MAD CHASE FOR ETERNAL LIFE

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16542, 28 September 1921, Page 3

MAD CHASE FOR ETERNAL LIFE

DOCTOR’S PLAN TO KEEP PEOPLE YOUNC. “ Physical immortality is not impossible—nothing is impossible.” This remark was made by Professor Sir Arthur Keith, conservator cf the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, in the course of an interview with a “ Sunday Chronicle ” representative about the claim made by Dr Carrel, of the Rockefeller Institute, U.S.A., that human tissues are practically immortal. “ There are much more important things to discuss,” said Sir Arthur, smiling. 11 than that of eternal life. That question suggests another, and it is this: ts eternal life desirable? “ Carrel is a Frenchman by birth, mid he went to the United States when ■ » young man. He is absolutely reliable and a finished scientist. I mean that there is no humbug or pretenco about his xx'ork. He is to be taken quite seriously. His discovery is to tho effect that you can take a little patch from the heart of a chicken and keep it full of vitality for nine years. “ From that lie draws the inference that il xve knew exactly how to do it it would bo possible to keep tissues living. In answer to that 1 would say leave aside eternal physical life as undesirable. We hope some day to know exactly what life is.’’ Sir Arthur asked that the matter should bo looked at in the light cf tho much xvider experience outside scientific laboratories. What do wo know,” he asked, * £ about the tenure of human life? In the Bible xx*e have a reference to * the allotted span,’ namely, 4 three score years and ten.’ We know that that was an advance upon the age of primitive peoples, of the aborigines of Patagonia and so fGrth, whose maximum span, we have every reason to think, was sixty years. “ From that we again have evidence that the human span of life has been, extended. I am not speaking of the average life, but of persons xvho overcome the accidents of life and reaefr middle age. “ When xve examine families most closely allied to man, such as the gorilla and the anthropoid ape, we havo every reason to believe that they are forty years old. Civilisation evolving from barbarism has increased the length of life in a legitimate way. All that looks as though life could be extended by another decade. “Medical men say it is not our business to get a lot* of old people such an you would keep in the workhouse, hut to keep the young people, that is, to keep the people young. It is worth our pains to extend first the vigorous period of life, and second to aim at safeguarding against the accidents of Life. 1 mean not only the accidents of the street, but the accidents of disease. “ This is infinitely more to be desired than adding to age. Let. us suppose v*e are going to extend old age by u. decade. Let hs make eighty instead of seventy the allotted span, and think what the condition of life is going to be. People think very selfishly about getting very old, but don’t think about the consequences. “ The, people of value to the community are the able men and women between the ages of twenty and fortyfire. We want not to extend life and add to old age, but t-o add to the vigorous period—that period of life that 28 worth living. Mere old age is often quite a tribulation. “ Nature’s aim is the Race, and not the Individual. In trying to extend tho perif/d of life to an older age, you are right up against Nature's basic laws, because list plan •(» to get vigorous individuals and kill off the old. Old age is not a disease at all, but is intended by Nature to get rid of usedup individuals. All Inis chase after eternal life is the chase of people who never think what it means. It is a. form of madness. If they thought cf the condition< of life they would never entertain the idea.”