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Sci-Fi Biotech Science

Humans Could Live For 1000 Years 156

Posted by Zonk from the i'll-sign-up-for-that dept.
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."
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Humans Could Live For 1000 Years More

Humans Could Live For 1000 Years

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  • Dying of old age? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jkauzlar ( 596349 ) * on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @04:35PM (#13875003) Homepage
    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? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by FidelCatsro ( 861135 ) * <fidelcatsro&gmail,com> on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @04:54PM (#13875226) Journal
      A human right now could potentially live to about 130 , we likely will succumb to another condition about 50 years before that though.

      The chance of contracting many of these conditions is greatly increased with age , if we can limit the decay associated with that then chances of contracting these conditions is also limited .
      Though the 1000 year target is not taking into account environmental damage , it seems reasonable figure for perfect conditions .
        limiting the cellular ageing will also help us to look a lot more youthful for a great deal longer

    • Re:Dying of old age? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Omniscientist ( 806841 ) <matt@ba d e cho.com> on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @05:10PM (#13875421) Homepage
      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. [wikipedia.org]


      • 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.
        Yah, but we all have cancer cells in our body all the time. Our immune system is able to take care of them though before they can overwhelm it. What if a lot of cancer were caused by the immu
      • As with most diseases, Cancer is more frequent the older you are, but still occurs in young people.

        So not prevents... reduces the risk of, though.

      • Re:Dying of old age? (Score:3, Interesting)

        by tchdab1 ( 164848 )
        Many types of cancer arise from the results of cumulative errors introducd in the duplication of your DNA prior to cell division.
        When a cell of yours duplicates the 6 trillion base pairs in your DNA, after the duplication errors result in mistakes (average one in 10,000) and the correction mechanisms clean up as many as they can, there is an average of 1 mistake per cell per dupication. 95% of your DNA is (near as we can tell so far) non-coding; it is not used to build proteins. So

    • Re:Dying of old age? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by drgonzo59 ( 747139 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @05:26PM (#13875611)
      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 [insolitology.com]. You can just buy yourself two nice little rings and of course live forever (...until you die of stupidity or cancer, of course).

      • Put up and show it is "bullshit"? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by BerntB ( 584621 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @07:09PM (#13876559)
        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?

        • Re:Put up and show it is "bullshit"? (Score:5, Interesting)

          by beeplet ( 735701 ) <beeplet@gmail.com> on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @08:16PM (#13877009) Journal
          So what is wrong?? Is the list of needed fixes incomplete?

          My guess is yes, it is. One theory of aging is that we are carrying around many genes which are harmful, but have a serious effect later in life. Such genes were never selected against when expected lifetimes were 35 years or less. Now that we have cured many things that prevented people from getting to 30 or 40, we are seeing new problems that prevent people from getting to 100 or 150. But who's to say that there are not even more aging effects that will only become apparent after 150 or 200 years? It seems shortsighted to assume that the aging processes that are a problem now are the only things we need to overcome in order to live thousands of years.

          I also think that a lot of the items on his list amount to replacement of body parts, whether whole organs or DNA. That isn't really reversing aging... That's just repair work which is likely to be needed more and more frequently as the person gets older. It also doesn't address the non-replaceable parts like the brain. Neurons continually die off during a person's adult life, and you don't grow new ones... that's going to be significant after a few hundred years.

          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.

          • 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 "of

            • 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.

              I did: see No evidence of new neurons in adult primate neocortex [unisci.com], among others. The general consensus seems to be that some areas of the brain have some capability to generate new neurons, but there's no evidence that it can happen in the neocortex, which is a pretty critical part... Though if you can point me to more recent research that contradicts t
              • Seems correct, at least for mammal neocortex. The research from '99 seems to have been withdrawn.

                But [eurekalert.org] the jury is still out, anyway. :-)

                Neurogenesis seems to be well documented for songbird neocortex, though.

                Since the argument we're discussing assumes working genetic engineering in the body, it seems like a smaller problem to extend the functioning from the speech center of birds to mammal brains... :-)

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

            And I'm sure they'll bitch about those problems and how medicine's too expensive when those problems emerge.

