The end of human ageing

[Dappy777]

I read a book a while ago called Ageless, by Andrew Steele. Steele argues that we're very close to being able to slow the ageing process, and maybe even reverse it (weirdly, it may be easier to reverse ageing than to halt it). I know that sounds like nonsense, but Steele is no fool. He had just completed a physics PhD at Oxford when he became interested in the subject and decided to write a book. He's also married to a GP.

Whether or not this will happen I don't know. A lot of the science goes over my head, but from what I gather there are numerous things on the horizon, from senolytic drugs to medical nanobots to gene editing and stem cells. Plus, of course, AI will turbocharge progress everywhere.

Leaving aside the science, how would you feel if this became a possibility? Steele said in an interview that at some point in the next decade or two there will be people in their 70s who look like they're in their 20s or 30s. And biologically they will be in their 20s or 30s. If there really were treatments that could reverse your biological age (obviously you can't reverse your chronological age):

1. Would you use them? Or would you choose not to? Imagine it is 2040 and your GP says "now you have turned 60 you have the option to undergo age- reversal treatment...if you wish."
2. If you did use them, what would you do after the treatment? I mean, let's say you are 68, undergo the treatment, and now have the looks and energy of a 20-something. Would you carry on as you are? Would you divorce? Start a new family? Re-train in something else? Move abroad?

Almost everyone I mentioned the book to (or who saw me reading it) said they'd rather not undergo the treatment.

Hmmm.

Women on both sides of my family seem to live to their mid 90s and get dementia.

If it would stop age related cognitive decline I'd seriously consider it.

If it was safe and I'd be healthy then yes, without a shodow of a doubt. I'm quite surprised other wouldn't too.

As for pp saying diseases need curing first, I think the same discoveries and technology might also be able to tackle that, especially chronic diseases (not infectious).

Someone mentioned telomeres, and how we 'wear out' as they keep reducing over time. I'm sure I read something ages ago that processing carbohydrates increases the rate of this degrading faster than fats and protein. Wish I'd kept it.

I wouldn't change career, have another family, or move abroad. I love my life and the city I live in so I'd stay here and enjoy it. But also travel the world if I could.

We'd need to limit the birth rate somehow if lots of people were doing that, that certainly raises ethical issues

1. Would you use them? Fuck yes.
2. If you did use them, what would you do after the treatment? Enjoy my life, I guess, same as I try my best to now!

I feel like there's so much I haven't done or seen or experienced.

I have some vague recollection that if your body could live forever, you would probably only achieve a lifespan of around 600 years because that's how long it would take you to die on average through some sort of accident.

Sounds like rubbish to me but I guess it is possible. For example the lifetime risk of dying in a car crash is maybe 1 % or so.

I think I would do it but I also do wonder if the finiteness of life is partly what gives it it's meaning? Having said that I'm in my late 40's now and starting to deal with my body doing weird stuff like sore joints, needing reading glasses and so on. I reckon I'm too young for all that and that life really is way too short. I am only just levelling out from my youth and I'm already getting old. So I'd like it if we could extend our lives a bit longer. I think it would be a huge boon for women especially considering what we expend on pregnancy, childbirth and child rearing, it would be nice to be able to do that and also have a different kind of life for longer earlier or later on.

"I have some vague recollection that if your body could live forever, you would probably only achieve a lifespan of around 600 years because that's how long it would take you to die on average through some sort of accident."

@GasPanic I'll take it! 😂

Hey at one point in time chemotherapy or antibiotics or mobile phones or ipads were considered to good to be true, what about flying or any modern invention?

I do get what you are saying and there can be side effects and unintended consequences but if we all turned down modern advancements we'd all still be living in caves and dead at 35.

Obsessed with your ‘married to a gp’ comment

most gps I’ve met have had to google my symptoms 😂

my new one seems alright so far but let’s see 🤷‍♀️

tbh, agree with the pp who said that, everyone who you knew would die and all of your frames of references would be in the past so you’d be lonely

yesterday I had to spend time with a group of teenage girls (awful) and i just didn’t understand how to talk to them. The thought of living forever, in this state, isn’t appealing

although @Pentalagon makes a good point re quality of existing life below

Women currently live longer than men but in significantly poorer health. I’m already taking HRT to try and avoid some of the problems that are blighting my dm in her 70s, so yes I’d absolutely choose age reversal if I could life out my normal lifespan without pain.

Steele said in an interview that at some point in the next decade or two there will be people in their 70s who look like they're in their 20s or 30s. And biologically they will be in their 20s or 30s.

Where are the mice that have the equivalent experience, and how easy was it to create them, and what is their actual lifespan compared to ordinary lab mice?Oh... and overall state of health, is it good? If it hasn't happened yet in mice, we're a long way off making it happen in humans.

