Scientists Battle For Longer Lives

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 8, 10 January 1936, Page 5

Scientists Battle For Longer Lives

"STOP TIME FOR A TIME"

NEW BRUNSWICK: (U.S.), Dec. 2. With increased knowledge, man could go oh increasing his life span indefinitely, until he reached the great age, sometimes discussed by scientists, at which he would be "all scars from an accumulation of accidents," Dr. William Marias Malisoff, editor of Philosophy of Science, said to-night in an address as Rutgers University. Dr. Malisoff discussed the human hope of some day "stopping time," and went on to declare his belief that men of science may ultimately approach this goal. .

Under the title "Time and Tide Will Wait," his talk envisioned a battle between mankind and eternity, which in the past has always ended with the engulfing of men in the vast reaches of time.

To-day, however, there is considerable scientific evidence, Dr. Malisoff continued, that it is already possible, in effect, to "stop time for a time," because of. progress in medical science. Ho explained that he meant by this the stretching of the present ordinary life span by scientific means, and expressed the conviction that it was not necessary to prophesy that the present life may be lengthened. Such a lengthening of life, he continued, would be only a first objective of science, since additional possibilities of extending human existence may be expected as knowledge progresses. He added that in his opinion only a united front of men of science and the rest of humanity can be successful in attacking .the' problem.

Declaring that no task of research is more important than that of promoting longevity, he suggested that such research might be undertaken by governments. A better plan, he said, would be to establish a research institute that would finance itself out of incor.e tu he obtained from its discoveries, government laboratories aro at present subject to "partisan" influences, he declared, while private research organisations do not have a broad enough scope to deal with the complex problem of lengthening life. Research of this nature, Dr.,Malisoff asserted, may be urged as tho only investment not subject to tho law of diminishing return, since it is impossible at present to conceive of an oversupply of ideas and methods for increasing longevity. Moreover, he said, such research wall always be needed, in view of the "inexhaustible" nature of the problem involved.