When There Are No More Old People

When There Are No More Old People

“May you stay forever young” – Bob Dylan circa 1967

I have said it before, and I will say it once more; This is not a blessing.  It is not actually even inspirational.  If you kind of think about it … it’s more of a curse.  To stay forever-young means that nothing will change in your life.  Being young is wonderful, when it is wonderful.

When it’s not so wonderful, being young can be nearly horrific.  Mostly in that, if you accept the one then the notion that, “Only the good die young.”  Means that if you’re young and good, then you’re also doomed.  (I have written about this before.)  However, what I have not put forward is the concept that also arises from the juncture of both of these old accepted (mostly blindly accepted) sayings, is that if you manage to live past being young, then you’re apparently not worthy of Bob’s Blessing and you’re bad!

Not just a punch to the jaw, but a stick in the eye. 

Now, common thought is that people are living longer than ever before in history – as far as we know.  Which is kind of true.  In the wealthier and more developed countries, a lot of people are living longer.  Existing longer, anyways.  Let’s say, “not dying young”.  And this either means the world is filling up with not good people, or Bob’s Blessing is falling flat.

Whenever I bring this up, all my friends, local wits, (or a lot of them anyway) say things like, “He means young at heart”.  Yeah, “young at heart” and “youthful thinking”.  Not to be a cynic, but I say getting old is a hoot and, to me, a blessing.  Sure, stuff starts breaking down – like, well, my knees no longer allow me to play soccer … or use stairs, for that matter.  But, I have more patience allowing me to wait for the elevator.  (emoji smiley face). 

But let’s be honest, people are living longer than the days when disease and the feudal system, hardship and starvation, etc. were taking them out before they had the chance to get old.  You know, like dragons and falling off the edge of the world.   Now that we know better, nobody is falling off the edge of the world.  Which is a good thing.  However, did you know (Dear Reader) that in this country, big stores have had to widen their aisles because two Americans, in their current stature, cannot pass each other in the dimensions used for previous generations?

Yup.  That’s just one thing.  It would seem that with starvation, in this country, being a thing of the past, the actual food people are getting is not actually feeding anybody – in a healthy fashion, anyway.  Plus, it has been noted, that the determinable fertility rate of the current young has fallen so low that in reference to previous generations, they are all eunuchs.  The birth rate in the developed nations is plummeting.  Along with the options for opting out of having children is being employed by more and more young.

If the old are generous with their acquired knowledge (empirical wisdom), it can save the young from a lot of problems and mistakes.  Assuming the young would listen, which for millennia, they have not – in most cultures.  There are many existant conditions today, which have never existed before, however.  Sketchy knowledge, as in lots of bad science and poorly researched statistics, is spread instantly across the planet via (what else?) the internet.  And, a great deal of human effort goes into building even greater sketchy knowledge based on this (basically) really bad system. 

Talk about, “building your house on sand” (Bible reference).  I saw an article on Yahoo! News about how bananas give you belly fat!  A banana is fiber and water, with a few minerals and vitamins.  Mostly water, though.  How is water going to give you belly fat? I dunno.  If you look at the source of this kind of science data, almost always it turns out to be some wizardly funky miracle product company trying to convince you to buy their sh*t.  And, this wonder crap turns out to be 99% cornstarch (in lots of forms you won’t find on the periodic table) and 1% dextrose (derived from corn). 

All-in-all this means that the global population, at large, is not growing old.  They are staying forever young.  By this I mean, the young, of today are not getting bad knees and arthritis.  You can medicate away the arthritis and you can just replace knees – so even though they are getting weirdly obese, what used to break down is now just a matter changing the oil.  And, they are not gaining knowledge with experience. And, the knowledge they are holding on to is shaky knowledge, at best.  So they will have nothing in their life bank of empirical wisdom, of any real value, to share with those young to come.

Does this mean that the old of the future will slowly cease to exist?  Bodies will exist longer, being replaced by fewer and fewer new people and those that are left won’t have learned anything from that lengthened aging process.  What will happen then when there are no longer any old people?   

dalepeterson.us

Books on Kindle by Dale Clarence Peterson
Peterson ArtWorks on Etsy

Note: for the brave among my dear readers, I offer a new, separate but different blog:

Equations for the Joyous Mind

A study in a matter of theory and conjecture about human brain-mind development towards retaining ever increasing meta-cognitive development.  Based on Mathematics, and I refer to Base 3 Calculus. I wouldn’t expect a whole lot of people to give it a try.  But if you are in any manner open-minded and intellectually curious, the Math used is truly only a tool to condense the theory proposed. 

