<i>Ars Longa</i> : A New Column Featuring the Humanities and Aging

We are pleased to announce a new section in the journal, "Ars Longa: Humanities and Aging." We welcome your submissions, which should follow the guidance provided on the Journal's Information for Authors page (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal/15325415/homepage/forauthors.html). "Ars longa, vita brevis" is the Latin translation of an aphorism, originally from Greek, comprising the first two lines of a maxim by the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates. The quote reverses the order of the original, stressing the long-lasting impact of art (meaning in this context "craft" or "practice") over the brevity of life1 (Figure 1).The idea for this section arose when exploring future directions for the Journal at an editorial leadership retreat. One of us (a.m.c.), who already oversees the "Old Lives Tales" section of the Journal, will serve as the Associate Editor for this section. He will be assisted by Dr Paul Rousseau, a member of our Editorial Board, as well as our Deputy Editors in this new endeavor. We need doctors right now. My God, we need doctors right now: to evaluate the coronavirus's assault, assess the body's response and figure out where, in that potentially deadly tumble of events, there's a chance to intervene. We need research scientists. It falls to them to map every last wrinkle of this invader and find its Achille's heel. But we also need Achilles. We need Homer. We need writers, philosophers, historians… They'll be the ones to chart the social, cultural and political challenges of this pandemic… they're beyond essential. The logic of Bruni's cri de coeur notwithstanding, getting this balance right is hardly a new challenge. For example, back in the late 1950s, the renowned British novelist and chemist C.P. Snow took his colleagues to task for putting too much emphasis on the Humanities.3 He criticized academic contemporaries in the "softer" sciences for not understanding basic physics. But today, Bruni and others feel that the pendulum may have swung too far back in the direction of the "hard" sciences. Justifiably, publications such as JAGS see as their primary mandate the elucidation of the science of aging and, via this exploration, seeking how best to care for the older individual and deal with a rapidly "maturing" population. Thus, we look to the basic sciences, to epidemiology, to clinical trials, and the like to find our answers. And many times, we do indeed discover them. But some questions cannot be approached using these methods alone. For example, what comprises a "good" death? Is it ageism to force older persons to stay "locked down" during the COVID-19 pandemic, causing them suffering from isolation and attendant loneliness in order to safeguard the stock of ICU beds? What about the ethics, costs, benefits, and utility of antiaging medicine and its close cousin "life extension"? Although "science" in the usual sense of the word can help inform the debate, it is the study of history, sociology, politics, literature, judgment, and—above all—values that will help us to arrive at the most humane decisions. (Interesting how the roots of both "humanities" and "humane" are the same.) Despite the hope that a study of the humanities will make us better, more well-rounded clinicians, one must never forget that doctors and organized medicine have all too frequently been involved in terrible human rights abuses.4 And many of these physicians were well educated, "cultured", and—in their time—highly respected members of society. Returning again to Greek mythology, it is the humanities, not the "harder" sciences, that can help us navigate between the Scylla of beneficence and the Charybdis of non-maleficence. The new section is meant to showcase various cultural and artistic approaches to aging and the care of older people. We welcome historical, anthropological, and sociological essays; nonmedical book and movie reviews; short stories; poems; original artwork; and photos (some of which may be used on the cover of the journal). Figure 1 is a good example of the type of moving images we seek, as are the evocative mirror images of aging and youth in Tom Hussey's Reflections collection.5 The fundamental criteria for acceptance in this new section will be the quality of the writing or images and their relevance to aging and the practice of geriatric medicine. Above all, the most important gauge for acceptance will be whether the material makes us think differently about aging and geriatrics. We welcome and look forward to your submissions!

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