting Tilted

    Location:
    PA's on U SofA
    Even if I was quite slowed down, I'd choose to live much longer as long as I wasn't bedridden or in too much pain. I would figure out how to still have some fun.

    Maybe I'd have to eat a few more gin soaked white raisins - see other thread http://www.thetfp.com/threads/joint-pain.928/#axzz1VWq0bdZG
    I would also like to see how the world changes during that extra time. Things change fast so even an extra 20 years would be interesting.
    Would the magic drug be affordable? Who knows. Pharmaceutical companies don't usually reduce prices to benefit of most humans. When do generics hit the market?

    I would worry about my nest egg/pension etc running out since I haven't planned to live to 100+. Maybe I'd luck out and one of my kids will be rich enough to support good old dad. This seems like it would also greatly speed up Social Security (the U.S. one) bankrupcy.

    I don't buy the "playing God" part but I'm sure some religious zealots would object. We'd be better off if they decided not to live longer.
     
  19. MeltedMetalGlob

    MeltedMetalGlob Resident Loser Donor

    Location:
    Who cares, really?
    I don't feel like living longer than most people if it meant watching every single friend and family member , including my children, die before me. Screw that.

    I just want to outlive my enemies, and so far... so good.
     
  20. Tully Mars

    Tully Mars Very Tilted

    Location:
    Yucatan, Mexico
    You realize taking them out yourself is cheating, right?
     
    • Like Like x 1