Is the wish to extend the human lifespan got a long tradition in many cultures?

Although we agree that being alive is naturally valuable, we think that there is a fundamental difference between the desirability of being alive within the limits of the average life expectancy and the desirability of being alive beyond those limits. In the first case, we deal with the possession and continuation of something we have a right to maintain. In the second case, we are dealing with a kind of enhancement to which the concept of a “right to” is ill-suited, and that raises a series of philosophical and ethical questions.