In the United States, the gap is about five years. Today, a newborn can expect to live about 79 years. In 1900, the life expectancy of an average American at birth was approximately 47 years. Since the mid-19th century, Americans have been living longer.
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We are growing old, and our older years are not of high quality. What are those reasons? Let’s begin with demography. Does that sound very desirable? Not to me. Americans may live longer than their parents, but they are likely to be more incapacitated. For many reasons, 75 is a pretty good age to aim to stop. I think this manic desperation to endlessly extend life is misguided and potentially destructive. This has become so pervasive that it now defines a cultural type: what I call the American immortal. Americans seem to be obsessed with exercising, doing mental puzzles, consuming various juice and protein concoctions, sticking to strict diets, and popping vitamins and supplements, all in a valiant effort to cheat death and prolong life as long as possible. I am talking about how long I want to live and the kind and amount of health care I will consent to after 75. I have long argued that we should focus on giving all terminally ill people a good, compassionate death-not euthanasia or assisted suicide for a tiny minority. The answer to these symptoms is not ending a life but getting help. The people they leave behind inevitably feel they have somehow failed. People who want to die in one of these ways tend to suffer not from unremitting pain but from depression, hopelessness, and fear of losing their dignity and control. Since the 1990s, I have actively opposed legalizing euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide. Nor am I talking about waking up one morning 18 years from now and ending my life through euthanasia or suicide.
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So I am not talking about bargaining with God to live to 75 because I have a terminal illness. I just climbed Kilimanjaro with two of my nephews. Today I am, as far as my physician and I know, very healthy, with no chronic illness. I’m neither asking for more time than is likely nor foreshortening my life. After I die, my survivors can have their own memorial service if they want-that is not my business. And I don’t want any crying or wailing, but a warm gathering filled with fun reminiscences, stories of my awkwardness, and celebrations of a good life. Indeed, I plan to have my memorial service before I die. And hopefully, I will not have too many mental and physical limitations. I will have pursued my life’s projects and made whatever contributions, important or not, I am going to make. I will have seen my grandchildren born and beginning their lives. My children will be grown and in the midst of their own rich lives.
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We are no longer remembered as vibrant and engaged but as feeble, ineffectual, even pathetic.īy the time I reach 75, I will have lived a complete life. It transforms how people experience us, relate to us, and, most important, remember us. It robs us of our creativity and ability to contribute to work, society, the world. It renders many of us, if not disabled, then faltering and declining, a state that may not be worse than death but is nonetheless deprived. In short, it deprives us of all the things we value.īut here is a simple truth that many of us seem to resist: living too long is also a loss. It deprives us of experiences and milestones, of time spent with our spouse and children. They are certain that as I get closer to 75, I will push the desired age back to 80, then 85, maybe even 90. To convince me of my errors, they enumerate the myriad people I know who are over 75 and doing quite well. They think that I can’t mean what I say that I haven’t thought clearly about this, because there is so much in the world to see and do. This preference drives my daughters crazy. That’s how long I want to live: 75 years.