All too often, when new technological advances make their way into the mainstream, they benefit young adults, who are generally their creators. Sometimes children are the beneficiaries but seldom are elders considered, which matters to me, an elder psychologist. There’s actually an evolutionary reason to explain that.
The ultimate goal of any species is to replicate itself and keep the species alive. So from an evolutionary perspective, adults of reproductive age and their offspring are valued most highly. There has never been an evolutionary role for the long-lived members of a species because they are beyond the reproductive stage of life. But most humans and some animals live well beyond childbearing.
Today, many adults in developed countries can expect at least seventy years and maybe even one hundred.
The Benefits of Senior Input
What is our role then? Certainly, we must provide some benefit to human evolution. And we do. As elders, we collect and transmit our species’ cultural rules and history. Since the beginning of recorded time, we've done this—consider shaman or priests’ stories passed on by word of mouth before written language.
Continue reading: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/enhance-your-vintage-years/202203/artificial-intelligence-can-learn-seniors
The ultimate goal of any species is to replicate itself and keep the species alive. So from an evolutionary perspective, adults of reproductive age and their offspring are valued most highly. There has never been an evolutionary role for the long-lived members of a species because they are beyond the reproductive stage of life. But most humans and some animals live well beyond childbearing.
Today, many adults in developed countries can expect at least seventy years and maybe even one hundred.
The Benefits of Senior Input
What is our role then? Certainly, we must provide some benefit to human evolution. And we do. As elders, we collect and transmit our species’ cultural rules and history. Since the beginning of recorded time, we've done this—consider shaman or priests’ stories passed on by word of mouth before written language.
Continue reading: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/enhance-your-vintage-years/202203/artificial-intelligence-can-learn-seniors
