From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Tue Apr 02 2002 - 08:56:14 MST
"Robert J. Bradbury" wrote:
>
> On Tue, 2 Apr 2002, Randy Smith wrote:
>
> > Fukuyama is a "political theorist" and apparently a wannabe
> > bioethicist:
> >
> > http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/02/science/social/02END.html
> > Major increases in human longevity could also be disruptive, he fears, because
> > "life extension will wreak havoc with most existing age-graded hierarchies,"
> > postponing social change in countries with aging dictators and thwarting
> > innovation in others.
>
> Isn't he denying the strength of his own political arguments here?
> If the drive is towards liberal democracy, then presumably we should
> not have "aging dictators". And most studies show that innovation
> tends to be made mostly by people in their 20's or perhaps 30's.
> A different type of creativity can be developed if one lives long
> enough to develop significant experience in multiple fields
> (take my experience in computer science and biotechnology for
> example).
>
> I don't see the preservation of "age-graded" hierarchies as being
> a strong argument unless there is more to it. If he is talking
> about the upset this causes to social security/pension systems,
> presumably those get solved by nanotech (though I doubt
> Fukuyama is aware of that).
>From a financial perspective, he's all wrong. Entirely backwards. Old
people get conservative in their decisions and willingness to take risk
because they a) don't have anything to fall back on, and b) are
generally physiologically unable to start over from scratch in a
competetive and demanding job market. With the sort of age ameliorating
technologies we forsee, this will not result in a greater degree of
conservatism as the population ages, but a greater willingness to take
greater risk for longer into one's life, thus leading to a more
speculative and dynamic economy.
Similarly, aging dictators will have more time to come to the
realization that they can be forces for good without having to send
one's opponents out to the firing squads.
The real threat that aging poses is those who are unable or unwilling to
make the shift from Aresian to Athenian thinking (using the analogies
used in Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon"). I think, though, that such
individuals will die out. If they embrace anti-aging technologies for
themselves but retain a general abhorrence for technology and liberty,
they will eventually undermine their own credibility within their
juntas.
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