Life is Short. That’s the Point

There has been a recent upsurge in the quantity of “longevity entrepreneurs” who are attempting to not only extend their own lives but to create a market for it. One such company, Ambrosia Plasma, actually provides young plasma infusions for $8,000 a liter.

Others see death as fundamental to our lives as living them. Without death, according to them, life would not have the meaning that it was designed to have. Barbara Ehrenreich in her book, Natural Causes: An Epidemic of Wellness, the Certainty of Dying, and Killing Ourselves to Live Longer, writes that, “You can think of death bitterly or with resignation, as a tragic interruption of your life, and take every possible measure to postpone it. Or, more realistically, you can think of life as an interruption of an eternity of personal nonexistence, and seize it as a brief opportunity to observe and interact with the living, ever-surprising world around us.”

The beginnings and the endings, the tragedies and the blessings, are the moments that can make us feel human instead of simply a piece of the Earth.

See Allison Arieff, Life is Short. That’s the Point, New York Times, August 18, 2018.

Special thanks to Lewis Saret (Attorney, Washington, D.C.) for bringing this article to my attention.