Anagathics in our lifetime?

[agorski]

Here's an interesting article I saw today:

Aging Process May Be Reversable, Scientists Claim

 

[talos402000]

The government would never allow them for wide spread use. Old people cost money and don't produce enough taxes.

 

[BlackBat242]

The government would never allow them for wide spread use. Old people cost money and don't produce enough taxes.

You really didn't read the link. It describes regaining muscle strength, endurance, etc - in other words, rejuvenation - which certainly would allow those persons to remain fully productive healthy members of the work force.


Where this would be a bad thing is in closing off advancement within companies, with fewer job openings because workers aren't retiring - leaving the younger people unemployed.

 

[mike wightman]

The scenario writes itself.
The rich and the powerful will keep this for themselves, or use it as a control mechanism for the working classes. There will also be a black market that can be exploited.
Be a good little worker and we keep you alive, to work.
Three strikes and you are removed from the program.

Strikes will be earned for:
voting the wrong way
any online dissent/workplace dissent (striking for example)
oh, and doing illegal stuff

The PCs can be:
part of the ruling class with a sense of morality
part of the underclass rising up against the unfairness

A group of Travellers arriving on the world and finding out about this wonderful treatment:
aid the rebels?
buy stuff from the black market to corner the market off world
do a deal with the ruling classes.

 

[Condottiere]

What you spend your pension on is up to you.

Or, you never get a pension.

 

[Enoki]

The downside would be a need for radically changing the birth rate. With people living far longer even a low rate could potentially cause a population explosion that was unsustainable. That might call for eugenics, sterilization programs, or mass mandatory abortions.
Depending on who is making the rules and choices it could be very... problematic...

 

[Condottiere]

 

[G. Kashkanun Anderson]

The downside would be a need for radically changing the birth rate. With people living far longer even a low rate could potentially cause a population explosion that was unsustainable. That might call for eugenics, sterilization programs, or mass mandatory abortions.
Depending on who is making the rules and choices it could be very... problematic...

Fertility rates already are dropping radically throughout most of the world, to the point where most demographics experts are beginning to talk about a looming depopulation crisis. Over half of the world's population, in fact, currently live in places where the native fertility rate is below the replacement rate. This includes most of North America and Asia, all of Europe and a large chunk of South America. The fertility rate in Mexico, for example, is at just about the replacement rate (2.33 births per woman) -- an astonishing decline, considering that just a generation ago it was 4-5 births per woman. India is undergoing a similar decline, and China (of course) crashed its fertility rate a generation ago.

 

[aramis]

This is turning political.
No one's gotten far enough that I'm going to infract at the moment (but the board staff will be looking at it and making a joint decision.)...

[m;] Thread Closed for review. [/m;]

[m;]:ssb: Topic may be continued in the pit, if desired. :ssb:[/m;]