Humans Could Live For 1000 Years

Maajid wrote to mention an article on the Chronicle of Higher Education site about a biogerontologist who thinks he can kill death. From the article: "The 42-year-old English biogerontologist has made his name by claiming that some people alive right now could live for 1,000 years or longer. Maybe much longer. Growing old is not, in his view, an inevitable consequence of the human condition; rather, it is the result of accumulated damage at the cellular and molecular levels that medical advances will soon be able to prevent -- or even reverse -- allowing people to go on living pretty much indefinitely. We'll still have to worry about angry bears and falling pianos, but aging, the biggest killer of all, will cease to be a threat. Death, as we know it, will die."

Comments

Dying of old age?

[jkauzlar]

This is great, but I've never known anybody who's died of 'old age,' but always from cancer, heart failure, complications of diabetes, etc.. Wouldn't you have to cure all of these things as well or are they mostly a result of an aged body? In this case, maybe this guy's discovery, if it's actually real (I give it a 0% chance) might slow down or stop the onset of these diseases.

Further more, would we all have to look like Yoda after awhile?

Re:Dying of old age?

[Omniscientist]

I always presumed that a lot of causes of death were a result of an aged body, among other things. As far as I know the most common types of death happen to folks who are usually older instead of younger folks, like heart disease. So I think having a young healthy body prevents a lot of diseases from occurring, but as far as I know cancer doesn't depend on your age at all. Judging from what I read from TFA, it appears that he has specific goals to prevent many kinds of diseases with his therapy, like Alzheimers.

As far as cancer goes...since cancer is caused by uncontrolled cell division (and the fact that these cells can invade other tissues) and in my understanding, pretty much sporadic or random if outside environmental issues (smoking, etc) are ignored, it seems like it is only a matter of time before someone gets cancer. If you could actually live to be 1000 until your body just gave out, the likelihood of having cancer in those years would have to be extremely high. However, it appears that curing cancer is one of Aubrey's goals...so that's not a problem either.

Interestingly enough, before he started working with biology, he was trained in computer science.

Re:Dying of old age?

[drgonzo59]

Well, cancer, heart failure, diabetes come with old age. There is no medical "old age" diagnosis. The claimed ability to reverse cell damage will also reverse cancer since it is technically a damaged cell with the celluar replication mechanism gone out of control.

That said, at the expense of burning my karma I will call "bullshit" on this story. Claims for aging cures are made every year by someone, and yet we still "kick the bucket" like everyone before us. Better hygiene and better drugs and procedures is what helps us live slighlty longer than our parents and grandparents, not some kind of magical cure-all aging panacea.

But of course the thought of death is a terrible thing so people buy into all these "finally we found cure for aging". It is like selling penis enhancement pills, it is just a clever play on people's insecurities and fears. If someone does want a good cure for aging, better try Alex Chiu's site . You can just buy yourself two nice little rings and of course live forever (...until you die of stupidity or cancer, of course).

Sure we will...

[Scrameustache]

And we'll be driving our flying cars all the while.

For me and mine

[Schezar]

I'm absolutely fascinated by the idea, but it raises several important questions...

Imagine a world where the vast majority of skilled people live effectively forever. What opportunity will there be for the young, if the elders have had a centuries-long head start?

How could we possibly provide the resources necessary to feed an effectively undying yet still growing population? Would famine become the determiner or longevity?

Can the human brain retain the sheer volume of information and experience achievable in a millenia of living? Would we forget the past, or become unable to learn the future?

Not all of the questions are negative, either. Would longer-lived decision makers take longer-term factors into account? Would humanity be more inclined to space travel if time were no longer the limiting factor?

Realistically, we do not have the capability as a civilization to cope with this sort of thing as we stand. Individuals could take advantage of it and live long, and believe me when I say that I'd be the first one in line, but to provide something of this magnitude to the masses would be suicidal.

Ideals aside, I would want this for myself, but not for my neighbors. Selfish, yes, but better some than all or none.

Of course, scientists have said as much before, and little has come of it, so it may be a moot point for centuries yet to come.

Re:For me and mine

[Frumious Wombat]

IMHO, the real problem is that our societies would stagnate. You may think that you're hip and forward thinking, just as I'm sure Francis Bacon did back in 1584 (though he probably was, "hippe and forwarde thinking"), but how will you be, comparitavely in 2385? Death doesn't just get the physically old out of the way, it also gets the old ideas. Sir Francis lived in a world of absolute monarchs where torturing and killing people over interpretation of the same scriptures was considered acceptable and desirable. Picture a world in which a man who amassed billions using 1970s technology in the 1990s, still had enough money to control computing in 2200. Picture Richard Nixon at 324, still with a secret plan to end the war on Proxima Centauri, the 600 year old Fuggers understanding money only in the sense of little disks of gold, or Benedict the 16th, worried in the 24th century that the church will have surrendered its soul if it accepts the social mores of 1974.

Personally, I'd be much happier if these people would work on a way for people to be healthy and capable (physically and mentally) up until 70 or 80, then still die. The 1000 year life span, besides being a nice round number, is about 10x our maximum current age. What's the point of outliving Methusaleh if the last several centuries are spent in a wheelchair (even if it is Luke Garner's flying one) ogling the cute, young, 300 year olds who sashay by and pat you on the head occasionally?

I cannot find the author, so insert someone suitably cynical, "all wish to live long, but none wishes to grow old". I think we should be working on improving the quality of our life, rather than extending it out of some fear of dying. Let's get cancer and heart-disease first, and deteriorating immune systems first, then worry about outliving Methuselah.

