Monthly Archives: November 2013

This flying magpielogo is used on all of Helena Frei's websites

that depends a good deal on where you want to get to

Tenniel illustration of Cheshire Cat from Alice Through the Looking Glass - flipped to face right.30,000 years or so ago the proportion of people who lived long enough to be grandparents skyrocketed – which may have been the driving force behind the explosion of new tool types and art forms that occurred at the same time, and may explain how modern humans outcompeted other hominids such as the Neanderthals.

Right now we’re experiencing just such another jump in life expectancy.

Judging from what happened from the last time humanity experienced such a jump, the life of our species may change radically. And this time we have the opportunity to direct that change.

So what are we going to do with it? Where do we want to get to?

(The title of this post is the Cheshire cat’s answer to Alice’s question)

This flying magpielogo is used on all of Helena Frei's websites

would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?

Tenniel illustration of Cheshire Cat from Alice Through the Looking GlassMost of the people who have reached the age of 65 are alive now. That was the text of the bank ad on the mall wall that accosted me when I came out of the subway. A startling statistic, but apparently true.

in 1881, when  Otto von Bismarck set the retirement age at 70, life expectancy in Europe and North America was in the low 60s – statistically few people were expected to survive to retire, even when retirement age was eventually lowered to 65.

Now it’s very different – in the western world life expectancy hovers around 80.

What to do with all those years?

(The title of this post is Alice’s question to the Cheshire cat in “Through the Looking Glass”)