Earth to Don: We're sorry. We've failed you. We will continue to fail you.

[elfs]

Has anyone else read It bothers me that I have to go? This has to be one of the saddest, most freighted things I've read in months. Don Crowdis, the blogger behind DonToEarth, is 93 years old, and he knows his mortality is approaching fast.

At this age, I must say that I do delight in people's amazement when I tell them how old I am. But under all this is the knowledge that I am the oldest male on either side of my family, maternal or paternal, and I know I must go fairly soon. I just don't like the idea. ... There are many reasons. For too long I have behaved as if I could postpone going indefinitely, and thus have so many things that I must do first. I don't want my successors to find out how much I could have done that isn't done, not by a long shot. There are numerous notes and letters I must write. There are places I've wanted to travel, but never had the chance. Actually, each of you can, if you think yourself into my age, fill out the list. At least you can try to understand why I say that I hate to go.

The man is eloquent, whole, and sane, and I have to ask why in all of creation do some people think than Sudden Infant Death Syndrome is a tragedy needing medical investigation to circumvent and prevent, but Suddon Don Death Syndrome would be natural, acceptable, even desirable?

I can't begin to tell you how saddened I am that the library of humanity known as Don Crowdis will someday, probably soon, burn to the ground, along with a hundred thousand like him every day. I can't begin to describe how utterly, unbelievably bloody fucking furious men like Leon Kass and Francis Fukuyama make me when they actively block the development of life-extending and life-confirming research, and who want to use government power to ensure that technology for healthy life extension is never developed or used. Kass is on the side of withholding techonolgies that can help us live longer, happier, more productive lives: he is on the side of legislative murder.

Sorry, it's been in the news a lot recently. Last week, the Guardian ran an article about how the children born this year are probably within the tipping point of voluntary immortality (personally, I hope it's 40 years earlier than that!) and how they face "unprecedented challenges" (when hasn't a generation faced "unprecedented challenges" since Newton and Darwin?) dealing with boredom and stagnation. If Mike Adams echoes from the popular tiers what his ivory tower intellectuals blather and believes that death is essential and morally compulsory for "making room," he should do the right things and embrace it now, rather than later.

As long as we continue to give ear to the Adams, and desks to the Kasses and Fukuyamas of the world, we will fail Don Crowdis, and we will continue to fail men and women like him.

Comments

"Unnatural" Life Extension Technologies

[(Anonymous)]

I think attempting to extend life by extraordinary means is trying to postpone dealing with the real issue, which is coming to terms with death.

Anagathics technology is "coming to terms with death" -- by setting the best possible terms of which we are technologically capable.

Our predecessors had to deal with death on a much more everyday basis than we do,...

A lack of clean drinking water, antiseptic techniques, and antibiotics will, indeed, force you to "deal with death on a much more everyday basis."

This is a BAD thing.

... and I think along the way we've lost their more realistic death-as-a-part-of-life attitude, replaced by the modern death-is-EVIL-and-must-be-destroyed perspective.

Death is the END of life, and consequently as long aw life remains even slightly enjoyable, a rational man does what he can, within the limits of his honor, to stave it off as long as possible.

Note that I said "within the limits of his honor." The soldier or fireman still dies bravely, protecting others. Life is not worth the abnegation of that which makes it worthwhile. But why die uselessly? The man who dies of a cancer which was medically treatable is not helping himself or enriching the world by his death: instead, he has just converted an expensively-educated and decades-programmed organic computer into worm food. This is a net loss to humanity, in most cases.

Death IS evil, from a memetic point of view, and thus should be avoided as much as possible.

I think the latter is holding on too tight to something (life) that wasn't meant to last forever, and if we think it should, the error is in our perspective, not with death.

Indeed? How long was life "meant" to last, and who decided this? Evolutionarily, we are designed to live about 100 years, provided that nothing critical fails first; under the best pre-Information Age medical conditions this means about 70+ years (the Biblical "three score and ten"); and in practice given most pre-1850 conditions this means that most of us die in childhood; those who survive that generally live to around 30 to 60 years.

Most Westerners today already live longer than that. Should we abolish hygenic water, antiseptics, and antibiotics to bring the lifespan down to a more "natural" level? If not, why would a hypothetical technology that increased the average lifespan to 100 or 200 years be somehow less "natural?"

From the viewpoint of a man of 1800, our current situation where most people who have children survive to become grandparents and often great-grandparents would be rather "unnatural." From the viewpoint of a man of 2000, the situation of 2200, in which probably most people will only die by accident or violence, will likewise seem rather "unnatural."

The glory of humanity is that we can create and adapt to new situations, and thus extend ourselves beyond that which is in the pure genetic sense "natural" to us.

Such is the power of memetic, rather than purely genetic, progress.