Scientists Show Human Aging Rates Vary Widely 285
HughPickens.com writes: Ever notice at your high school reunions how some classmates look ten years older than everybody else — and some look ten years younger. Now BBC reports that a study of people born within a year of each other has uncovered a huge gulf in the speed at which human bodies bodies age. The report tracked traits such as weight, kidney function and gum health and found that some of the 38-year-olds in the study were aging so badly that their "biological age" was on the cusp of retirement. "They look rough, they look lacking in vitality," says Prof Terrie Moffitt. The study says some people had almost stopped aging during the period of the study, while others were gaining nearly three years of biological age for every twelve months that passed. "Any area of life where we currently use chronological age is faulty, if we knew more about biological age we could be more fair and egalitarian," says Moffitt. The researchers studied aging in 954 young humans, the Dunedin Study birth cohort, tracking multiple biomarkers across three time points spanning their third and fourth decades of life. They developed and validated two methods by which aging can be measured in young adults, one cross-sectional and one longitudinal. According to Moffit the science of healthspan extension may be focused on the wrong end of the lifespan; rather than only studying old humans, geroscience should also study the young. "Eventually if we really want to slow the process of ageing to prevent the onset of disease we're going to have to intervene with young people."
Colour me suprised (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Colour me suprised (Score:5, Funny)
What you do/experience when you are young (smoking, drinking to much, too little sleep, bad excercise, bad housing ... etc. ) comes back to haunt you.
Not always. Jeanne Calment [wikipedia.org] was once asked what the secret of her long life was and she said that she thought that cutting down her smoking at the age of 96 had a lot to do with it.
Re:Colour me suprised (Score:5, Interesting)
Not always. Jeanne Calment was once asked what the secret of her long life was and she said that she thought that cutting down her smoking at the age of 96 had a lot to do with it.
Uh, I know you were trying to be funny -- but the very article you linked explains that she stopped smoking at age 117. Wikipedia doesn't say why, but I recall reading an article years ago which said it was because she had gone blind and was unable to light her own cigarettes -- and was too vain to ask others to do it for her.
Re:Colour me suprised (Score:4)
Re:Colour me suprised (Score:5, Insightful)
From the article:
The team said the next step was to discover what was affecting the pace of ageing.
So common wisdom might tell you that this is all caused by smoking, drinking, lack of sleep, lack of exercise, etc., but scientifically we don't know. We might study this and discover that the effect of some of those things in minor when compared to... I don't know what. Genetics? Childhood trauma? Stress? Sitting too much?
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I look younger than my age and smoked until I was 45, partied my ass off in the 20s (award winning partying...), sleep 4 hours a night most of the time. I don't doubt that these things can affect how old you look, but they aren't the defining things. Like with most things, genetics is probably the key.
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Re:Color me suprised (Score:3)
- Redd Foxx
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take care of yourself and you will look good (Score:2, Informative)
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I was with you until the Milk part. My ancestors worked hard at animal husbndry and shoving milk down thier guys to ensure I was lactose tolarante. Ok to be fair they didn't care about me they just wanted to surivive, but its a niec side effect at any rate, ...
Re: take care of yourself and you will look good (Score:5, Funny)
The trick is to avoid processed milk. Just suck it right from the cow. But, make sure you find a cow and not a bull. The bull won't like it. I know that seems counterintuitive, but trust me on this one.
Extrapolating from anecdotes (Score:3)
Yankees first baseman just gave up milk as well and says he's never felt better.
Good for him. That has nothing to do with me or millions of other people. I drink milk daily and I feel great. Times when I've gone without it had no effect on me positive or negative. So what exactly am I to learn from your anecdote?
even if you're not allergic to milk like I am, it's not very good for you after a while
And your evidence for this is what exactly? Unless you have a specific digestion problem with dairy (and many people do) every bit of evidence suggests it is a fine part of a balanced diet. It's on the food pyramid and every dietician I've ever met will tell you dairy is
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Yep, Look at Babe Ruth, He was a perfect example of humanity.... Fat, lazy, and mean.
Re:take care of yourself and you will look good (Score:5, Funny)
I'll just stick with the painting in my attic thanks.
