UNA SAGGEZZA NEGATA. LA CONDIZIONE DELL'ANZIANO NELLA SOCIETÀ POSTMODERNA
Denial of wisdom. The condition of elderly people in the post-modern society

Summary/Abstract: Senility has been considered synonymous with wisdom for a long time, but the condition of the elderly seems to be perceived otherwise in a liquid society. The causes of this change are due to the paradoxical situation in which the elderly live today. On the one hand, life expectancy has lengthened greatly in recent decades and the economic condition of pensioners has improved; on the other hand, the new diseases that affect the elderly have questioned the equation between senility and wisdom, while the costs of the pension system seem nowadays unsustainable even in advanced countries due to the economic crisis. The situation of the elderly becomes, then, a significant example of the existential condition typical of our time. A vision of life as a “project” generates suffering and frustration which are expressed in anxiety and depression, so widespread in our times, particularly among old people. Only the recovery of an authentic vision of wisdom and transcendence could help to overcome these social and cultural contradictions

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