Just published  “Twelve Roses for Kathy – A journey on a motorcycle out of the darkness of bipolar disorder”

Secret Lives – We All Have Secret Lives

Secret Lives – We All Have Secret Lives

I didn’t see one of my very best friends for a couple of weeks.  Then she showed up at my local coffee shop and signaled that she’d been through another low bout and tried ending-it-all again.  We know what I mean.  Yess … the unmentionable “suicide”.  Ooh ooh – did he really just say (write) that?  Oh no!  Oh no!  Oh no!  Oh no! 

Well, he did.  Sure, it’s a horrible (taboo) topic.  But suicide is a part, a fact, of life.  I say that again – “suicide is a part of life.”  So is “addiction”.  Addiction is a part of everybody’s life.  Just open up, admit it.  Everybody is addicted to something, most people to several things.  Religion, religion is an addiction.  I know people who would crawl to church after a compound fracture on Sundays.   They would take Communion if it was served on a sh*t platter.  They would put their Prayer Rug, facing east, on a lava field, if that was where they were when the Mullah calls.  They would never pass through any door without tapping the Mezuzah. THAT is an addiction, no matter how you look at it.  But it is how they get through their day(s).

Of course, the biggies, after religion, are alcohol, tobacco, drugs and, I would add, firearms.  And ALL of them kill, eventually, in one way or another.  Now suicide kills and that’s that.  But many more people attempt suicide than we have any way of knowing.  Sure, there are a lot of statistics on this, but how many people are telling the truth?  Some comedian, or other person who people quote, once said, “90% of all people masturbate and the other 10% are liars.”  So, while that is kind of funny, how do we know if it is actually true? 

Part of life is knowing that life is not a ray, as defined by mathematics and physics.  It is not a straight line, starting at one point and continuing for infinity.  There is simply no way we can know that.  We do know that at some point we all did become aware and we know for sure, that at some point we, each one of us, will die.  Or, cease to be aware.  That’s really about ALL we can truly say we DO know.  As far as I am concerned, those are the only two facts that exist.  Everything else is malleable, even our understanding of gravity.  EVERYTHING. 

It is totally historically evident that as human knowledge grows, what we like to call facts freakin’ change.  Facts are rewritten ALL the time.  SO, while a successful suicide is tragic, humans do do it.  And, while for them it is the end of their lives, as soon as it occurs, it becomes part of the life of everyone who is related to, or ever even knew, them.  And, (again, the and) it becomes part of many Secret Lives.  For many of the survivors of suicide, both the attempter and many of those sharing that person’s life, the tragic and taboo nature of the act devolves into a secret.

If anyone ever openly admitted to attempting suicide, they would never be able to get a job – anywhere.  And, they would immediately be dropped from just about every social group they had been a part of.  And yet, being discriminated against for having a disability is against American Law.  And, a mental disability is included in this law.  In fact, it is not a requirement that any person has to disclose this information to anyone they do not want to disclose it to.  And, what does this mean?

I have a ton of experience in mental disabilities, no certified expertise, but a shipload of experience both with my own and the Mentally Disabled Community.  Within the secret lives of many, many of the mentally disabled, attempts at suicide are as common as orange juice at breakfast.  For most it really fits more into the genre of self-mutilation of some sort – like what is called cutting.  It’s just an attempt to stop the crazy in their brains for just a few minutes.  A little physical pain diverts that brain from the intense crazy for just as long as the physical pain lasts. It’s a stop for breath on a long uphill run.  That’s really about all it is.

So, again, what does it mean?  It means it goes into the secret vault.  “Don’t ask, don’t tell.”  Which is a concept that has also been debunked and ruled not only politically incorrect, but also illegal.  In other words, if anyone tells you they happen to be Gay, or whatever gender or sexual identity or practice they happen to identify with, you aren’t allowed to do anything about it.  That’s come out of the Supreme Court. 

Secret Lives, secret lives.  We ALL have them.  Or, at least 90% of us have them and the other 10% are liars.

 "Face the sun and you will not fear the shadows." - Ancient Aboriginal saying ...

Thank you Dear Reader and Joy be unto you.

dalepeterson.us

Books on Kindle by Dale Clarence Peterson
Peterson ArtWorks on Etsy

Note: for the brave among my dear readers, I offer a new, separate but different blog:

Equations for the Joyous Mind

A study in a matter of theory and conjecture about human brain-mind development towards retaining ever increasing meta-cognitive development.  Based on Mathematics, and I refer to Base 3 Calculus. I wouldn’t expect a whole lot of people to give it a try.  But if you are in any manner open-minded and intellectually curious, the Math used is truly only a tool to condense the theory proposed. 

Just published  “Twelve Roses for Kathy – A journey on a motorcycle out of the darkness of bipolar disorder”