            You want medicine as cheap as it used to be? Stop going to the doctor after age 70, that'll fix that problem right up. I swear I read just a couple days ago about some 90 year old woman getting treated for breast cancer.. WHY?!?! We all gotta die sometime, just let it go or quit bitching a
          • Such genes were never selected against when expected lifetimes were 35 years or less.

            Seeing as how I'm posting this 7 days afterwards, I'm not expecting a lot of eyeballs on this comment, but I'll make it anyways...

            Another thing that keeps those genes from being selected against is that most of the gene selection occurs during breeding age, based primarily on the characteristics of a person at that age. There aren't a lot of people who, in choosing a mate, use the health status of their grandparents as

        • Let's see, a couple of things:

          -> The author claims to be able to fix aging, but doesn't go into much detail how to do it. Theoretically it might be possible to to create wormholes and perhaps do time travel, that doesn't mean that it will ever work. One could probably move genes back into mitochondria, but will that mean living forever? Which brings me to the next point.

          -> It is implied in the article that aging = cell damage and toxicity. The reader is expected to assume that as truth just like t

          • The author claims to be able to fix aging, but doesn't go into much detail how to do it.

            Check the web site for details. He goes over what he claims are the damaging changes found -- and argues that there probably aren't that many more of those on the cell level, since they should be known by now.

            I have done a bit of biochem courses for fun and can't see any obvious errors in the description.

            There might be changes in the brain coming from age, of course. (The obvious answer would probably be that i

  • only one problem (Score:2, Interesting)

    by iLogiK ( 878892 )
    and it's an issue evan today with our current lifespan: over population...
    ofcourse, a lifespan of 1000 years can open doors to interstellar voyages...but still
    • I just had a vasectomy, sign me up!
    • Society's already giving an interesting change that should ease overpopulation in developed countries: More and more people, in the US, in Europe, moreso in Japan, aren't having children. There have been projections that these countries could actually see a population decline in the next 50-100 years.

      As for developing countries, where overpopulation is a problem and will probably become worse in the next 50-100 years, do you really think they'll live for 1000 years, that this technology will be accessible t

  • Great. (Score:2, Informative)

    by Morgalyn ( 605015 )
    Let the overpopulation commence!

    Seriously, human society will never be able to tolerate considerable anti-aging treatments until the general populace is accepting of birth control measures.

  • How many times... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Chuckstar ( 799005 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @04:39PM (#13875040)
    How many times do you think you'd be able to say "B.S." in 1000 years.

  • Sure we will... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Scrameustache ( 459504 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @04:39PM (#13875044) Homepage Journal


    And we'll be driving our flying cars all the while.
  • In 500 years, you've got a 100% chance of being struck by a bus.
    • In 500 years, you've got a 100% chance of being struck by a bus.

      Ah, you too have foreseen the murderous roboBus revolt of 2505!
      The horror...
    • 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.

    • exactly so (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Quadraginta ( 902985 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @07:06PM (#13876538)

      OK, hot from the CDC we learn the following average death rates (in persons per 100,000 population per year) from causes that have nothing to do with old age:

      • accidents: 30.4
      • infectious disease: 28.0
      • murder: 8.5

      Grand total, 66.9 per 100,000 per year. From which it follows that the average person has a 0.0669% chance of dying each year from some reason other than old age. The rough estimate of your life expectancy is then reasonably close to the inverse of this number, i.e. 1500 years.

      Nice enough, but hardly forever. More troubling, however, is that these rates are for a population that is quite young. Suppose instead we use the results for old people, 85 and over, who are unfortunately far more susceptible to accidents and disease:

      • accidents: 276.2
      • infectious disease: 1183.6
      • murder: 3.

      Grand total of 1462.8, which means your average 85-year-old has a 1.46% chance of dying each year from causes unrelated to chronic "old-age" diseases like heart attacks, strokes, and cancer. The inverse of this is 68 years, for a grand total lifespan of 153 years. Lots shorter. And wet get intermediate results if we use the results for other older age groups, but not the oldest.

      Which is to say, you can only get a 1000-year lifespan if you not only defeat the usual diseases of old age (cancer, atherosclerosis, etc.) but also stop the clock on practically every consequence of aging from fading vision to slowing reflexes to slower healing to more brittle bones. A very tall order indeed.

