History of the Self: Aging
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Around 200 BC, China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, feared death so badly that he sent an alchemist on voyages across the sea to search for a magic elixir that would give him immortality. After the alchemist disappeared at sea, the legend says the emperor took things into his own hands and died after drinking what he thought was a cure. Around 200 years later, another legend was born. A holy grail that was thought to hold life-restoring powers for anyone who drank from it. There was the Philosopher's Stone, the Fountain of Youth. And then, in late December of 1899, a scientist named Eli Metchnikoff woke up in Paris to learn that he had done it. He had found the secret to eternal life.
The French morning newspaper Le Matin carried a huge headline article in large block letters all across the front page. And it said, vive la vie, long live life.
Underneath that headline, it said things like l'élixir de l'éternelle jeunesse, the elixir of eternal youth, l'institut des miracles, the institute of miracles, la vieillesse vaincue, old age defeated.
None of us should despair to see the year 2000. We'll reach the age of the Patriarchs and Monsieur Metchnikoff will be damned only by heirs of fortunes.
Eli Metchnikoff had captured the world's attention. For millennia, people had tried to evade death, seeking cures in things like mercury, gold, powders, liquids. But now they had a new tool. Science. And it was miraculous. There were new vaccines. X-rays had just been invented. You could now see what had once been invisible. And Metchnikov had helped to make that happen.
He was very famous. He was one of the most famous scientists in the world.
Eli Metchnikoff was hardcore. The man drank cholera in the name of science. He injected himself with disease and he tested the body's power and its limits. Later in his career, his work on the immune system would win him a Nobel Prize. When the world was sick, Eli Metchnikoff tried to cure it. And he made sure people knew.
He loved the journalists. He never turned them away. And they loved him even more than he loved them. And they followed him around and they took down his every word.
And his message was clear.
He thought that a solution to everything was science. So, of course, science was going to solve aging as well.
Aging is a disease that should be treated like any other.
No one had studied aging scientifically before. And here was this famous scientist saying he wanted to take it on. But Metchnikov didn't just want to study aging. He wanted to cure it.
This became for him like a new mission.
Science alone can lead suffering humanity into the right path.
Free the world from this terrible affliction.
And the world ate it up.
Entire sacks of letters that piled up in the mailroom was stuffed with letters from people who didn't want to die.
Nobody likes to die. Nobody likes to see their friends and family die. So we want to extend the lifespan as much as possible. People nowadays want to remain ageless.
We can delay aging. It's one of the foundational questions in science. We can stop aging. How long can we live?
We keep searching. What is it exactly we're looking for? I don't know what I want to do. Living to 200? Are we looking to living to... You know, 95 with our senses and being active and in control. I think the most important thing to me is maintaining my mobility. I would love to, like, renovate a house. I think I want to travel more. Traveling as much as I can. More time to myself.
We all know that winter is coming for us.
I think I have about 20, 25 years left.
The question is when, and can we push it out as much as possible? People have been talking about it for thousands of years. It's not a new question, it's an old question.
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Speakers
22 identified
Devin Katayama 14 min
Luba Vukonsky 10 min
Ramteen Arablui 4 min
Podcast Sponsorship Message 3 min
Eli Metchnikoff (quoted text) 3 min
Lina Zeldovich 3 min
Olga Metchnikoff (quoted text) 2 min
Jay Oshansky 2 min
Carol Haber 1 min
Sponsor Message 1 min
Leo Tolstoy (quoted text) 1 min
14th Amendment Narration
Quoted Speaker
Caller Introduction
Consumer Testimony
Listener Testimony
News Segment
Historical Newspaper Narration
Randa Abdel-Fattah
Dreams Narration
Segment Introduction
News Commentary