What I saw at Pigface Point: Coming to terms with 'what is natural'
"Professor Sinclair, Please stop trying to extend lives unnaturally! There are already billions of people too many on this planet. Sincerely, Katherine."
Katherine isn't the first person to ask me to "cease and desist" in my efforts to slow, stop and reverse aging—nor is she the first person to remind me that there are 7.6 billion people on this planet, with hundreds of millions more showing up each year.
Under these circumstances, these people often suggest, it is unconscionable that anyone could work to help people live longer lives, thus adding to the ever-growing population. It's simply unnatural, they say.
Well, if it's a natural life you want, I've got some bad news for you: You're not living one. We long ago left a world in which our individual lives, let alone our global population, could be sustained without technology, society, government, laws and complex resource distribution.
Even farming, I'll hasten to add, isn't "natural." This came into stark relief for me in 1988, when I spent a day at a derelict "educational" farm, an hour south of Sydney, appropriately called Pigface Point. The farm was the utopian dream of Ted Trainer, Australia’s answer to Paul "The Sky is Falling" Ehrlich, who has argued that a "population bomb" is coming to kill us all. Trainer preached that we should all immediately move to three-acre farms, using solar ovens to cook home-grown eggs. (Strangely, part of the plan at the time was for us all to commute an hour each way in a smoke-belching car.)
If a Hobbesian existence of “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short” lives is indeed what is natural, then I have no interest in living a natural life, and I would wager that you do not wish for that either. But the way I see it, that's not natural, either!
So what is "natural"? In my view, it's the very human tendency to strive for existences with less fear, less danger, less hunger and less violence. And it's the drive to extend those blessings to as many people as possible—with the greatest stability possible.
A limited population is certainly part of the equation for sustainability, but it's not even the biggest part. Consumption and innovation will play a much bigger role in our survival on this planet than population ever will. They already do.
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While you're here, head on over to Twitter — I'm @davidasinclair — and say "hi." If you've got a question about the fight to slow, slop and reverse aging, or the implications of doing so, don't hesitate to ask.
Philosophy Student
2 年Well you effectively used Ted Trainer as a strawman to answer a common appeal to nature argument.
Well said indeed and I agree to your natural life analogy I quote "it's the very human tendency to strive for existences with less fear, less danger, less hunger and less violence". definitely yes I was looking for the same as "suicide blast survivor" in my country.
Digital designer specializing in website design and print work. I do AI Art with MidJourney, ChatGPT. I am currently doing video with Runway AI.
6 年Also, what has fueled innovation is the large numbers of people on the planet. Once we are a space faring race I don't think population will be an issue since the galaxy is so large.?
R&D Scientist, Writer, Author, Artist
6 年Indeed, we are very far away from the cave people and times when natural selection and herbs were the only means to reach 30-ties. I would support anyone who is working on finding ways to extend healthy, active life, not just lifespan by itself. Any medications, therapies, medical devices and procedures being developed to successfully fight illness will also extend life and therefore will work against aging. In approaching this goal, US is, by all means, leading the way.