Age Retardation - Brutes or Angels: Human Possibility in the Age of Biotechnology - page 220

expectancies of 180 years, with at least 150 of those years being crea-
tive, vigorous, and productive. how do you think higher education and
the college experience for those students would differ from that of cur-
rent college students?
5. Would your present views on religion change if you were certain of bio-
logical immortality (or at least a life span of several thousand years) here
on earth? if so, how; if not, why not?
6. should aging be treated as a disease to be cured?
7. Do you believe there are ethical issues raised by the prospect of human
age-retardation technology not mentioned in this chapter?
notes
1. einstein's physics tells us that time ceases to pass for things traveling at the
speed of light, and, so far, light is all we know that can travel that fast. The static
nature of information carried in a beam of light is why the hubble telescope can
literally look back billions of years in time to when galaxies were first forming.
nothing has changed in the light beams carrying that information to us.
2. from the national Census of fatal occupational injuries in 2006, pub-
lished by the Bureau of labor statistics in 2007, the chances of losing your life
on the job is thirty times higher if you are a farmer or forestry worker than if you
are an educator. http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cfoi_08092007.pdf
(accessed may 19, 2012).
3. life expectancies are in the Period of life table published by social se-
curity online and based on mortality rates in 2007. http://www.ssa.gov/oACT
/sTATs/table4c6.html (accessed september 12, 2009).
4. eighteen men were used in this study (Taaffe et al. 1994).
5. some data hint at a correlation between increased prostate cancer and ele-
vated growth hormone levels.
6. The project is called CAlerie (Comprehensive Assessment of long-
Term effects of reducing intake of energy). http://calerie.dcri.duke.edu/index
.html (accessed september 16, 2009).
7. The roundworm species Caenorhabditis elegans is the worm used in genetics
of aging studies. it is a favorite experimental animal for developmental and cell