The doctor said, “You have normal, age-related degeneration.” I said, “I do not believe that it is normal.” She replied, “People like you never do.”
Widely attributed to Thomas Edison (without good support) is the sentiment: “All I ask of my body is that it carry my brain around.” I repeated that to a friend and she cautioned me: “How long is it going to do that if you don’t exercise?” That was just before I joined the Texas State Guard which put my body in pretty good condition, granted that the standards were lower than for the federal army. Having aged out of the TXSG, I fell out of the daily push-ups and sit-ups, but my current job in parking enforcement at the University of Texas has me walking, and a couple of times a week, I get down on the ground and wrestle 10 kg of iron around a tire to disable a scofflaw. So, despite some serious problems, I am not too concerned about my body. Diet, exercise, and vitamins take care of that.
Over the last four years, I have had four neurological assessments. The doctors agree with each other, but I believe that they are all limited by their education and experience to accept their expectations for normal aging. Exercises for the mind are outside of their knowledge bases.
First, the mind is not synonymous with the brain or even with the nervous system of brain, spinal cord, and neurons. Back in the 20th century, I kept on my office wall a quote of my own devising:
At ArmadilloCon 46 I served on a panel to discuss the future of artificial intelligence in science fiction. After my prepared remarks, in the têt-a-têt with the other three panelists, I agreed with Stina Leicht that, historically, we model the human spirit (whatever that is) according to our technology of the moment, from “faculties” to “mechanisms” to “wiring” to a “computer” or “software.”* I said that it is limiting to believe that an electro-encephalogram (EEG) can make the pens of a machine move on a strip of paper but that we cannot communicate directly with another person. (The EEG is more delicate today than it was back in the 1960s but the fact remains.)
Keeping your spirit in good working order—another model of the moment—can be enhanced with new “book learning.” In 2021, I completed an online class in astrophysics. For other people, crosswords, Sudoku, etc. would also be new exercising.
I know that I am not alone in this.
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| Robert Leighton for The New Yorker. 25 June 2024. |
In the meantime, it takes a few seconds longer to cross the kitchen—a dozen times a day, every day… And I do not always remember why this chicken crossed this road. We say that time is money, but right now, I believe that I have more money than time. One fun fact is that some years ago, I looked up my life expectancy on a life insurance website. My expiration date is 18 June 2032. As I have been treated for multiple myeloma, my oncologist assures me that I could live to be 80 or 82. There are many levels of meaning in “No pain; no gain.” and “No praise; no blame.”
* Stina Leicht mentioned Edgar Allan Poe’s exposé of the mechanical “Turk” in “Maelzel’s Chess Player” (1836). See, also Programming and Metaprogramming in the Human Biocomputer by John C. Lilly (1968).
PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS
Aging in America: Alternatives to Government Policy
Disruptive Diagnostics and the Business of Science
