A Rational Cosmology: The Distinction Between Age and Senescence

Essay XXIV

This is Essay XXIV of Mr. Stolyarov's series, "A Rational Cosmology," which seeks to present objective, absolute, rationally grounded views of terms such as universe, matter, volume, space, time, motion, sound, light, forces, fields, and even the higher-order concepts of life, consciousness, and volition. See the index of all the essays in "A Rational Cosmology" here.

The popular use of the words "old" and "age" may have, thus far, impeded some readers' understanding of the ideas in these essays. Thus, it is fitting to dispel certain undue equivocations employed in mainstream culture regarding these terms.

Let the reader recall that philosophy rightfully belongs to the realm of science, though it is a foundational rather than a specific-observational science. Thus, the terms employed within a philosophical treatise must each refer to one concept and one concept only, making distinctions between different cultural uses of the same word and correcting them by giving one of the uses a different name.

"Age" and "aging" are often used in the mainstream culture to refer to senescence, or the progressive decay of bodily mechanisms. The same words can also be used in the manner hitherto employed in these essays, to describe the measurement of the quality, "time," accumulated by an entity.

However, aging and senescence are in fact two distinct phenomena that happen to correlate in human beings, some of whose internal functions deteriorate over time. One of these is purely an issue of the accumulation of numerical age, the other, a deleterious alteration in some of the physical qualities of cells, organs, and tissues.

The mainstream culture has committed the error of considering the two phenomena one and the same, and becoming "old" has become synonymous with becoming feeble and incapacitated.