Cheating Death

The dubious premise of this futuristic exercise is that baby boomers will achieve life spans of 110 to 120 years, and advances in aging research will ""very likely"" push death back to age 150 or 200. With dizzying speculation, the authors gauge the impact of life extension on Social Security, pension plans, work, the environment, medicine, hospices and home care for the elderly. Embedded in this crystal-ball gazing is advice on how to plan for one's postponed or delayed retirement (e.g., develop alternative sources of income, keep learning new skills, retire in stages). Nearly half the book consists of prognosticative lists of 124 trends in the coming ""postmortal"" world of artificial blood, plastic modular housing and memory-enhancing drugs--a world where a fully funded U.N. will function effectively, while the industrialized nations distribute huge sums to jump-start the economies of poorer countries. Cetron, founder of Forecasting International, and Davies, former senior editor at Omni, whose previous collaborations include Probable Tomorrows, mine the techno-apocalyptic idiom of John Naisbitt or Alvin Toffler, but without the spirited vigor. (Feb.)