ESD’s
Joe Coughlin keynotes
UCLA
Conference on Technology and Aging
May
13, 2008
Joseph
F. Coughlin, AgeLab
Director, keynoted the UCLA “Technology
and Aging Conference: Successful Aging
in a High-Tech World" May 9th,
at the Skirball Cultural Center in
Los Angeles. Sponsored by the UCLA
School of Medicine Center on Aging
the event explored cutting-edge innovations
in the medical, consumer and lifestyle
fields that help people live better
longer.
Speakers
included actor and author Kirk Douglas
and Dr. Bruce Dobkin, medical director
of the UCLA Neurologic Rehabilitation
and Research Unit discussing the effects
of stroke and rehabilitation options,
Intel’s Eric Dishman on product
development as well as industry leaders
from Microsoft, Accenture, Qualcomm,
Toyota and others.
Organized
by Dr. Gary Small, UCLA's Parlow-Solomon
Professor on Aging and Director of
the Center on Aging, the event featured
leading researchers from UCLA, Duke
University, and the Mayo Clinic. Presenters
discussed the operating room of the
future, mobility and connectivity,
and the future of healthcare as they
related to demographic transition.
In his
keynote, “Technology, Aging
and Inventing Longevity 3.0,”
Dr. Coughlin described his developing
ideas around a concept he has coined
“Longevity 3.0.” Building
upon the AgeLab’s multi-disciplinary
research and the contributions of
its home department, MIT’s Engineering
Systems Division, Coughlin argued
that future advances and innovations
in aging are fundamentally a systems
challenge. Where most improvements
in longevity over the last 300 years
can be traced to technology that has
improved the delivery of better nutrition,
sanitation, and healthcare, future
improvements in quality of life, in
developed and developing economies,
will require far more than technology.
According to Coughlin’s Longevity
3.0 thesis, the next societal challenge
is far more complex than extending
life – it is how to develop
and strategically align innovative
technology, entirely new social systems,
and institutions to support longevity
that demands lifelong independence,
wellness, mobility, education, productivity
and engagement.
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