Materialism and the Future of Aging in America

Abstract

In Growing Old in America, David Fischer argues that colonial America witnessed a sudden and revolutionary shift in social attitude from gerontophilia to gerontophobia. It is argued here that the shift can be explained as the necessary result of an emerging materialism which came to dominate mercantile America. It is shown how philosophical materialism requires an attitude of denigration toward aging and the elderly, and that the future of our collective attitude toward the elderly is wedded philosophically to the future success or failure of philosophical materialism. It is also suggested that the future of materialism in America looks dim and that there will emerge a strong philosophical base adequate for reforming ethical attitudes and engendering a much more favorable attitude toward the elderly in general. It is suggested that positive or negative attitudes toward aging and the elderly are rooted in unconscious commitments to non-materialistic (dualistic) or materialistic views on the nature of man. The two basically different views on the nature of man beget the two basically different views and attitudes toward aging and the elderly. Which attitude is right is a function of which philosophical view is correct and the paper closes with some evidence that materialism is on the wane.