Longevity Escape Velocity

LEV (Longevity Escape Velocity) is, they say, coming (I think later than sooner, but I'm in the minority, plus I'm just a trombonist). We're all going to live to 150 or a thousand or whatever.

Suicide is fundamentally taboo, so don't be so sure we'd be permitted to opt out of more life this way, either. It's already been firmly decided that we mustn't leave money on the table.

As for me, I'd be super stoked to go another 50 years with arthritic shouders, overstretched ankle ligaments (randomly and excruciatingly flopping into sprain while I walk) and torn plantar plates (the tissue just below the toes which let you walk), among other compiling ills. Fun! And how awesome for us Olds to fossilize ad infinitum in a society where we can't speak the lingo or follow the references.

Meanwhile, the Youngs, currently struggling for foothold in job and housing markets, and caught in a holding pattern munching cannabidiol gummies in their parents' basements, will remain there forever, because mom and dad won't be passing on their assets. The Olds will keep holding the best jobs, the best properties, and disproportionate power, while more and more Youngs keep piling up behind them.

With Olds calcifying and Youngs languishing (and me mercilessly animated despite a growing checklist of bodily insults), society will take on a zombie-like quality, shambling onward without the essential churn and renewal.

It sounds nearly as fun as colonizing Mars, or Universal Basic Income!

Wishes are notoriously problematic (we're urged to be careful with them, not that we ever are). And Utopias are nothing but great big hairballs of demented wishes. Here's the absurd lowdown: Cartoon Me wants to live forever, and go to Mars, and never need to work.


See also "A Case for Opting Out of Life Extension"