1.      Is it a good idea to continue to expand the average life span? Why or why not?

Expanding the average life span sounds like a Brave New World or a Faustian Bargain.  We can’t we in our consuming, throw-away society be content with improving the quality of what we already have?  For example, addressing the obesity epidemic in affluent societies, without drastic and costly fixes after the fact, or simply charging higher health insurance rates  -- or both.

 2.      These medical procedures are likely to be very costly. Who should decide who gets them and who does not? Should they be available only to those who can afford them? Explain your answer.

 Why does everything in health care have to have a price tag, whether it’s medical procedures, the cost of prescriptions and research, or high-tech equipment?  We need to replace price with value, cost-benefit with prevention and early intervention, advantage with public health, safety, and well-being.  I think “Who should decide” is idolatry, the Romans in the coliseum circus maximus deciding thumbs up or thumbs down, or perhaps just plain arrogance.  As to availability, it begs the same question as “Who.”

 3.      What effect might longer life spans have on such systems as Social Security, the job market, healthcare, prisons, schools, the leisure industry, food-growing operations, organ procurement practices, church ministries, etc.? What effect might they have on population issues?

 I think the effect of longer life spans on human systems would be to compound the dilemma, begging the question, getting what you wish for, the down-side.

 4.      What are the religious implications of living with vigor longer? How might it change our thinking about the soul?

 The biblical examples of living to extreme old age found in the Old Testament were quite rare and centered on male leaders.  It was about their vision, heart and soul, not the length of their hair or the strength of their muscles.   Perhaps we should ask, “What is a healthy soul?”  The answer should be framed not from a human perspective of ad-vantage but from God’s vantage of grace and mercy.

 5.      How might the nonphysical aspect of human life -- social life, spiritual life, mental life and so on -- be affected by longer life spans?

 We’re putting the cart before the horse.  The four phases of our being – physical, emotional, mental, spiritual; doing feeling, thinking, being; the body, heart, mind, soul – come first.  Whatever else happens in the Ages of Man is a sacred gift not a human gimmick.