Never Retire? "How many of us are planning now for our social activity accounts," Safire asks When 75-year-old columnist William Safire wrote his last copyrighted column for the New York Times in January 2005, he recalled the advice given to him years ago by two of his well-known associates: "Never retire. Your brain needs exercise or it will atrophy," Nobel Laureate James Watson told him two years ago. Watson was co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, so his advice carried some weight with Safire, who has dished out over 3,000 columns of advice during his career.. So did the counsel of  Bruce Barton, the legendary advertising pioneer.  About 50 years ago Barton, he recalled, said something like "when you're through changing, you're through." So, instead of retiring, Safire has moved from the New York Times, where he could probably remain forever, to the chairmanship of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives, which is dedicated to researching the mysteries of the brain and passing on its findings to the world in language that the rest of us can understand.  Safire, who described himself as a "language maven, talking head, novelist and twice-weekly vituperative right-wing scandalmonger" said the brain project had been running in the back of his mind for the last dozen years. "Dana philanthropy provides forums to debate neuroethics: Is it right to push beyond treatment for mental illness to enhance the normal brain? Should we level human height with growth hormones? Is cloning ever morally sound? Does a drug-induced sense of well-being undermine "real" happiness? Such food for thought is now becoming my meat," Safire wrote in his last NYT column. He added that "with cures for cancer, heart disease and stroke on the way, with genetic engineering, stem cell regeneration and organ transplants a certainty, the boomer generation will be averting illness, patching itself up and pushing well past the biblical limits of "threescore and ten."  But to what purpose? If the body sticks around while the brain wanders off, a longer lifetime becomes a burden on self and society. Extending the life of the body gains most meaning when we preserve the life of the mind." Safire said "the trick is to start early in our careers the stress-relieving avocation that we will need later as a mind-exercising final vocation. We can quit a job, but we quit fresh involvement at our mental peril." he added. "But how many of us are planning now for our social activity accounts," he asked Apparently he already had. The Dana Foundation maintains a wonderful website at http://www.dana.org.