[lbo-talk] Philip Mirowski - Social Physicist

Somebody Somebody philos_case at yahoo.com
Fri Mar 5 11:32:47 PST 2010


Chris Doss: All human beings age, and mostly at about the same rate; therefore, aging is not a disease. However, premature or accelerated aging are, because they violate the norm. Even though it gets you to the same place.

Somebody: Of course, there's another criterion, which is to say that we should combat disease according to a hedonic calculus, not because of some appeal to the norm. Thus, there are people, like Aubrey de Gray, who are seeking to extend human life and who see the "natural" process of death as not qualitatively distinct from dying from cardiovascular disease or from cancer. Similarly, there's the school of positive psychology that focuses on improving the quality of life, not merely treating mental illness.



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