Monday, November 24, 2008

Elitism

It has been argued that it would be selfish for some people to extend their lives when the technology is not available to everyone. However, life extension will not be a single technology hoarded by an elite--instead, it will be a natural consequence of health maintenance. Inequities in availability of health care are widespread today, and curing more diseases will not make the problem worse. On the other hand, development of more effective medical tools will reduce the cost of medical care. If you want to increase the availability and reduce the cost of a technology, you should invest in research and development, and buy more technology. The more people who make use of health maintenance technologies, the faster they will become cheap and widely available. (Several large private foundations are working to make medical care widely available in the developing world.)

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