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Introduction
On Sunday (10 November 2024), I had the honour of laying a wreath at a Remembrance Day Service. It was a simple, dignified, poignant, experience.
I spoke with an attendee who told me her father had served in the second world war – but he had rarely spoken of his experiences.
My father had served in the war too. He left school at 14, in 1941. Initially, he worked down the mines as a Bevin Boy, which I think must have been around 1943.
I recall my dad telling me that the atmosphere in the mines – I’m guessing the coal dust – caused severe eczema. So he was released from the mines and joined the navy.
He, too, rarely spoke of his wartime experience. I think his joining the navy was well towards the backend of the war, and if he saw any active service, it would have been limited. I can’t be certain of that, however.
Much later in his life, he took quite an interest in naval matters. He’d often attend naval events down on the south coast. And he amassed quite a number of books on naval themes.
While at the ceremony, I reflected that, had my dad still been alive – he died in 2020 – he would have been days away from his 98th birthday.
After the ceremony, I began to think about memory, mortality and sacrifice.
Lest We Forget
There are no living world war one veterans – and hasn’t been for some years. As time passes, fewer and fewer world war two veterans remain. Any living world war two veterans will now be around the age that father would have been.
We are living longer. But human lifespan is finite, and when measured on a cosmological scale, fleeting.
The idea of time has always intrigued me. The realisation that there was a past, for most of which I played no part, and a future, in most of which I will play no part was at the same time profoundly illuminating and infuriatingly beyond my full comprehension.
And as for now, the present, how could that exist? Now, it seems, never is. It is always becoming the past and moving into the future. The realisation of a future without me was also a realisation of my mortality.
The language of the remembrance day ceremony resonates deeply with me. The focus on memory (Lest we forget; We will remember them), time (They shall not grow old) and sacrifice (For your tomorrow, we gave our today) is simple yet profound.
But it is the central message of the importance of memory that has always affected me most deeply.
Because, what do we do when there is no-one left who remembers?
Immortality Anyone?
Do you want to live longer? An extra 10 years? 20 years? 100 years? Forever? If you had the chance would you do it?
If we had the chance, should we do it?
Extending the human lifespan takes us deep into the work of the transhumanist movement. Transhumanism has a fairly long history but it was Julian Huxley‘s essay in 1957 that brought it to the attention of a wider audience.
In short, transhumanism is the belief that humans can and should use technology to enhance physical and cognitive abilities, potentially transcending current biological limitations. And, I guess, extending the human lifespan is the ultimate enhancement.
There are clearly ethical considerations surrounding whether we should, if we were able, to extend human life. I’ll save those considerations for another article.
For the moment, let’s look at things slightly differently.
Medical tech advances apace. There is speculation that in the not too distant future, we may have anti-ageing medication, gene therapy and regenerative procedures that will off human life extension.
Now here’s a question for you: if we could extend the human lifespan significantly, would it enhance or diminish such events as the remembrance ceremony?
Immortals Cannot Be Noble
I recall hearing a radio programme a year or two ago about extending the human lifespan. One of the reasons given for not doing this was that many people would not know what to do with their time.
One commentator’s quip was along the lines of how we already find it difficult to fill our time on wet Sunday afternoons, so, what on earth would we do with an extra 10, 20, 50 (or an infinite number of) years.
That trivialises things in a way. It seems to me that moments of boredom are just part of what it is to be human. And the fact that we get bored is not a good reason for not extending our lifespans.
I have to say, if I were in a position to extend my lifespan I should not hesitate. Or so I thought.
The subtitle of this section, Immortals Cannot Be Nobel comes from a book by Leon R Kass, called Life, Liberty and the Defense of Dignity. (To be transparent here, that link is an Amazon affiliate link. If you click it and buy the book I get a commission at no cost to you.)
The argument that Kass puts forward against extending the human lifespan is elegant and compelling. I’m going to concentrate on just one strand of his argument.
It is the fact that we are mortal that we are able to perform virtuous deeds, like making the ultimate sacrifice.
We free ourselves from fear, from bodily pleasures, or from attachments to wealth – all largely connected with survival … yet for this nobility, vulnerability and mortality are the necessary conditions. The immortals cannot be noble.
I find the argument persuasive.
I am pretty sure that, as I write this, I would still eagerly grasp at the chance of extra years. But…
…the more I think about it, the more I think that there is a real chance that many of the things that are most dear to us as human beings would lose something.
We love intensely because our time is short.
We appreciate the beauty of the world because our time is short.
Our time is short, and so memories are special because they are, like life, finite.
Finitude gives meaning to our memories and memories are gilded by the fleetingness of life.
Please comment if this resonates with you