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EXCERPT We are entering the most age-rich period in human history, and the graying of humankind offers us opportunities to adopt alternative perspectives and redefine issues and questions related to aging and longevity. William H. Thomas, a well-known geriatrician, questions current societal views of aging and the aged in his 2004 book, What Are Old People For? How Elders Will Save the World. Drawing on popular culture, history, science, and literature to explore what aging really is, Thomas presents elderhood as a developmental stage of life that is an essential part of a healthy society and is as important in its own way as childhood and active adulthood.
Barba et al. (Tue,) studied this question.