Re:take care of yourself and you will look good (Score:5, Informative)
You were doing pretty well right up until you mentioned gluten. This near fanaticism with avoiding gluten is approaching the same level of thinking organic foods are more nutritious.
Gluten comes from certain grains. Despite this fact, I have seen products, including fruit itself, labeled as "gluten free" which do not use grain in their production. This article [webmd.com] spells it out very nicely:
The researchers noted that many symptoms attributed to gluten may actually be caused by sensitivity to other components of wheat flour or other ingredients found in wheat-based foods like bread, pasta, and breakfast cereals.
Symptoms that have been attributed to gluten sensitivity include diarrhea, abdominal cramping, bloating, headaches, fatigue, and even those associated with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Di Sabatino and Corazza write that some people may experience these symptoms when they eat foods containing gluten simply because they believe these foods will make them sick.
They conclude that common sense must prevail to "prevent a gluten preoccupation from evolving into the conviction that gluten is toxic for most of the population."
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I have seen products, including fruit itself, labeled as "gluten free"
I've seen Gluten free Sea Salt. Based on how they marketed it, I questioned the quality of the salt.
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Gluten-free sea salt is to go with your non-GMO oats.
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You were doing pretty well right up until you mentioned gluten. This near fanaticism with avoiding gluten is approaching the same level of thinking organic foods are more nutritious.
A restaraunt my wife frequents has completely separate grills and utensils for gluten free cooking. That's pretty much fanaticism.
Gluten has replaced peanut allergies as the allergy du jour. If you have celiac disease, you have a real gluten allergy. If not, not as likely
Gluten comes from certain grains.
Specifically, it's the protein portion of the seed. And each version of gluten is a little different. Anin in an ironic twist, is one of the meat substitutes for vegans.
Despite this fact, I have seen products, including fruit itself, labeled as "gluten free" which do not use grain in their production.
I saw a bottle of spring water that was labeled as "gluten free" As t
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A restaraunt my wife frequents has completely separate grills and utensils for gluten free cooking. That's pretty much fanaticism.
There are people with celiac (I know one) who are *incredibly* sensitive to gluten, so that actually sounds like a really great place for people with celiac to eat at. And even if it's not strictly necessary, it's an excellent way to avoid accidental contamination.
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A restaraunt my wife frequents has completely separate grills and utensils for gluten free cooking. That's pretty much fanaticism.
There are people with celiac (I know one) who are *incredibly* sensitive to gluten, so that actually sounds like a really great place for people with celiac to eat at. And even if it's not strictly necessary, it's an excellent way to avoid accidental contamination.
Certainly there's no argument that the celiac sufferers will benefit.
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> A restaraunt my wife frequents has completely separate grills and utensils for gluten free cooking. That's pretty much fanaticism.
No, for people that actually have celiac disease (as opposed to people that are "gluten free"), that's how you have to do it. They're allergic to even small traces of gluten; similar to the way peanuts trigger allergies in minute traces.
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> A restaraunt my wife frequents has completely separate grills and utensils for gluten free cooking. That's pretty much fanaticism.
No, for people that actually have celiac disease (as opposed to people that are "gluten free"), that's how you have to do it. They're allergic to even small traces of gluten; similar to the way peanuts trigger allergies in minute traces.
That isn't even the argument. No doubt a celiac sufferer will need to avoid all gluten sources. But just imagine if restaraunts all had to essentially provide separate kitchens for each allergy. Might get a little expensive.
It might make more sense to have celiac restaurants, although the numbers are probably too low to be econommically viable.
Perhaps the best outlook is that for those with the allergy du jour, that celiac sufferers will gain some benefit.
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Apparently you're incapable of understanding that your wife frequents a restaurant that actually caters for sufferers of Celiac disease, and you're also incapable of understanding that them doing so is not indicative of 'fanaticism'.
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I agree that the "gluten-free" fad is ridiculous.
But I have discovered that I was gluten-intolerant completely randomly, since even my doctor said that I was suffering from IBS, and provided me drugs which never solved my problems.