  • For me and mine (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Schezar ( 249629 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @04:43PM (#13875090) Homepage Journal
    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.

    • If it works, guess who lives forever? Hint: not you.

    • Re:For me and mine (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It seemed to work for the elves.
    • Realistically, we do not have the capability as a civilization to cope with this sort of thing as we stand

      Do not worry. The patent secured monopoly granted to the two or three companies who are actualy allowed to sell this product will ensure that this anti-ageing treatment will be far out of reach for all the commoners with less than a few billion dollars to spare.
      On the upside, our grand-grand-grandchildren will still know what we were talking about when they unearth our slashdot postings wherein we t

    • Re:For me and mine (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Frumious Wombat ( 845680 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @06:31PM (#13876268)
      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.
      • Your primary insight is, perhaps inevitably and certainly excusably, tainted with the perspective of the "western" world. A more stable---some would say stagnant---culture would absorb a change of this nature better.

        Even in such a culture, overcrowding would be a serious problem; although I'm sure environmental stresses would serve to alter the state of our society until we think that breeding before one is one or two hundred years old is unseemly.

        The research the article describes also indicates that cell

    • Re:For me and mine (Score:3, Interesting)

      by kenthorvath ( 225950 )

      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?

      Speaking from an economics standpoint, there will always be people who need things, they are called consumers. In order for consumers to acquire the things that they need, they must produce things that others need, etc... Perhaps one day there will be a small subset of humanity that can produce enough goods and services to s

    • 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?

      This is like saying there's no opportunity for a 5 year old because a 50 year old has a huge head start on experience. The answer, if we're all living to be 1000 years old, is that we'll be going to school for 120 years instead of 12 years. When you've got such an enormous lifespan, what's the rush to enter the workforce at ag

    • Our Society could evolve to deal with these problems - if it can survive the creation of these problems.

      What happens when we discover the means to 120 years old when the Baby Boomers are 90? Who's paying for another 30 years of retirement for them? They didn't save enough. There aren't enough of us to pay their Social Security. Are we going to deny them the 30-year treatment? Are we going to take our parents into our homes like the Chinese do?

      One solution is to let them die, through not paying for trea
    • Science fiction authors such as Alistair Reynolds speculate that this problem will be solved by interstellar space travel. Longer-lived people can travel the necessary distances and establish new societies. When you come right down to it, it's an overcrowding problem.

      I'd love to see both longer lifespans and interplanetary space travel in my lifetime. Whether I will depends on, I suppose, how long I manage to live.

  • Great.. (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Sunrun ( 553558 )
    Just what we need: a way to slow down our own evolution.

    One of the nicest things about life is that it doesn't go on forever.

    This is to say nothing of the sociopolitical consequences, such as state-mandated birth control, and their sociopolitical consequences.

    • Bah, we control our own evolution now. Our technology has taken the place of biological evolution. At least that's what whacko transhumanists would say. Dunno how much of that I buy, but there's some interesting ideas out there.
    • One of the nicest things about life is that it doesn't go on forever.

      If Quantum Immortality [wikipedia.org] is true, then you may not have a choice in the matter. It could be quite possible that it maybe impossible for you to die. Even if you do loose your memories and your physicial bodies is destroyed, chances are you will spontaneously exist somewhere else in this universe or another.

      Try to think of it like this. You obviously are observing yourself currently existing (while reading this) so therefore your conciousness
      • I call BS on quantum immortality. I don't see why one should rule out the scenario that due to your (or other) actions, you end up dead or nonexistent in all possible universes.

        As for eternal life. Eternity is a very long time. We are all flawed. Flawed creatures living for eternity could be a definition of "Hell".

        • I don't see why one should rule out the scenario that due to your (or other) actions, you end up dead or nonexistent in all possible universes.

          Because you cannot nonexist unless you currently do not exist. Since you exist now, you will exist forever as something because you can't observe yourself not existing and it could be infinite time between you now and the next time of you being consciously being able to observe your own existence.

          Can you conceptualize infinite time? No... Well neither can I. So that
      • I wrote my thoughts [zone-mr.net] on the subject of life after death a while back.

