"The real issue is what makes a meaningful life," he told CBS News. "I think this manic desperation to endlessly extend life is misguided and potentially destructive," he wrote. Rather, at 75, he believes he will be content enough with his life to not actively try to prolong it. In the Atlantic article, Emanuel, who is in good health in his late 50s, made clear that he is not looking to end his life through suicide or euthanasia. They've lost friends and loved ones or activities are restricted and maybe it's not so great after all."įor Emanuel, such frank discussions with older adults and time spent in self-reflection led him to the decision that he does not aspire to an exceptionally long life and would not take steps to extend it. But when you talk to older people, many of them are sort of tired of life. And then you probe and you find that people are so psychologically scared of dying and not having lived out a meaningful life. "If you ask most people about quality versus quantity of life, they will say in a second that quality is what's really important. "I think it's fascinating that so many people are obsessed with living long," he told CBS News. In 2014, Emanuel penned a controversial article for the Atlantic titled " Why I Hope to Die at 75." Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist and Chair of the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania, is among them.
Several prominent bioethicists have spoken out against such efforts to extend longevity.ĭr. "It's very much like how nature and evolution work."īut not everyone thinks the quest to cure aging is well-founded or wise.
"What's wonderful about prizes is that you set a goal and you're essentially inviting a diversity of options to compete and see which one wins," he said. When asked why he set up the competition to find ways to solve these problems of aging, rather than invest the money directly into research, Yun said he thinks the nature of a contest yields the best results. "But maybe it's all really the same process that is the decline of homeostatic capacity." "We give these things names like diabetes and hypertension," he said. But as we age, the body loses this ability. He gave the example that when people are young and healthy and their blood pressure or sugar level is high, the body brings itself back to homeostasis on its own. But think of all the things you can't feel." All of this happens at once, and these are all things everyone can feel. Foods we may have once loved, we are no longer able to tolerate. It's hard to recover from injuries, from a late night, from jet lag. All of a sudden you're finding that your body can't get back to homeostasis on its own," Yun said. "We're more vulnerable to the forces of aging. Then, after about the age of 40, our homeostatic capacity starts to decline. That's very different from what marketers try to say, that healthy means vitality and energy." "When you're feeling healthy, you're feeling nothing because you're in homeostasis.
"That is the true definition of health," he said. Yun went on to explain that when we're young and healthy, we don't even notice it. "It is so pervasively effective that we don't even realize we have it until we start losing it." It's our ability to self-tune in response to stressors," he told CBS News. "Homeostatic capacity is probably nature's greatest gift. He explains this in terms of homeostatic capacity, which refers to the body's natural ability to fight off stressors in order to remain healthy. Yun is quick to point out that the aim of most of longevity research - and the ultimate goal of the Palo Alto competition - is not simply to extend life in terms of sheer number of years lived, but to enhance quality of life, as well. Because of the nature of the competition, specifics about each project have not been disclosed to the public, but videos are available on the contest's website with teams introducing their research. The roughly 30 teams that are participating in the competition are taking a broad range of approaches, from stem cell therapies to gene modification to hormonal treatments to behavioral and nutritional interventions. Winning research teams in two different categories - who will be awarded $500,000 each - are expected to be announced by the end of 2019.
The competition was announced in 2014 and final registration closed this past December. The Palo Alto Prize is meant to inspire and reward such innovations.