They conclude that common sense must prevail to "prevent a gluten preoccupation from evolving into the conviction that gluten is toxic for most of the population."
You make it sound as if Di Sabatino and Corazza were debunking gluten, while they are doctors specialized in celiac diseases.
The conclusions of the above sentence are:
1) if you have problems with gluten, it doesn't mean that people around you will also have them. It's a belief.
2)
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My appendix was removed 35 years ago ;D
I believe that my gluten tolerance was reduced because of a combination of gluten consumption (I was a heavy bread eater) and antibiotics.
But who knows really ? Since I inherited from all the bad genes from my parents.
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Try to avoid any wheat products....and most grains in general, but wheat products especially.
Maybe even more general than this.
Avoid all WHITE foods with the exception of cauliflower.
That alone will go a LONG way towards helping your general and long term health.
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"Avoid all WHITE foods with the exception of cauliflower."
Racist.
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It's the fervor with which some people claim gluten is poisoning humanity that I rail against.
Re:take care of yourself and you will look good (Score:4, Informative)
generally eating gluten free is better for your digestive system,
What utter unscientific bullshit*.
*unless you have actual celiac disease.
Unsupported assertions (Score:5, Informative)
generally eating gluten free is better for your digestive system
There is no credible scientific study I am aware of that supports this statement. If you wish to assert this you need to provide non-anecdotal evidence, preferably in the form of a double blind study supporting this assertion. I am not aware of any evidence that gluten is measurably harmful to individuals without celiac disease, an allergy or other form of gluten sensitivity. This is a very small portion of the population (somewhere between 0.5% and 1%) that is known to be affected. The best available evidence appears to clearly show that if your aren't part of that population then avoiding gluten is a waste of effort.
if you want to stay young, avoid as many processed foods as you can.
Again you are asserting that "staying young" is linked to avoiding processed foods. While there is evidence to support that processed foods are frequently harmful if consumed regularly over time, you cannot automatically generalize this to link it to biological aging (versus chronological aging) without evidence. There may very well be a link but it is unproven at this time. I understand that it sounds reasonable but lots of things sound reasonable that aren't actually true.
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While there is evidence to support that processed foods are frequently harmful if consumed regularly over time
Really? Where? Just because canned food is "processed" it does not make it bad for you. And i have never seen a study to support this assertion in any way or form. After all bread is processed foods!
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Well, not a great example....processed refined wheat products (i.e. BREAD) are NOT good for you. They spike your blood insulin levels and go straight to fat (do not pass GO, do not collect $200). And these types of foods promote inflammation of the gut, which can be detrimental to your entire organ system.
Much of the obesity today can be attributed to sugar and the huge amount of refined carb products.
Combine that with the fact that much of the processing behind process
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"Really? Where? Just because canned food is "processed" it does not make it bad for you. And i have never seen a study to support this assertion in any way or form. After all bread is processed foods!"
Maybe he meant 'indirectly' bad for you. Generally, canned foods contain a lot of salt -- which is generally believed to be harmful if consumed in excess and regularly over time.
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I suspect processed foods are not harmful. A raw food diet is a lot likely to be less optimal (basically, cooking - which is processing food - is what made us human: processing our food allowed us to break it down a bit meaning a simpler, more efficient digestive process, allowing us to have larger brains).
If you cook from fresh ingredients, guess what you're still eating processed food. Just because the food processing happened in your home, doesn't mean it's not processed food. It doesn't matter where the
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Unknowingly, you are following an old diet:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Though I would recommend to reduce the amount of meat and fish. Eating meat once or twice a week should be enough.
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I'm 43 and people who meet me think I'm in my 20s (well, apart from the receeding hairline but I've had that since a teenager). I drink, I eat processed foods all the time, I have plenty of milk, not too much sugar, and love gluten. I exercise a bit (mostly ride my bike). I drink tea (hot with milk, no sugar) by the gallon. I eat ice cream and chocolate probably too much. I'm 5'11" and weigh 152lbs.