        Basically, you are saying that your consciousness might not be linked to the physical body and brain. However, we know that if the human brain is damaged, it irrecovably alters a persons character. If you die in this world, and your consciousness suddenly attached itself to another body/brain in another world/universe, you wouldn't be 'you' anymore. You wouldn't have any of the experience, memories, brain structure, etc which shaped your in

  • TV reference (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Vaevictis666 ( 680137 )
    We'll still have to worry about angry bears and falling pianos,

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

  • Hurrah (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by metamatic ( 202216 )
    Death is dead, long live death!

    Imagine a 900 year old Strom Thurmond staring cabbage-like into space as our artificially stupid computerized Republican overlords tell him how to vote.
  • Or would you have to give in and die at 1000?
  • Death, as we know it, will die.

    First a "Dead Like Me" reference, then a Cthulhu reference. "That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die."

    Well, since death will die, I for one, welcome our OLD, many-angled, overlords.

  • Kill me (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Piroca ( 900659 )


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

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

  • I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even five hundred would be pretty nice.

  • cancer and the effect on the human mind? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by egomaniac ( 105476 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @05:38PM (#13875755) Homepage
    I accept that we could, in theory, mitigate the cellular damage that leads to aging, and humans could live much longer than they do now. There are, however, two BIG problems, in addition to the overcrowding that everyone else has mentioned.

    First is cancer. Cancer is caused by DNA damage which causes cells to begin dividing uncontrollably. Humans, over our mere 100 year lifespan, face a very high risk of dying from cancer. Over a thousand years, it becomes a virtual certainty that at least a handful of your cells would have a very harmful mutation. Unless we also have the technology to periodically "refresh" all the DNA in your body (hint: unlikely), the simple fact is that after a thousand years you would have developed every kind of cancer known to man. I don't believe any medical technology could keep one of us alive that long -- if and when humans manage to extend our lifespans to the thousand year range, we won't be doing it in our current bodies.

    Second is psychology. The human mind did not evolve to last a thousand years, and asking it to operate so far outside of its design parameters is bound to have some surprising (and likely unpleasant) effects. In fact, I am very skeptical that anyone could even hold on to sanity for that length of time. We just aren't built for that kind of time scale. We obviously don't know the effects of a truly long life on the human mind, but I just can't imagine an ordinary human lasting for a thousand years without becoming seriously disturbed.
    • I agree with your first point. your second one doesn't seem right, though.

      design parameters? if we were designed along any particular parameteres (I'm not touching that arguement), we certainly can all agree that we don't know what those paramaters are. unless you think we were designed to live till 30, as was the style in ancient times, in which case a bit of insanity might not be so bad.

      as to the time scale, I think we can adapt. it might take a generation or two, but we'd adapt to it. humans have gotten
    • Psychology in this context is more a matter of environmental impact on the human psyche... stress. If you have to live a life full of bad stress then yeah, you're going to eventually break and go insane or at least chronicallly depressed.

      On the other hand if you don't have to worry about money, housing... basically survival - then you would probably be okay for a lot longer. This means no forced work, only work that you enjoy doing on a schedule that is comfortable. This means plentiful healthy food, a very

  • Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @05:42PM (#13875805)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Statins, as a class of drug, are among the best selling drugs in history. An interesting thing about statins, which are prescribed for hyperlipidemia, is that patients might wind up, on average, getting a few more months before they drop dead of CVD anyway

      Most likely because treating a symptom or an indicator does little to combat the root of the problem. It's the lifestyle or physiolgical conditions that lead to high cholesterol cause the problem. They haven't invented a pill that gets your fat ass up off
      • Actually, they have created a pill that does that--it's called meth. It has it's own problems though...
      • It's the lifestyle or physiolgical conditions that lead to high cholesterol cause the problem.

        You are correct with this statement, but the problem goes deeper than that. There are commercial, psychological, and sociological issues which cause high cholesterol, and ultimately CVD as well.

        • Commercial: It is easier, cheaper, and more profitable for companies to create and sell food containing refined sugars and trans-fats than to use regular sugars and non-trans-fats.
        • Psychological: We like the flavor and c

    • Re:Start small, cure cancer (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Neurotoxic666 ( 679255 ) <neurotoxic666.hotmail@com> on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @06:46PM (#13876371) Homepage
      We can't even cure hunger

      Yes we can. Eat.

