Aleksandar BogojevićScientific Computing Laboratory Institute of Physics, Belgrade

http://scl.phy.bg.ac.yu/

Café ScientifiqueBritish Council, BelgradeFebruary 12, 2007.

Economy of Immortality

Introduction

• Modern research is on the brink of understanding why we live as long as we do and of creating practical ways to substantially extend the human life span.

• The possibility of (repeated) life extension would represent a new and unique commodity that everyone must have.

• Abandoning the “mortality paradigm” would profoundly effect every aspect of economy and of society in general.

• We need to understand the consequences of these changes before they are upon us.

young adult old

young adult old

young adult

generation n

generation n + 1

generation n + 2

one generation is approximately 30 years

Modeling the flow of generations

m 2m 2m

k C

m

k m’

2 P = 2 α m

inheritance marriage investing in one’s children and old age benefits

Flow of money

Simplifying assumptions

• All people have the same lifespan.• Mates chosen with same economic standing.• Uniform values of economic growth , child

investment C, and pension coefficient α across the whole population.

• Equal partition of inheritance among siblings.

• Number of children k is chosen to be the maximal number that assures they have equal or better financial start-up than their parents.

Evolution of wealth and fertility

Fertility data shown is for France, but is typical for many other countries

Recursive life extension

life extension

You can come to the fountain of youth repeatedly, however, each time you have to pay the price for this unique commodity.

young adult old

Possible life spans

young adult old

young adult adult adult

adult

“natural” life span

one life extension

immortal

old

two life extensions

young adult adult adult

adult…

life extension

m 2m 2m

2 E

m

k C

( k + 2 ) m’

inheritance marriage investing in life extension andone’s children

New flow of money

life extension

Additional assumptions

• Uniform price of life extension E across the whole population.

• Life extension is a novel commodity: everyone who can pay for life extension does so.

• Parents “inherit” same amount of money in the next generation as do their children.

• Given the fact that life extension is purchased or not, the number of children k is determined as before.

life extension

Министарство наукеРепублика Србија European Commission

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Evolution of individual wealth

without tunneling with tunneling

life extension

Price of life extension

• The relevant parameter is E / C the ratio of the cost of life extension to per child investment.

• A society can can determine E / C in two ways: (1) minimize social pressure (segregation of mortals and immortals);(2) maximize profit (as with other commodities).

• Look at the compatibility of these two criteria.

Tunneling into immortality

A – UK, Sweden, Australia,…B – US, France, Italy, Canada, India,…C – Spain, Greece, Romania,…

life extension

Profit of pharmaceutical companies

life extension

Profit vs. price of life extension E (for C = 2)

t = 1

t = 2

t = 4

Conclusions

• Not surprisingly, introduction of recursive life extension will severely impact society. Contrary to naïve expectations, we find that these changes might not necessarily be bad.

• It becomes possible to have sustained economic growth in a society of stable size.

• Realistic values of growth lead to populations of stable size that do not segregate mortals and immortals and in which pharmaceutical companies can optimize profit of life extension just like any other commodity.

life extension

Future directions

• More complex models in which is not a given constant but is itself determined by the dynamics.

• Look at two or more segments of society having different values of child investment. Introduction of life extension brings even more drastic changes to heterogeneous societies.

• Similar kind of models could in principle be used to investigate cancer cells. Tunneling would now represents normal (mortal) cell becoming cancerous (immortal).

life extension