Unless you've got a specific condition which gluten aggravates (celiacs etc.), gluten free diets are a fad die
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i'm 41. and people who meet me for the first time think i'm in my mid 20's. same with my wife. don't drink more than once or twice a month, exercise, avoid eating out all the time and avoid processed foods. stay away from milk, sugar and gluten. cook for yourself and don't buy the prepared foods
I drank milk all the time as a kid and still do (1% now). I also look to be 10 to 15 years younger than my age.
Giving up anything (sugar, meat, milk, gluten) can have a placebo effect. You feel better because you are taking control, exercising more, etc.
There are people who legitimately have various levels of sensitivity towards certain foods (peanuts is one of the more common). There are also people who eat too much which can cause problems such as Diabetes, becoming overweight, not having energy, etc.
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...and men.
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LOL at gluten. Fuck off, fad dieter.
You got lucky in the genes, that's it. You're just to arrogant to realize it.
I am not too arrogant to realize I have awesome genes. In fact, I'm pretty awesome in general, and rather smart too! How's that for not being arrogant?
Lifestyle Differences (Score:2)
No, I haven't read the article. Are there really differences in the speed with which we age, or is it more about how we live our lives, what we eat, how much time we spend in direct sunlight, exposure to disease, drugs, alcohol, pollutant, etc.?
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Sometimes being fair requires ignoring differences (Score:5, Interesting)
From the summary: "Any area of life where we currently use chronological age is faulty, if we knew more about biological age we could be more fair and egalitarian,"
That depends. Should people with a higher biological age retire earlier? Kinda unfair to people who looked after themselves.
Of course I can also see ways to make good use of this: It would be interesting to see if certain jobs are linked to people ageing faster. Maybe (maybe) people in those jobs should be give the option of retiring earlier, with pensions adjusted somehow.
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What are these "pensions" you speak of?
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Should people with a higher biological age retire earlier? Kinda unfair to people who looked after themselves.
What about those who take care of themselves, but were in the unlucky part of the gene pool that included high cholesterol, heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimers, cancer?
With all of those items in my own family history, and being in my late 50s, I've been doing what I can, but I personally plan on retiring (not completely, but doing something I really enjoy like volunteering) as early as financially possible. I've seen too many people who never got to enjoy any of those later years before they were dead, bra
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Kinda unfair to people who looked after themselves.
Do we have evidence that "looking after yourself" is the only factor, or even the biggest factor, in "aging rate" that they're talking about? As you point out, if it's related to taking certain jobs, it seems like it might be more fair to make sure that people who take those jobs get to retire earlier. But what if it's genetic, or some other set of factors that people can't really control?
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Well even if you are allowed to retire earlier, you would make less money than a person who was healthy enough to work another decade. So I feel that there is a built in incentive there.
Unless one adjusts for that too, giving preferential treatment to those who age faster, giving them greater fianancial benefits in retirement.
Mind you, I don't agree with that, mainly since in my experiences with my extended family (my paternal grandparents had a LOT of children) there's huge variation in how people have aged, so it's clearly not simply a matter of biology. Choice plays a rather large part and those that have engaged in fewer self-destructive habits have generally aged better.
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I may well end up not being able to work until normal retirement age due to various health issues, none of them caused by lifestyle (genetic auto-immune problems). So I've given this some though, but obviously I'm biased.
I want to work and earn for as long as I can, of course. Maybe there will even be a cure one day, although currently medical science doesn't even understand the problem. Of course, I might end up with a small pension and early retirement, and then be reliant on benefits. I hope I won't, but
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ANTIOXIDANTS! (Score:2)
Consuming 40 pounds of blueberries a day will stop the aging process!
I can see lifestyle and genetics being the main drivers. Look at 3rd world citizens, some look like they are 50 when they are in their late 20's. High stress life, lack of proper nutrition, etc...
But then you have the genetics curveball. There is a guy here at work that is 70 years old and he looks like he is not a day over 40.
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I don't doubt it. Ask anyone in rural Maine. The farmers are all perfectly healthy right up into they decide to retire and get a place in town. Then they go down fast. Being up and moving a large part of each day clearly is good for longevity. At least for most people.
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The farmers are all perfectly healthy right up into they decide to retire and get a place in town.
