Doing Justice to Life

The book opens with a memorable comparison. A climber who has spent forty days, thousands of dollars and years of preparation on Everest gets a photo on the summit, face unrecognisable in the fog, and comes back saying, «This was a mental and emotional journey, not a physical one — I'm not the same person.» Another is dropped near the top by helicopter, takes a glossy photo and flies off to applause. Baltaş asks: do these two photos record the same experience? The answer: diplomas are like summit photos — success in life is determined by the journey, not the picture.

The second half of the introduction is a sharp critique of Turkish society. The author argues that after the 1980s the country «Americanised», moving from accumulating virtue to accumulating money, replacing responsibility with «rights» and valuing appearing over being. Lines like «a life built on pleasure has no story» and Rumi's «the thorns in your foot may herald the rose you seek» are powerful. But the remarks on paid exemption from military service, COVID rules and politicians read like a personal column rather than science, and not every reader will agree.

The «Long Life» part rests on Lewis Terman's study. The 1,528 Californian children with IQs above 135 whom Terman selected in 1921 were followed until death; family relationships, friends, even the number of books at home were recorded. Decades after Terman died, Howard Friedman and Leslie Martin found this «treasure» in a Stanford basement, obtained the participants' causes of death and traced the «pathways» to long life. Baltaş tells the story engagingly and is honest about its limits: participants were mostly white, middle-class, gifted Americans.

The most interesting section is a list of «unconfirmed assumptions»: the good die young, married people live longer, don't worry so much, religious people live longer, you need serious exercise, retire as early as possible, start your child at school early. According to the research, long-lived people did not owe their health to broccoli, frequent check-ups, vitamins or the gym. Being active in daily life, persistence, hard work, an engaging job and strong social ties mattered more. Baltaş separates correlation from causation with a rain-and-umbrella example.

Baltaş is cautious with medical advice, showing how preventive aspirin use was wrongly generalised and how vitamins that lower homocysteine did not cut heart-attack risk as expected, and warns against self-medication. On stress the author cites an earlier book of their own, comparing six traits of stress-resilient people — active engagement, enjoying change, hope for the future and so on — with Terman's longevity traits. There is a touch of self-promotion here, but the comparison is interesting.

The format is reader-friendly: each chapter ends with a list of key takeaways, followed by short scales such as a six-item «life satisfaction» test. The language is plain and technical terms are explained. The weakness is that the book leans heavily on summarising a few sources, especially Friedman and Martin's «The Longevity Project»; readers of the original will find little new.

• Memorable opening stories such as the Everest metaphor
• Chapter summaries and self-assessment scales
• A clear style that tests health myths against evidence