Photo credit:  Dea e Bruno, Shutterstock

Life extension treatments will be available in your lifetime. That may be great for you, but potentially catastrophic for society.

The tall ship dropped anchor off the southeastern coast, and a group rowed ashore early the following morning. Greeted by man-eating crocodiles, the crewmen quickly hacked their way into the relative safety of the dense jungle. The spry young men moved quietly when they could, to avoid the jungle cats and natives. Stinging insects tormented them for days until they came upon a sacred spring with a rejuvenating fountain, the target of their quest.

Unfortunately, Juan Ponce de León had found just another lovely jungle pond, not the Fountain of Youth he coveted. He never did find it, and ultimately died from a native’s arrow in 1521, in a land that would later be named Florida.

Many adventurers and scientists before and after his time have dedicated their lives to finding the secret to eternal life. So far, none have succeeded.

The first person who will live to see their 150th birthday has already been born.

Aubrey de Grey, Biogerontologist

On the cusp of a new era

Every day, science is getting closer to solving the puzzle of extreme life extension.

Modern medicine has improved average life expectancy from 35 years in Ponce de León’s day to over 75 years now. A child born today can expect to live into the 22nd century. And if Aubrey de Gray’s prediction is true, our children and grandchildren could enjoy twice our life span. Or more.

In a subsequent prediction, Aubrey de Gray claims that some individuals born in the next 20 years will live past 1,000 years.

Crazy claims? Perhaps, but there is solid science behind it, and it’s worth a look. If true, virtually everything we hold dear will be upended. Careers, education, finance, retirement, medicine, family planning, adventure, religion, human rights, and even the fundamental rules of ethical behavior we live by.

How scientists are extending life

Today we live longer than our ancestors because we eat more nutritious foods and live in safer environments. We’ve conquered childhood diseases with vaccinations and medicines. We’ve learned how to cure and control chronic illnesses like diabetes that would otherwise hasten death. Hearts, kidneys, joints, and a myriad of other body parts can be repaired or replaced. In most cases now, people die as their bodies and organs approach their natural limit.

Scientists who study aging are pursuing multiple approaches to extend healthy lives up to – and well beyond – what they believe to be the natural limit of 125 years.

1. Genetic engineering

Scientists have become more adept at genetic manipulation — the ability to clip out sections of DNA and RNA and replace them with corrected or modified strand sequences. The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines (editing virus mRNA, not human) are beneficiaries of this technology, as are several cancer cures that rely on genetically modified stem cells. Dozens of other treatments are in clinical trials.

Genetic repair techniques can be used in vitro or at any stage throughout life. They can be used on crops, animals, and humans. Procedures you’ve heard of such as “designer babies” are highly controversial but technically indistinguishable from other life-extending treatments that remove one’s susceptibility to breast cancer, sickle cell anemia, arthritis, and hemophilia.

When treatments are advanced, safe, and broad enough to address the range of ailments that cause death, we’ll see a dramatic increase in lifespans for those who have access.

2. Medications

Drugs are available today to prevent, repair, and retard cellular damage. The most commonly taken ones are metformin, melatonin, rapamycin, and even Aspirin. While these are generally considered safe, and even approved for specific medical uses, there are no long-term double-blind studies on humans yet that can prove out their claims of life extension.

3. Metabolic Repair

Aubrey de Grey and his like-minded colleagues have a different philosophy. He contends that the best approach is to focus on repair treatments rather than a Whac-a-Mole assault on prevention.

The problem is simple, they say. There are seven causes of aging. Cellular damage from those causes is the natural metabolism that slowly degrades cellular mechanisms, inhibiting their functions. Restoring them to a more pristine state will extend life for decades, centuries, and perhaps an eternity. Developing a repeatable regime of repairing damages is a more straightforward approach than identifying and altering the complex mechanisms that cause aging.

Many therapies using techniques such as stem cells and genetic editing tools will be in clinical trials soon. With luck, they’ll be available in our lifetimes. Success with just one or two could add decades of healthy life.