I haven't known too many farmers, but none of them have been 'perfectly healthy'. They've all got aches and pains.
To me the ideal is to be active, but also to have time to rest when you're hurt. That's not the life of a farmer.
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Its called keeping busy. If a person feels that they have a purpose in life after retirement, they tend to live longer, all other things being equal.
try facebooking with friends when you're 40+ (Score:5, Insightful)
Getting back in touch with high-school classmates was a huge eye-opener for me. I'm 47 now, graduated in 1986. Many of my classmates look like they're in their 60s. I'm not exaggerating. It's just amazing to me how differently people age.
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Is it just you?
Once I visited home and walked around with my dad, and ran into my friend's dad, Bill.
All I could think was "two old men having an old-man conversation".
Afterwards my dad told he he was surprised how much Bill had aged, while he himself had barely aged at all!
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Is it just you?
Once I visited home and walked around with my dad, and ran into my friend's dad, Bill.
All I could think was "two old men having an old-man conversation".
Afterwards my dad told he he was surprised how much Bill had aged, while he himself had barely aged at all!
Good question, but no, it's not just me. Admittedly I look young for my age, as does my wife. We're both commonly mistaken for being 10 years younger than we are. What stuck out in my facebook friends list isn't "me" vs. "other people", it's "some of my friends" vs. "some of my other friends". If you saw their pictures without knowing who they were you would have trouble believing they were all the same age. Some look to be my age and others look 20+ years older. I know one guy who's 50 who looks to b
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I'm nowhere near your age, but I live in a country where smoking wasn't very popular until 20-25 years ago (in schools as well). And I had a few mates that smoked a lot. By graduation, they looked pretty much like fully aged adults. It was strange.
My family, and everyone on my mothers side are non-smokers. Not even second hand. They all look better than others their age.
I can say that smoking and possibly drugs are a factor in at least some of the folks who aged more quickly. That's a good point.
Unfair (Score:2, Insightful)
I propose that if we cannot retard the aging of those who age more quickly, then we must work to accelerate the aging of those who appear younger, to level the playing field.
We'll call it, "Redistribution of Health". (insert the obligatory "thanks Obama" here )
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So I guess in the interests of fairness you would suggesting lobotomizing everyone to bring them down to your level of stupidity?
The way to make things better is to improve them for everyone. It's kind of insane to be jealous of people who need more healthcare than you... Maybe you could hack a finger off or eat some industrial waste or something. Or, you know, try to see that helping the less fortunate is probably a good thing overall, and be glad you don't need it.
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It was just a joke, based on a pun. Whoosh. Take a breath.
Lose weight (Score:2)
I recently had a high school re-union, and some people did look a lot older. I guess you could make a complex theory about how some people genetically age faster than others, even if their overall lifespan is approximately the same. However, the real determination was: "are they fat?" People who weighed more also tend to look older.
Let me guess.. (Score:2)
Harrison Bergeron (Score:2)
I don't even know what "fairness" is supposed to mean in this case. Is it supposed to mean that people who are genetically better off pay extra for people with poor genes to compensate and help them? Or is it supposed to mean that people who are genetically better off pay less for healthcare because they need it less but are forced to retire later? Or what?
This at
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The only fair society is one that lets people make their own decisions about how to lead their own lives, and how to spread out savings and consumption over their lifetime.
But that doesn't give pushy logical positivist progressives the special privilege of telling other people how to live.
diet/stress/genes (Score:2)
For me the greatest change was adopting low carb diet and exercising. However, I think I did this a bit too late [at 40]. So now I can do a lot more than a year a ago and I mean a lot more [figure and fitness level are as a young man]...but the skin is not very elastic anymore so in the face I kind of aged [smoking for 20 years does not help].
Stress - the biggest killer. A few years worrying all the time about health [the system fucked me] , my relationship [dying, now totally dead] and financial troubles [
Six words: (Score:2)
Don't you think she looks tired?
~Loyal
To all you '45 and look 20' posters (Score:2)
When people say 'gosh you look like 20,' they're actually basing that on the way you behave, not your appearance.
