• qprimed@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    10
    arrow-down
    4
    ·
    1 year ago

    especially when it’s something that isn’t a vital life-saving treatment that people have no choice but to try

    last time I checked, life was terminal.

    • FaceDeer@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      I don’t see how that’s relevant. This is about a drug that simulates exercise. It’s a convenience drug. If you’re literally dying from lack of exercise, there are other less conveninet ways to do that already.

      • qprimed@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        the trend is toward life-extention beyond natural limits. this has massive social implications and I don’t see anything that promises real artificial longevity ever becoming affordable by us plebs.

        • FaceDeer@kbin.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          “Real” artificial longevity doesn’t exist yet. You’re jumping rather far ahead in that assumption.

          • qprimed@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            pehaps, but the trend is there and its accelerating. I suspect that in short order (timeline unknown) we will actually have a legitimately marketable “life extension” option at which point its only a matter of degrees. the extra x years that you and I might possibly afford will eventually pale in comparison to the extra y years for the truly wealthy - at that point, generational wealth and power take on a wholly new and rather frightening dimension.

            I admit… I may have a particularly bleak view of our possible futures, but an “undead” ruling class does not figure into any rosy endings that I can envision.

            • FaceDeer@kbin.social
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              I think my “and then a few years later in generic form for much, much less” prediction would still apply here. There’s always going to be demand for life-extension treatments at every wealth level, so any company that can figure out how to make it more cheaply than the others is going to have an additional market they can offer the treatment to that’s further down the pay scale from the others. A pharma company wouldn’t maximize profit by selling to only a handful of billionaires when they could also be selling to all the millionaires that are also out there.