Public discussions of life extension suffer from the confusion between two possible meanings of it.
The first meaning is to just postpone death. Maybe at 90 you don’t remember anything any more, the list of your chronic diseases doesn’t fit on a page, you require round-the-clock care and semi-permanent sedation, take 37 different pills and need a trip to the hospital weekly—but by golly! we can and will keep you alive for ten years more and as medicine progresses we’ll keep you alive for twenty years more.
The second meaning is to postpone senescence. You’re 90, but you look like a 60-year-old. You’re mobile, active, with most of your mind intact, with a functioning immune system and ability to enjoy life.
I feel these scenarios are rather different. In particular, they lead to different answers to questions about whether life extension is worth it.
I once heard an acquaintance of a friend of mine put it this way (back when I wasn’t familiar with transhumanism and I didn’t know whether he was wrong or right): “Life extension had better be called old age extension: you may die at 160 instead of 80, but it’s not like when you’re 40 you’ll do the things people today do when they’re 20.”
I don’t think that necessarily reveals people’s preferences; that would imply that they choose that outcome. I think in most cases people are ignorant of what is going to happen, or know only in an abstract sense. Those who actually know what they’re in for, tend not to die that way..
I was just about to say almost the same thing but I decided I’d check the other replies to see if anyone else had already said it. Just to emphasize and agree with you—I think most people imagine the 1st scenario when they are answering these questions. Its just too hard for people to imagine 40yr olds that are like 30yr olds, 60yr olds that are like 45yr olds, 80yr olds that are like 60yr olds etc… That is not what I think they are imagining when they are answering.
Public discussions of life extension suffer from the confusion between two possible meanings of it.
The first meaning is to just postpone death. Maybe at 90 you don’t remember anything any more, the list of your chronic diseases doesn’t fit on a page, you require round-the-clock care and semi-permanent sedation, take 37 different pills and need a trip to the hospital weekly—but by golly! we can and will keep you alive for ten years more and as medicine progresses we’ll keep you alive for twenty years more.
The second meaning is to postpone senescence. You’re 90, but you look like a 60-year-old. You’re mobile, active, with most of your mind intact, with a functioning immune system and ability to enjoy life.
I feel these scenarios are rather different. In particular, they lead to different answers to questions about whether life extension is worth it.
Yes, this is a common suggestion; the first one is called the ‘Tithonus fallacy’ or error by proponents of the second (see for example the
fightaging.orglinks I posted).I once heard an acquaintance of a friend of mine put it this way (back when I wasn’t familiar with transhumanism and I didn’t know whether he was wrong or right): “Life extension had better be called old age extension: you may die at 160 instead of 80, but it’s not like when you’re 40 you’ll do the things people today do when they’re 20.”
Anyway, going by revealed preferences, fewer people might dislike the former scenario than you might think.
I don’t think that necessarily reveals people’s preferences; that would imply that they choose that outcome. I think in most cases people are ignorant of what is going to happen, or know only in an abstract sense. Those who actually know what they’re in for, tend not to die that way..
I was just about to say almost the same thing but I decided I’d check the other replies to see if anyone else had already said it. Just to emphasize and agree with you—I think most people imagine the 1st scenario when they are answering these questions. Its just too hard for people to imagine 40yr olds that are like 30yr olds, 60yr olds that are like 45yr olds, 80yr olds that are like 60yr olds etc… That is not what I think they are imagining when they are answering.