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…Grey’s SENS foundation, and many others. The ultimate aim of many of these researchers is “indefinite life extension”, and an end to the aging process as we know…
Why Christians Should Support Radical Life Extension
Huffington Post
by Micah Redding
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/micah-redding/why-christians-should-sup_1_b_9190470.html
Feb 9, 2016, 02:44 PM EST | Updated Feb 8, 2017
“Never again will there be…
an infant who lives but a few days,
or an old man who does not live out his years;
the one who dies at a hundred
will be thought a mere child” (Isaiah 65:20, NIV)
In Isaiah 65, the great prophet of the Jewish scriptures looks forward longingly to a day when no one would die as an infant, and 100-year-old grandparents would be thought of as youngsters.
In saying this, he connects two things which have sometimes become separated: our physicality, and our spirituality — our religious aspirations, and our desire to improve earthly life.
We sometimes think that these are two separate, even competing, ideas. Sometimes, people think that to be a spiritual person is to downplay the significance of life — to not care about what happens in the world, or in our physical existence.
This would have shocked the first Christians. For them, the resurrection of Jesus wasn’t simply a body coming back from the dead — it was the sign and declaration of God’s commitment to the world. In the resurrection, God was declaring that death’s days were numbered. In the resurrection, God was committing himself to pushing back death from the universe, as he restored and redeemed creation.
The apostle Paul describes this in 1 Corinthians 15, where he talks about resurrection as a process that begins with Jesus and spreads outward through his followers, until death is finally eradicated. And in Romans 8 he describes this continuing outward to fill the entire cosmos, so that creation itself is liberated to enjoy the freedom and the glory of the children of God.
For the first Christians, this was the mission of God. And they would participate in that process.
This is why Jesus sends them out with the command to heal the sick, feed the hungry, and bring life to the dead. He's asking them to participate in the fight against death in all its forms. No wonder, then, that even today so many hospitals have names like Saint Thomas, Saint Jude’s, and Saint Mary’s — healing has always been a significant part of the Christian mission.
Today, we have new options for extending that work. A new class of life extension technologies are currently being pursued by researchers from Google's new Calico Labs, Aubrey De Grey’s SENS foundation, and many others.
The ultimate aim of many of these researchers is “indefinite life extension”, and an end to the aging process as we know it. But what does that mean?
The Year 1900
In the year 1900, the primary way people died was by infectious disease. For all of human history prior to that, this had been the case: most of us died by catching an illness, and as a result, our lives were very short.
In the last one hundred years, we’ve changed that dramatically. Now the primary way we die is due to heart disease or cancer. We’ve changed the way humans die, and in doing that, we’ve extended our lifespans.
Human life expectancy used to be twenty to thirty years. Now we’ve extended that to 40, 50, 60, 70 years old. And if we cure any of the major diseases we currently face—like heart disease, cancer, dementia—we’ll move that bar again, and extend life even farther. We will change how we die, and as a result, we’ll change when we die.
Life Extension?
Currently, when people die in their senior years, we chalk this up to “natural causes”. In reality, there is no such thing. Everyone dies from either accident or disease, and the kinds of disease we associate with the aging process—things like cancer, heart disease, dementia—are caused by the gradual accumulation of cellular damage over years. People don’t just grow old; rather, their bodies are subjected to relentless attack, day after day, until eventually, they just aren’t able to repair the damage anymore.
Life extension technologies aim to repair this cellular damage.
When someone experiences a heart attack, we rush to restart their heart, and work to get things back in order. When someone gets cancer, we work to eradicate the disease within them.
We are now looking at the possibility of being able to address things before they get that far. We could work to heal the damage of heart disease before it becomes a heart attack, we could work to eradicate cancer before it grows into massive tumors, we could work to reverse accumulated brain damage, before it becomes full-blown dementia.
That’s what it would mean to be able to heal cellular damage. But if we did that, the aging process as we know it would be over. Instead of facing a slow decline into inevitable terminal illness, our parents and grandparents would experience a long and healthy life, able to see their grandchildren and their children’s grandchildren.
This wouldn’t be the end of death. People would still die, but it would no longer involve a painful, extended process of ever-worsening degeneration.
Think of what would be gained. Much of the pain and suffering of the senior years would be removed. The pain of watching loved ones lose a battle with debilitating illness would be relieved. Aging would stop being seen as a loss, and begin to be seen as the unmitigated opportunity to gain wisdom and experience.
Concerns?
But aren’t there significant concerns? For example, would this technology only be available for the rich, leading to drastic differences in lifespan between rich and poor? What about over-population? Is premature death necessary so that the old can give way to the new?
These are good questions. Any time humans solve a problem, we create new challenges to be overcome, and this will be no different. But that’s not a reason to avoid doing good—rather, it’s a reason to be proactive and visionary, and to aggressively tackle these new challenges as they arise.
Christians
So is this scenario of increased lifespans consistent with the biblical vision?
Yes, it is.
First, it’s consistent with the biblical commission to heal the sick, and the Christian tradition of establishing hospitals and caring for the ill.
Second, these technologies would be repairing physical damage — which is continuous with current medical treatment and practice.
Third, it would relieve vast amounts of human suffering — the currently unavoidable disease and degeneracy of late middle age.
Fourth, it would improve the depth and wisdom and resilience of our culture.
And finally, it is exactly what the prophet Isaiah hoped and longed for — a day when everyone would get to see their grandchildren and their grandchildren’s grandchildren — a day when anyone who died before their hundredth birthday would be thought to be a mere child.
Learn more about this and related subjects here.
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…was committing himself to pushing back death from the universe, as he restored and redeemed creation. The apostle Paul describes this in 1 Corinthians 15, where he talks…