Nah. Lives really serve no purpose other than to inconvenience and punish you arbitrarily for having a difficult time on a specific part of a level. If I'm having trouble on a specific series of jumps in a level, what good is it to send me back to redo several levels that I didn't have trouble with after a completely arbitrary number of attempts?
Because 'finishing the game' was once meant to be a singular challenge in its own right. Not that this particular argument applies to NSMB where 1ups are more of a minor reward than any vital source of difficulty alleviation.