I think there is a lot of value in being a long-lived person. I love what has happened to my thinking. In our youth, we gather facts and take pride in being smart and clever, and this goes with bodies that do almost everything we want them to do, short of flying like the birds. I don’t know about other countries, but the US worships youth and independence, and we like to think of retirement as our golden years, kind of like a second childhood, a well deserved time for traveling and enjoying life. The reality of old age tends to change how we think and what we think about, and this might be a good thing?
Facts may slip our minds, but for those of who continue to pursue knowledge, our sense of meaning when we put facts together with our life experiences can be described as enlightening. That is, suddenly we realize meanings that totally missed us before. I live for these moments of enlightenment, and I am so thankful for the internet that provides many opportunities to feel enlightened. However, dealing with many strangers, and sensitive forum owners who may be quick to ban people, and very insensitive people who dish out insult after insult, I am curious about how hard it can be for us to get along and appreciate each other. For centuries religion and philosophy has tried to make us better, but is it possible for us to be better?
As my body declines, and I wonder how much longer I can keep my independence, and how much longer can I use my body to give service to others and thereby make myself a useful, worthy person who enjoys social rewards? Should I accept all that medicare can give me, or accept my physical decline and that my time of being useful has passed? I do not want to take from the young, and think it is likely more important for a child to walk than for me to operation after operation, so I can walk. If I don’t have all those operations I will become dependent on others, and that is very hard to accept. However, if this means advancing our humanness and promoting good relationships in my family, community and the greater culture, then maybe this is a good thing? Like a man and woman should compliment each other, perhaps the old and young should compliment each other.
Before our technological age, children were taught to honor their elders, and I have heard in some cultures that is still practiced. I also look around me and see so much anger and violence and stress and wonder if we are culturally better off focusing on the new, the material goods and technology, than we were when the best thing a doctor could do was comfort a person, because s/he really couldn’t do more? Will old age return our culture to human values? That is when there are enough old people to say how it is and how should it be, will we start wondering why some people think robotics are a good replacement for humans?