4. Severe caloric restriction

Life extension has been conclusively documented through extreme calorie reduction when maintained at levels very close to starvation. A landmark 20-year study at the University of Wisconsin on Rhesus monkeys showed both a significant increase in lifespan and better health throughout life.

This is exciting news, but putting test subjects on starvation diets is painful and cruel, and unethical. The best approach, which researchers are taking, is to identify the underlying biological mechanisms that cause the extension and develop chemical or procedural substitutes. 

Impact on society

A longer life of health and happiness is the collective dream of all citizens of the world. The value individually is immense, but what about the consequences to society? Similar to the tragedy of the commons, where too many people compete in their own best interests for limited resources, life extension and immortality could lead to a devastating impact on society and the world. Possibly, a dystopian future for mankind. 

Health and happiness 

On the positive side, Handicapped, blind, chronically sick, and mentally ill individuals could wait out a cure that will let them enjoy life as they should. We would enjoy endless educational opportunities and multiple careers. Eternal youth and health bring endless opportunities for love and affection. Time is abundant for creativity and the arts. Opportunities to pursue your passion are endless. 

Population

With longer lives comes more people. In short order, the world’s population would explode. More people with the vitality of youth will lead to more babies and consequently even more population growth. Without some set of worldwide regulations (which we know people hate), the growth would be unsustainable in a few generations. 

Economy

Today, a large part of the world economy is directed to social services. With a rapidly aging population, there could be an unsustainable drain on resources and services. Changes to social support networks would be essential. 

Risk-taking

Immortality is not the same as invulnerability. Accidental deaths from risky activities like auto racing or skydiving will be immeasurable tragedies. Imagine an accidental death at the age of 20 and the loss of centuries of unlived potential.  

Legal

What legal or financial recourse will you expect when someone accidentally kills your spouse or child? The current remedy is a multiple of lifetime earnings which would be a king’s ransom. The cost of insurance would skyrocket and liability laws would change.

Careers and retirement

A perpetual retirement might sound like paradise, but financing it would be challenging. Instead, many of us would shift into a repeating cycle of work, and retirement. Ongoing education and training will prepare us for technical and career changes, and retirement will be just a pause in between professions.

Ecology 

Longer lives and more people will accelerate climate change and the resulting consequences. Garbage and waste will overflow from landfills and pollute our oceans. Water will become even more scarce – and wildly expensive – and open lands will diminish. 

Medical

Healthcare costs will be crippling if we subsidize expensive therapies for all. Yet if we don’t, we end up with a two-class society (see equality below).

Equality 

At first, therapies will only be available to the rich, which will result in a two-class society — those who live longer and those who don’t. The rich who extend their lives will get richer (see finance below). Further, when some choose against life extensions, we’ll have short-timers and long-timers. Should the short-timers get to cut in line?

Incarceration

When life is eternal, murder would be the worst possible crime. Lives are of infinite value when they’re infinite in duration. Sentences of life in prison and execution would need to change because, at some point in the future, society will find a solution or rehabilitation technique. 

Finance

Invest $1,000 at 7% for 100 years and you have a million dollars. Invest it for 1,000 years and you’ll have five trillion trillion dollars. That’s impossible to scale across billions of people, of course. Principles of monetary policy, investments, interest, and retirement planning are completely upended when people live, save, and spend in perpetuity.

Religion

With perpetual life, there is no afterlife, and therefore no religion as we know it today. Social and cultural elements can survive, but the foundational principles of most religions will have to evolve to remain relevant. 

Love

“Till death do us part,” has no meaning when there is no death. Dating, romance, sex, and marriage rituals will change, some enduring and some cyclical. 

What else?

Surely I missed some. Share your thoughts in the comments below.

The choice is yours

We already take deliberate actions to live longer and healthier lives. Smoking cessation, weight loss, veganism, nutrition, and exercise are virtues of our modern society. We embrace medical and pharmaceutical advancements that keep us healthy and living a few years longer — in fact, living as many years as we can.

The drive to live longer is in our very nature. Is immortality in yours?

If life is good, is more better?

The inexorable march of scientific progress means that one day we’ll have to make a decision. Never before in the span of human history have we encountered the very real possibility of immortality and its resulting consequences.

What will you choose?