I read a novel about a woman who found she was living forever at physiological age about 25yo. After 280 years of that... She was... bored. Very bored. That's what I'd expect to happen. Boredom. The book is about her choice to die because she doesn't have a reason to keep living and death is the one thing she hasn't experienced yet so it's the only experience she finds attractive.

Think how over populated the world already is.....then imagine what it would be like if 60 million people didn't die every year.

The concept of not aging is a stalwart of science fiction. Generally the story will follow the societal impact rather than the personal - e.g. does the world become overpopulated as people stop 'dying of old age' and continue to be fertile, does the population drop like a stone because the ageless adults stick at 25 and decide to be eternal hedonists, is the treatment only available to the rich so the poor revolt and society collapses, or does the prospect of immortality lead to depression as the impact becomes clear? Or maybe these days, the Leadbitter Assisted Dying Bill combines with Logan's Run, we get bumped off by the government?

Personally I don't see it happening outside science fiction. You may think "Steele is no fool" OP, but I just think he has a book to sell.

Women currently live longer than men but in significantly poorer health.

I was thinking about that... are survival rates for men just hugely lower for most serious diagnoses? I imagine that is why women seem to get "more" of some illnesses (age adjusted). Because women can live longer with those life-limiting / life-changing conditions. Men can't. Females are much tougher, basically.

I'd quite like to reverse some of the effects of midlife hormone changes but I'm not sure I want to live forever. My brain is already too full.

He had just completed a physics PhD at Oxford when he became interested in the subject and decided to write a book. He's also married to a GP.

You realise that in terms of “knowledge about the science of ageing”, that is the equivalent of me writing a book about black holes because I speak French and am married to a maths teacher?

I wouldn’t want to live forever, but I’d be first in the queue to sign up for 100 years in a 25yr old body. Speaking from a creaky jointed 50 something yr old body!

I've known people who have lived late 80s & beyond. Most have said they feel they have outlived their tome . As one woman said 'even my enemies are dead, I've nobody left to have a real conversation with'.

I'm 50s , I don't want to go back to my 20s, I do want to be as healthy as I can for my remaining years.

There was a a Monkey Cage about this a while back.

The most reliable way to extend human lifetime (as a species, not for individuals) would be to slowly increase the age at which we have children. Which is the secret species that live centuries rather than decades have pulled off.

There are lots of predictions @Dappy777 out there as to what will happen in this area. But most popular science fails to distinguish between slowing down ageing and disease prevention. The two are not the same.

Medical history has shown time and time again that when you treat one area, you often create different problems in another - cancer, neurodegeneration, CVD, co-morbid conditions etc etc.

The aim is generally to live healthier lives, rather than longer lives so you enjoy more years of good health rather than over medicalised ones. But most life extending treatments just mean you live longer with the underlying issues and conditions. We are a long way off being able to address this (and I say this as someone who has worked in this sort of area for over 25 years) in a real person. It is interesting science, but the human body is so complex that to acheive all these claims is almost impossible. Don't believe all the hype (and by the time it is ever a reality we will have found other ways to finish ourselves off as a human race anyway...) but it makes for good reading!

Due to early deaths in my family I'd take it because my biggest fear is not getting to retirement age and a horrible drawn out decline and death. If it had been available when I was 40ish I'd take it then turn th4 clock back to 20 to avoid the symptoms of peri and menopause and have more energy for the last period of working. I'd then not take another treatment and decline but hopefully have a good chunk of retirement in good health. I think it'd be a big problem for pensions though - there would need to be rules in place for the defined benefit ones that stop you claiming them forever!

How? I can see the difference for females, but what difference would it make for male lifespan?

I’m the child of old parents and am still aggrieved that my grandparents were dead/nearly dead when I was born and that my kids never met my parents.

I would totally love to do it.

One thing I always think is such a shame is that as you go through life you gather so much experience and then just as you've got all this experience and intelligence and knowledge you die and it's all lost.

I would probably start writing books and live in the sun and grow my own vegetables and do all the things that I've never felt I've had the time to do because I've been trying to earn a living

But you’d still have to be earning a living? You’d still have bills to pay no matter how old you got? Can’t see a pension provider paying out from 67 - 250!

I could happily downsize from my enormous family house and buy myself an annuity with the equity and a smaller place. Perhaps inland Spain where you can get a gorgeous little finca with incredible views for not much at all

Anyway, my books are all going to be best sellers and I will make a whole new career that way like Mary Wesley did in her 70s

I think I’d be happy to use such treatment if it meant I could be biologically fit for longer. I wouldn’t be particularly interested in longer life but being healthier with the energy of a 20/30yo for my last years would extend my ability to travel etc.