TV reference

[Vaevictis666]

We'll still have to worry about angry bears and falling pianos,

Hey, I can spot the 'Dead Like Me' reference in there :)

Re:Slashdot Could Give any Crazy Credit!

[shawb]

What you just did is nowhere near what this man has done. He identified the major physical reasons behind aging and is working on proposing and coordinating new ideas to fight the causes of aging.

Is he crazy? Probably. Is he wrong? Probably. At least he's got a goal and is formulating a plan to achieve it. If he is wrong, science will probably learn a lot about how the human body works, and other scientific achievements will be made in the process.

By the way... these treatments will only really be available to the extremely wealthy. Considering how difficult it is for many Americans to get basic health insurance as it is, and the fact that most medical treatments are financially out of reach for those who are not covered, this will probably only exaccerbate the situation unless some great social or technological discovery is made which allows anyone who desires it access to this longevity. Is this evil? Not really. Denying something to a priveleged few people simply because the masses (of which I consider myself to be a member) can not achieve it isn't right. Denying this longevity because it causes an undue burden on the rest of society, however, is not morally outrageous.

Kill me

[Piroca]

aging, the biggest killer of all, will cease to be a threat

I'm pretty sure it will be substituted by suicide.

Re:Slashdot Could Give any Crazy Credit!

[Baron_Yam]

I happen to believe de Grey is right - the human body is just a machine. It happens to be an incredibly complicated machine composed of many smaller machine (which, in turn, are supported by even more, even smaller machines) that we barely understand as yet, but overall the body is just a machine.

His major point (as I understand it) is that we don't necessarily have to know the WHYs of the body, as long as we know the WHATs and can correct them when they change. Watch what changes in the body over time (after full maturity) and then periodically undo those changes when they've gone too far. This is also the point on which most biologists argue with him - they want the WHY before they fiddle with the WHAT.

The only thing I'm still very wary of is perfoming such procedures, should they ever be developed) on the brain. I don't want to be the first.

Re:Got more to worry about than disease, Old Age

[N3Bruce]

Though the parent was modded funny, there is a lot of truth in that sage comment. At present time, the average person in the first world has about an annual lifetime risk of dying due to accidental trauma in the range from 1 in 500 to about 1 in 1000. People who work in certain professions/occupations have a higher risk as well. Infantrymen in Iraq might have an annual risk of violent death of about 1 percent, but people who work as commercial fishermen, in construction trades, drive trucks, or work as policemen or firemen also face above average risks as well.

Another factor not to be discounted lightly is the risk of disabling injuries. I saw few if any grey heads working on the roof of my recently constructed house in the crew of about 8 or 9 guys out there. People tend to abandon risky occupations as they get older if they can, either they suffer physically disabling injuries themselves, or see enough of their friends get hurt that they decide to find a safer way to make a living. Even as lifespans have increased by the relatively modest amounts over the last 50 years or so, one of the biggest problems will be finding help to put new roofs on their houses, take down overgrown trees, etc.

If life spans increase 10 fold, the amount of dangerous work will not go down that much, but the pool of people willing to do that kind of work will diminish to nearly the vanishing point. If people live to be 1,000, occupations such as truck drivers, roofers, cops, and many of the construction trades will either be a death sentence, or something that most people will be unable to do for more than a few decades before being disabled or forced to seek safer employment. People may become too risk-averse for society to function.

Put up and show it is "bullshit"?

[BerntB]

I will call "bullshit" on this story.

Put up, then.

If it is garbage (and YOU aren't full of it yourself!) what are the errors in the arguments??

Just that something hasn't been done is not a serious answer; there has been literally hundreds of "firsts" the last 150 years.

Some of the proposed solutions aren't exactly trivial -- e.g. "simply" moving genes from the mitochondria and then move back finished proteins would be a large change! (Sure, some proteins are made in the cell kernel and moved to the mitochondrias already, but to get the right levels of manufacturing, etc, etc. Not easy.)

To do that modification in living bodies seem ... well, a factor of ten harder still!

But is should be doable theoretically. And probably practically. I haven't read that much biochemistry, but I can't say that any of the points strike me as theoretically impossible.

So what is wrong?? Is the list of needed fixes incomplete?

A serious answer would be appreciated. I'm curious and you seem to be certain in your opinion. You should know, yes?

Uhm, isn't that already discussed?

[BerntB]

But who's to say that there are not even more aging effects that will only become apparent after 150 or 200 years?

That is quite likely.

The argument is that the known list of problems can be solved in a few decades. The next bunch of problems will be solved faster, when there is functioning gene therapy on living humans(!). (-: There might be continous attrition amongst the oldest people living... :-)

I haven't read too carefully (one of the previous times it was posted), but I think that is the "official" argument. Read the web site, most obvious counter arguments are answered.

you don't grow new [Neurons]

Sigh. The brain do grew new ones. Quite old knowledge. If the brains stop doing them, you get a depression. Exercise increases the rate. Google, or something.

The biochemists I studied with had lives, so I guess they have no /. where we can ask? :-)

If ageing is really to be solved, I think it will be done from the inside, by understanding and altering the functions of harmful genes. That's a long ways in the future, though.

See previous argument -- new, unknown effects will be found after a while and cured faster than the previous ones. (Sure, a generation or two might die before something new thing is cured.)

The whole thing seems to hang on (a) if the list of magical solutions are possible and (b) if there are unknown aging changes that can't be fixed.