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Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

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Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#21

Post by Udo »

It's important to make a distinction medically between pushing as many as people as possible towards the high-age end of that curve on one hand and scaling the entire X axis on the other. The first one is what we're currently doing with modern medicine, and it boils down to debugging the most common causes of premature death.

The second one is completely separate from this and way harder to tackle because it involves messing with the parameters of life in a profound way. The main problem here is that the human body, like all higher life forms on this planet, is designed to be a disposable object from the ground up. We now know that human biochemistry is the result of an evolutionary process which when faced with a problem consistently comes up with the worst possible solution that is still workable. It's 3 billion years worth of crufty spaghetti code, literally.

Contrary to disease, aging isn't one factor going "wrong". It's a million little modules coming to the inevitable end of their cheaply designed life. Of course, we'll tackle this eventually - we have to if we ever want to move on from this weird intermediary half-state between nature and intellect - but it's going to be slow, slow progress.

Intuitively, I'd say we might have some very limited success in scaling up that X axis within the next 20 years, but it'll be a long time before we actually solve this issue. Which is sad, because I wanted to be around for much longer and now I most likely won't get to do that. Then again, the subject of life extension meets with so much hostility it's actually easy to argue that we as a culture are not ready for this yet.

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#22

Post by Hyena »

The article addresses this at the end: Kurzweil, et al are banking on dramatic changes in medicine on the level of the introduction of antibiotics. Right now we're possibly at the farthest end of the antibiotics-and-surgery technology suite. Much longer life expectancies or actuarial escape velocity will need to come from a disruptive medical technology.

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#23

Post by w1ntermute »

Udo wrote: post #21

It's important to make a distinction medically between pushing as many as people as possible towards the high-age end of that curve on one hand and scaling the entire X axis on the other. The first one is what we're currently doing with modern medicine, and it boils down to debugging the most common causes of premature death. The second one is completely separate from this and way harder to tackle because it involves…

I'd say there's little value in trying to fix what's broken to the core. Research should focus on ways to extract one's consciousness from the body and place it in an artificially designed shell (a Ghost in the Shell, one might say).

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#24

Post by broot »

w1ntermute wrote: post #23
Udo wrote: post #21

It's important to make a distinction medically between pushing as many as people as possible towards the high-age end of that curve on one hand and scaling the entire X axis on the other. The first one is what we're currently doing with modern medicine, and it boils down to debugging the most common causes of premature death. The second one is completely separate from this and way harder to tackle because it involves…

I'd say there's little value in trying to fix what's broken to the core. Research should focus on ways to extract one's consciousness from the body and place it in an artificially designed shell (a Ghost in the Shell, one might say).

But W1ntermute, wont William Gibson be mad that you're cheating on Neuromancer with Ghost in the Shell?

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#26

Post by suprgeek »

I am unable to find a citation for this but I recall having read that Scientists had started to notice a pattern - The life span of a mammal is typically a function of the age of maturity. The function was a factor of 6. In humans age of maturity is approximately 20. So it is believed that the maximum lifespan is about 20*6 =120 years for humans.

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#27

Post by paganel »

I was just reading this morning an archaeological report about a 14th century cemetery dug up somewhere in the Balkan area. Around 40% of the skeletons belonged to children aged 0 to 7, while out of the rest no skeleton was found having belonged to a person older than 60. In the following 2 centuries the situation got slightly better, as the percentage of children 0-7 decreased to ~30%, and they were able to find a few skeletons that had lived beyond 60.

The point I'm trying to make is that we tend to very easily forget that we've come a really long way, but these things take time and they don't involve only science (the fact that the area I was studying was ravaged by the Ottoman expansion definitely had an impact on how long the people in the Balkans lived, as do today's not so healthy diets for most of the Western-populations). This is why I think that making bold and unsubstantiated predictions such as "in 20 years' time we will have reached indefinite lifespans" doesn't really get us anywhere, it only helps confusing us.

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#28

Post by iwwr »

Udo wrote: post #21

It's important to make a distinction medically between pushing as many as people as possible towards the high-age end of that curve on one hand and scaling the entire X axis on the other. The first one is what we're currently doing with modern medicine, and it boils down to debugging the most common causes of premature death. The second one is completely separate from this and way harder to tackle because it involves…

On the other hand, the subject of life extension meets with so much hostility it's actually easy to argue that we as a culture are not ready for this yet.

Only from the Malthusians.

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#29

Post by ciupicri »

Ruudjah wrote: post #3

Genesis 6:3 3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. AFAIK, all people in recent history ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanne_Calment If this is true, [i]Men[/i] still did not exceed 120 years by 128,99 days. Interpreting the bible is hard, determining as literal and figure of speech is the hard part.

Speaking of the Bible, Adam lived 930 years ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam ) and if I remember correctly Eve also lived nine hundred years.

Re: Why aren't the oldest living people getting any older?

#30

Post by ern »

chc wrote: post #4
Ruudjah wrote: post #3

Genesis 6:3 3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. AFAIK, all people in recent history ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanne_Calment If this is true, [i]Men[/i] still did not exceed 120 years by 128,99 days. Interpreting the bible is hard, determining as literal and figure of speech is the hard part.

Jeanne Calment, mentioned in the OP, lived to be 122. But yes, I think most people in the field agree that 120 is roughly our shelf life.

Could there be some deeply ingrained idea, possibly derived from Genesis, that leads to dimished care for people as they approach 120, and hence increases mortality? I doubt it, but I wonder if this possibility has been explored.
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