(Insert smiley faces at your own discretion)
Shift already occurring in scientific research (Score:2)
In our latest studies on various diseases associated with aging, many are now following younger subjects. The major problem is that annual followups tend not to work as well, since younger people are busy, so you have to go from an annual cycle to an every 2-3 year cycle. However, this makes changes more noticeable. Following subjects when they're very young is more difficult, as they tend to move a lot more. So most studies now are shifting to a 35-40 lower age range.
Re:Methamphetamines age you prematurely. (Score:5, Funny)
I have some old friends that are meth addicts that look like my grandparents.
Are your grandparents on meth?
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Grandparents manufacture the meth. Sell it to friends.
Re:Methamphetamines age you prematurely. (Score:5, Interesting)
I guess raising kids takes a toll on your health as well as your bank account.
Re:Methamphetamines age you prematurely. (Score:5, Interesting)
We really don't have enough information at this point though.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Methamphetamines age you prematurely. (Score:4, Interesting)
*raises hand* I'd like to join your congregation.
Father of two, sole income-maker in my family, average sleep time is 6 hours a day. I work more than it's healthy, and that's because I have no choice. Still, many people think I'm younger than I actually am. I guess at some point I'll start aging really fast, like it's often seen in Asian people. This year they look like they're 25, next year they look like they're 50 and their actual age is 35-36.
Re:Methamphetamines age you prematurely. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's stress; be it from the hard work in raising a family or a single person pushing 60+ hours a day with 5 hours of sleep or less.
That is a long freaking day.
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I've worked days that crossed the international date line. Billed 30 without double counting (14 where travel hours). 60 would be a trick.
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You just need to use a time machine to work three times during the same day. WORST. TARDIS. TRIP. EVER!
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How the heck does a mans body know when his imperative is met?
Pheromones? If the women around him have had their imperative met? As plausible as any other made-up bullshit, probably moreso
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Not sure about that. One of my best friends leads a very relaxed lifestyle in Berlin. Only works 4hrs a day, 4 days a week, no kids, no family, just his very own, slow-paced life and hobbies. He manages that because he lives in a cheap room in a shared appartment without a car and has in general a very frugal lifestyle. He is two years younger than me, in his early thirties but he has lost almost all of his hair, and what is left around the sides has turned grey.
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Really, it's the opposite at my class reunion, the single people who led "hard life" (excessive drugs and boozing and other types of 'partying') looking the oldest
I'd rather think taking care of one's' self plays the biggest factor
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Seven! That's such a rarity now... If you don't mind my asking, how do you like it? My wife and I both came from two-child households, and we have three kids (all under the age of 6). Our parents all thought it was bizarre and that we were crazy to have three kids. I kind of want more while my wife--who admittedly has to do most of the work of creating the child!--is not so sure right now. I'm always curious to hear other people's takes.
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White Trash is basically the Caucasian equivalent of nigger, right?
Why is that post not getting down modded as fast as this one is...to be due to the utterance of the dreaded "N" word?
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Oh so your post is ok but if I chide black people who look prematurely aged by being addict or gang-banger with "don't be nigger" would that be received the same way?
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"It was the year 2081, and everybody was finally equal."
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Molecular biology is extremely complex, and we have barely scratched the surface on all the mechanisms when things are going right. When things go wrong, the complexity is much greater. To improve health and extend life, these mechanisms must be understood and acted on.
..
Since, as a general rule, big government can't make the average person better off and indeed damages them, expect the same thing with regard to lifespan. Indeed, this is the theme of "Loga
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"How many years have you spoken [insert your native tongue here]?"
Not useful information. Some people are better-spoken at 15 than are others at 51.
"How many years have you known how to multiply small numbers in your head?"
Some people never learn this. You tell them how much change they're going to give you and they say "You've got math in your head". Not making this up, even a little bit.
"Who was your President/head of state when you turned 18/reached the age of majority/reached voting age?"
What does that have to do with anything?
"When were you confirmed/bar-mitzvahed/considered an adult congregant in your church/synagog/place of worship?"
Can't ask that in a job interview :p
I know this wasn't all about job interviews, but since most of your questions smelled like interview questions...
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