X-Message-Number: 15613
From: "Mark Plus" <>
Subject: Lame rationalization for deathism.
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2001 19:53:54 -0800

From the Monday, Feb.12, 2001 edition of "The Objective American" Website, 
<http://www.objectiveamerican.com/> (content changes daily):

[Question to Website's editor:] In watching the development of the human 
genome project and all the wonderful advances it promises for 
disease-inhibition and life-extension, I'm afraid I was born too late to 
take advantage of what's coming. I'm in my late 40s, and from what I'm 
hearing, it will be decades before genetic engineering significantly 
curtails disease or advances human life. I seem to have just missed the 
boat. It's making me very depressed. I know this is probably irrational, but 
I don't appear to be able to talk my way out of it. Any suggestions?
 Too Late at Tulane

[Editor answers:] Well, maybe you just need a better sense of perspective. 
Your grandparents' parents missed out on antibiotics, jet airplanes, 
computers, television, freeways, movies, SUVs, space travel, atomic power, 
and dozens of other conveniences and delights of modern living. They perhaps 
caught glimmers of some of the advancements, and, like you, realized they'd 
not live to see their full dawning. Ditto the pioneers. Ditto Leonardo da 
Vinci, whose vision of the future was perhaps the best of any man who lived. 
But do you suppose those people pined away for the future, letting it ruin 
their present? Not from what I've read! Rather, they marveled at what might 
come for mankind but continued to focus on the improvements and 
opportunities available. By doing so, they maximized their productivity, and 
as a consequence, the progress of humanity itself. This is what you should 
do.

Concentrate your energy on making your life better in whatever fashion is 
open to you now. It is the only way in which you can bring the future closer 
faster. The art of living is largely the art of taking advantage of current 
conditions. It's fine to hope for a better future, but the fastest way to 
get there is not to pine away for what you haven't got, but rather to 
embrace fully the positive possibilities that pop up here and now. That's 
how your ancestors did it. It's how the pioneers did it. It's how da Vinci 
and millions of others did it. Don't waste your present life in sad 
daydreams of missed tomorrows. Concentrate on maximizing your present 
happiness and success. By doing so, you'll find that the future will take 
care of itself.


_________________________________________________________________
Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=15613