Old age is over—if you want it to be
Some huge advances in longevity medicine may be coming, and as they do, we’ll have to grapple with the challenges and opportunities of a world in which people live longer and healthier lives.
The latest issue of MIT Technology Review is all about the biological and technological advances that will help us all to live longer, and the implications for society.
For such a world to be prosperous and harmonious, society needs to shed stereotypes of older people as unproductive, inflexible, and technologically challenged. Our very notion of “old age” was invented around the same time as the theory of eugenics and is about equally valid. Groups like the Longevity Explorers and Senior Planet give the lie to the idea that older people can’t start new ventures or learn to use technology.