The Sunday Read: ‘How Long Can We Live?’

Jeanne Calment lived her entire life in the South of France. She filled her days with leisurely pursuits, enjoying a glass of port, a cigarette and some chocolate nearly every day. In 1997, Ms. Calment died. She was 122.

With medical and social advances mitigating diseases of old age and prolonging life, the number of exceptionally long-living people is increasing sharply. But no one is known to have matched, let alone surpassed, Ms. Calment’s record.

Longevity scientists hold a wide range of nuanced perspectives on the future of humanity. Some consider life span to be like a candle wick, burning for a limited time. While others view it as a supremely, maybe even infinitely elastic band.

As the eminent physicist Richard Feynman put it in a 1964 lecture, “There is nothing in biology yet found that indicates the inevitability of death.”

Additional production for The Sunday Read was contributed by Emma Kehlbeck, Parin Behrooz, Carson Leigh Brown, Anna Diamond, Elena Hecht, Desiree Ibekwe, Tanya Perez, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Margaret Willison and Kate Winslett. Special thanks to Mike Benoist, Sam Dolnick, Laura Kim, Julia Simon, Lisa Tobin, Blake Wilson and Ryan Wegner.