On the purpose of my research

As quals get closer (have them next month!) - meetings with my advisor, M, gets more frequent as we hash out the research presentation, experiments to do, papers to read, etc. Last Friday night was one of those discussions, an hour late in the night - where both of us exhausted at the end of another week, where the shared acknowledgement allowed us to drop our filters a bit.

As every conversation at one point inevitably turns to - we came back to the fundamental question - "Why and what are we doing here?" both in a philosophical and a realistic sense - what is the purpose of our research and where will it lead us?

On the surface, our 3D bioprinting of organs is to alleviate organ donor shortage, there are too many people on the organ donor list (and thats with preselection of individuals to be placed on the waiting list, current estimates that only 10% of all people who need organs get placed on the list!), and frankly not enough donors both alive and dead.

However, one thing that came up was - we are essentially targeting human immortality - can we replace our ailing bodies with new organs, can we extend the human lifespan?

M did mention that in reality, epigenetic programming enabled by CRISPR will be the next decade of the search for the Fountain of Youth. Epigenetic programming can be understood through this poker scenario : imagine being dealt a hand that is one 9, and one 11, and on the table are two 10's. If you had both 10s, you would have a winning hand. Now imagine you had a little magician next to you, and he manages to change both your cards to a 10. He can't be too obvious like changing a 1 to Jack, but he can make small changes such as raising or lowering a card value by a single value. Thats what epigenetic programming is : you just tweak your already dealt hand (body, organs, etc), with just enough enhancements to get you the winning scenario.

However, what happens if you get dealt a shit hand? Will epigenetic programming help? Not really. In that case, it is better to just ask the dealer for a replacement. But since we cannot ask our dealer (parents, or even God if you prefer!) for a better set of genetics, we must play the hand of God ourselves - we have to create organs from scratch.

But if we are cosplaying as God, and essentially giving a lengthened lifespan by creating and transplanting organs, which at one point will be ubiquitous and not just limited to the organ donor list - is it really worth living to 150 and beyond?

M and I both agreed that living that long is very unappealing, and immortality is just hell. We both discussed that the death is what drives us to seek out meaning in life, and without the ability to die, ironically life and living just becomes meaningless. But it did bring up a few questions - who would answer these tough questions about prolonging human existence, and who and what deserve it and who doesn't?

Kurt Vonnegut in 2 B R 0 2 B (To be or not to be) poses this question - how do we manage indefinite lifespans. The world in the book is based on population control - for someone to live (every new birth), someone has to die (voluntary assisted suicide). The voluntary assisted suicide may seem horrifying at first; but the reality is - we have no control of our birth circumstances, and in the absolute majority of cases, we have no control over our death circumstances.

M and I both agree that Vonnegut did get something right; death needs to be a human choice, more so than a circumstance but an expression of individual dogma of free will. I am aware that these are extremely tricky scenarios and philosophical landscapes - and the truth is we are getting to these scenarios faster than we can coalesce our beliefs as a society - and it would help to be prepared.

In light of this, I would like to change the famous John Locke quote "I think therefore I am." to : "I can die, therefore I am."