The Philosophy of Viagra: Bioethical Responses to the Viagrification of the Modern World is a collection of philosphical essays about aging desire. Carlin Romano contemplates some of the questions raised by the book:
What is “natural” in sexual life? If, before the discovery of Viagra, it was “nature’s course to diminish sexual power in men once their peak reproductive fitness had passed”—as Sylvanus Stall wrote in a 1901 book—is it “unnatural” to change that aspect of senior-citizen life through drugs? Or is drug-assisted virility simply better living through chemistry—like raising life expectancies from 45 to 75? Is the appropriate meaning of “natural” not what existed in the past, but anything that can be achieved through physical means at any time?
The Dish 