Never heard of them afterwards... what happened to 'em? Would love to find out :-)
(or - just for fun - s/1999/2035/ and s/Y2K/singularity/ - hilarity ensues)
]]>Interesting first 10-20 years as the pharma company that invented it fights the bootleg generics that quickly come into existence. Would we see folk who took bootleg versions become criminalised? Would we get a bunch of common bootlegged versions with dodgy side effects?
What if "maturity" isn't just number-of-years lived, but has a biological basis. I can imagine there being some positive behavioural changes in folk past child bearing age that got kin selected... so it's vaguely possible that reverted folk remain young-and-dumb despite the number of years lived.
How much is the fear of death and not making a mark on the world a driver for progress? If it has any significance then maybe we see fewer new companies, new research programs, new technology, etc. when "I've got to do X before I'm 30/40" becomes "I've got a few hundred years"...
I am pretty certain that risky behaviour will go up, not down. People's concepts of risk are dumb - we didn't evolve that way. For examples drivers seem to exhibit more dangerous behaviour if they're in a boring environment with lots of safety features (see http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a930850139~frm=titlelink). I suspect the general background feeling of "I'm going to live to be 600" will get people to do riskier things.
I can imagine that there are going to be a new set of legislative conflicts. I've not run the numbers but maybe a 600 year lifespan makes the chance of dying in an auto-accident large enough that the folk who can run the numbers try and legislate against manually-driven cars.
We're going to lose the natural "I'm older and wiser" indicators our body gives us. I suspect that some new conventions of dress, etc. will be developed to replace 'em.
Euthanasia will become a more acceptable option. People are going to have personal experiences of more people who are facing 500 years of serious dementia, or a chronic pain condition, etc.
In fact they'll be a general change as more people encounter things personally due to the longer lifespan. More folk are going to encounter serious mental illness in themselves or close friends. More folk are going to encounter people with physical disabilities from accidents or disease.
I'm not as sure as others that the pension industry will completely explode. I think they'll reconfigure themselves to supply "work breaks". Work for 60 years save a pension, play for 15, repeat.
... and that's enough for now :-)
Adrian
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