"I'm going to assume I'm going to die on my 90th birthday," he says. "It would be unbelievably moving. It would be greater than any theater you've ever seen." If you knew you only had to do it for maybe an hour, that doesn't mean you wouldn't feel despair - just means you could set it aside to watch the sunset. That's part of what James and Quarona are exploring is like what about the months and the years of the year.
Suppose all of humanity was infected by a virus that left us all infertile--no one will come along after us. How would you react to such a world? Agnes Callard of the University of Chicago says she would be filled with despair. But why does this seem worse than our own inevitable deaths? Callard speaks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the meaning of life, and what exactly about the end of humanity is so demoralizing. The conversation concludes with a discussion of whether humanity is making progress.