Well aren't we right back to where Qin Shi Huang was, only now we're injecting mercury even into the bodies of newborn babes.

I feel certain something like this happened to Atlantis, some bright idea that they would all live forever if they just ate a whole lot of gold or something, and they poisoned the entire population before anyone was the wiser.

Seems that there has always been and will always be some section of humanity that thinks it should and could live forever.
I wonder what sufficed as "proof" in the 17th century.

Interesting