      Seriously, hunger as you refer to it is not a disease but more of a political problem. Food and other resources are controled and dispatched in such a way that some people do not get any. But we're not lacking food and, again, hunger itself is not a disease.

      ...diseases caused by natural bodily functions. In cases like this, medicine is all too willing to look at simply interrupting one of the chemical reactions in the body

      Again, we're facing and finding solutions to symptoms. Often, we do not have to cure anything as if it's a natural reaction, it will go away. It's the people making the choice of being treated or taking this or that pill so as to not endure the pain while it lasts. And what disease are caused by natural bodily functions?

    • We can't even cure hunger and this guy wants to talk about curing aging?

      Hunger stopped being a scientific problem long ago. Hunger is a political and/or economic problem. Cancer is a different story. One of the biggest risk factors for cancer is simply age. The very old are far more likely to develop cancer. If this is a result of accumulated cellular damage, then curing aging would also be a major step towards preventing cancer in the first place.

      Also the biggest cause of death (at least in the develo
  • If we eliminate all disease and extend the viability of the human body indefinately, I believe we are left with only a few options for death:
    1. Murder
    2. Suicide
    3. Accident

    What a wonderful world it would be!

    • Okay, but exactly which happy-fun-time forms of mortality are we being deprived of by this?

      C'mon, name one.

      Cancer? No, not fun. Heart disease? Again, not fun. Ebola? Novelty aside, still not fun.

      What about that one disease that makes you feel like you're shot full of heroin right before you die? Wait, no such thing.

      I don't think people will really be complaining that all the good deaths have been gotten rid of. The biggest effect, I think, will be a sudden onset of safety paranoia. The building code
      • What about that one disease that makes you feel like you're shot full of heroin right before you die? Wait, no such thing.

        WTF? I'd say that an actual shot of heroin right before you die of a heroin overdose feels quite a fucking bit like that.

  • It's simple... (Score:2, Funny)

    by Ibiwan ( 763664 )
    I've found a simple solution to rid us of death forever! I can't believe nobody's ever found it! Unfortunately it's a little to long to jot down in this margin, but I'll type up the paper in a couple hours. I've been feeling so streesed late....

    HEEEURK! bleaugh...

    • Re:It's simple... (Score:5, Funny)

      by ColaMan ( 37550 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @09:54PM (#13877481) Journal
      MAYNARD: It reads, [reading] "`I've been feeling so streesed late....HEEEURK! bleaugh...'"
      ARTHUR: What?
      MAYNARD: [reading] "HEEEURK! bleaugh..."
      BEDEVERE: What is that?
      MAYNARD: He must have died while typing it.
      LAUNCELOT: Oh, come on!
      MAYNARD: Well, that's what it says.
      ARTHUR: Look, if he was dying, he wouldn't bother to type 'bleaugh'. He'd just say it!
      MAYNARD: Well, that's what he posted!
      GALAHAD: Perhaps he was dictating.
      ARTHUR: Oh, shut up.
  • He claims his name is "Aubrey de Grey". This is an anagram.

    Can you guess what his real name is?
  • "...some people alive right now could live for 1,000 years or longer..."

    Sounds so familiar, where have I heard that before? Oh that's right, Jehovah's Witnesses [wikipedia.org].

  • Great.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by crotherm ( 160925 ) on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @06:50PM (#13876411) Journal

    That also means that they will be married to their "ball and chain" wives for 970 years. Have in-laws for that long too. And just how long will your slashdot reading, basement dwelling kids stay with you... gads...

    But on the bright side, I fully expect to play Duke Nukem Forever....

  • ... now that we CAN live for 1,000 years ...

    Who would want to?

    In what STAGES would aging progress, would it just be slowed?

    i.e. would I have to put up with 200 years of hip pain, drinking fiber every morning, etc...?

    The questions! Oh! The QUESTIONS!

  • joke-remake (Score:2, Funny)

    by gyepi ( 891047 )

    "Death will die" - Aubrey de Grey.

    "Aubrey de Grey will die" - Death.

  • Netcraft confirms it. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Polo ( 30659 ) * on Tuesday October 25, 2005 @09:09PM (#13877286) Homepage
    Netcraft confirms it - Death is dying.

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