A prediction: the first person to live to be 200 is alive today

Probably not. Though the idea fascinates me I have no interest in celebrating a 200th birthday. At best I would be part of a team doing the lab work, as it correlates to my field of engineering.

Also, forgive my choice of the word necessary. I perceive death as a natural phase in the cycle of life, but I am also playing the Devil's Advocate here.

But hear me out; entertain the thought for a minute.

Assume the average lifespan is 100 years. (In theory it's probably closer to 75.) Extending a human's lifespan to 200 years would essentially double the human population on Earth. I do not see this "treatment", as you refer to it, being readily available (or possibly even affordable) upon convenience. By the time this "treatment" would become available to the public I would expect the population to have reached 11 billion. Give it a hundred years or so for this "treatment" to become a common "thing", and you'll be looking at an ambitious 14 billion with the present birth rates. Now double everyone's lifespan. People are being born, and a natural death is prolonged. I know nothing about lab grown meat, but I would assume such things would be reduced to an expensive luxury, replaced by long-lasting nutritious liquids of some kind. Technology, for example, is another factor. In the next 100 years there will no longer be any need for drivers in the transportation services, as vehicles are headed towards becoming completely automated. (I recommend you watch the YouTube video "Humans Need Not Apply".)

Now, assuming this "treatment" is a one time thing, and not something that requires a refill every 10 years or so, people are being born at a rate where it would be difficult, if at all feasible, to extend this service to everyone. Then there are other matters such as housing, fresh water for everyone, etc.

It's an interested topic.

/r/Futurology Thread Parent