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So you wanna build an aging company

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Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#11

Post by lawlessone »

tracker1 wrote: post #7
nashashmi wrote: post #2

Diabetic medication can be a significant factor for increased healthy longevity.

But is it the medication, or reduction in oxidative stress and glycation? Medications almost always come with some form of negative side effects for a portion of those prescribed to. I think part of it needs to come from awareness of what we're putting into our bodies in the first place. I think a large part of it all comes from what we're taking in that wouldn't be considered food by most reasonable people knowing w…

>I think a large part of it all comes from what we're taking in that wouldn't be considered food by most reasonable people knowing what goes into processed "food".

we're not going to natural food our way to 150.

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#13

Post by nowahlot »

izzydata wrote: post #12
Maultasche wrote: post #5

The headline is confusing. This is not about a company that's becoming older. It's about a building a biotech company that treats the symptoms and causes of aging.

Wouldn't this be an anti-aging company? Aging is bad and not aging is good.

Is aging bad though? Seems like natures way of helping humanity evolve.

As individuals it may seem bad. As a species, keeping old ideas in the form of ossified biology around seems like a bad idea.

For example: see 70-80 year old politicians ageist assault on future generations.

Physics is ageist and its march towards entropy unstoppable. Anti-aging is just more first worlders who can ignore externalities thanks to fiat wealth, engaged in vain wank.

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#14

Post by Jalad »

lawlessone wrote: post #9
hyghjiyhu wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From an anti aging perspective, cancer is the most visible symptom of DNA gradually becoming more and more damaged. The anti aging solution that happens to solve cancer as a side effect is then to figure out how to repair DNA damage, and/or replace cells with damaged DNA with cells with intact DNA.

We all get cancer everyday, normally our immune system destroys it.

Wouldn't it only be cancer if your immune system doesn't destroy it? If your immune system can handle it, that's just normal.

The DNA damage that the parent was talking about would lead to cancerous cells which your immune system cannot handle, which is different from the ones that your immune system can handle

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#15

Post by daemonk »

rhet0rica wrote: post #6

Unpopular opinion: Any medical intervention that delays or defeats the aging process will disproportionately benefit the wealthy, and is therefore unethical. The last thing a healthy democracy needs is millennium-old acolytes of Peter Thiel pulling the strings from the shadows.

This isn't an unpopular opinion. I would argue this is the mainstream argument.

I think all medical advances benefit the wealthy first and then becomes more affordable over time.

The term "aging" seems to trigger a lot of people and lead to philosophizing over the importance and morality of death. They are important topics to discuss, but I also think it is worthwhile to also hear out the optimist perspectives rather than the endless dystopic cynicism we hear on the daily basis.

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#16

Post by hinterlands »

I think there's a fundamental disconnect here: the article says that you should be focusing on strategies that, for the most part, make aging more dignified. The goal shouldn't be even curing cancer. And maybe that's right.

But the reason billions of dollars are poured by SFBA VCs into aging research is probably just that they're getting older, they don't want to die, and they figure that they can put some of their money into anti-aging moonshots. It's not really different from rich people getting cryogenically frozen. If you have more money than you can possibly use, why wouldn't you try?

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#17

Post by izzydata »

nowahlot wrote: post #13
izzydata wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't this be an anti-aging company? Aging is bad and not aging is good.

Is aging bad though? Seems like natures way of helping humanity evolve. As individuals it may seem bad. As a species, keeping old ideas in the form of ossified biology around seems like a bad idea. For example: see 70-80 year old politicians ageist assault on future generations. Physics is ageist and its march towards entropy unstoppable. Anti-aging is just more first worlders who can ignore externalities thanks to f…

That is a much more philosophical point than I was trying to make, but it definitely raises some interesting questions.

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#18

Post by avogt27 »

hyghjiyhu wrote: post #4
idopmstuff wrote: post #3

"A successful aging treatment would be something that: prevents diseases of aging, ideally more than one; preserves a healthy function that normally declines with age (like fertility, immune function, cognitive function, resilience, or physical fitness); or reverses the course of at least one age-related disease." I think a lot of the anti-aging companies out there would say that the real answer is a combination of t…

From an anti aging perspective, cancer is the most visible symptom of DNA gradually becoming more and more damaged. The anti aging solution that happens to solve cancer as a side effect is then to figure out how to repair DNA damage, and/or replace cells with damaged DNA with cells with intact DNA.

Pedantic semantics gripe: DNA damage refers to actual damage to the DNA molecule (breakage of the sugar-phosphage backbone, loss of nucleosides, etc). DNA accumulates MUTATIONS over time, which lead to the loss of genetic fidelity.

Many cancers have unregulated DNA repair pathways, which is one of the mechanisms by which they can sustain proliferation without succumbing to apoptosis. Common chemotherapeutic targets are actually DNA repair factors that can both help kill the cells and sensitize them to radiation. It's well known in the DNA repair field that cells maintain rather delicate balance between carcinogenics and death by regulating repair. The vast majority of research into DNA repair is aimed at solving problems treating cancer, with some peripheral voices (albeit ones that garner more publicity) working on anti-aging applications. I personally wouldn't sign up for any of these start-up nonsense treatments; traditional scientific orthodoxy may be overly reductionist, move slowly, and lack imagination but good god does it beat all of these people that treat grand problems in biology like some sort of app you just need to take the right angle on to figure out.

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#19

Post by II2II »

rhet0rica wrote: post #6

Unpopular opinion: Any medical intervention that delays or defeats the aging process will disproportionately benefit the wealthy, and is therefore unethical. The last thing a healthy democracy needs is millennium-old acolytes of Peter Thiel pulling the strings from the shadows.

That sounds similar the prevailing criticism of biotech companies: their primary concern is to develop treatments for the rich or, at a very minimum, common (and often trivial) conditions in first world nations. In other words, for people who can afford to pay. The only real difference in the latter case is that wealthy nations are pulling the strings.

Re: So you wanna build an aging company

#20

Post by gopalv »

nowahlot wrote: post #13
izzydata wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't this be an anti-aging company? Aging is bad and not aging is good.

Is aging bad though? Seems like natures way of helping humanity evolve. As individuals it may seem bad. As a species, keeping old ideas in the form of ossified biology around seems like a bad idea. For example: see 70-80 year old politicians ageist assault on future generations. Physics is ageist and its march towards entropy unstoppable. Anti-aging is just more first worlders who can ignore externalities thanks to f…

> Is aging bad though? Seems like natures way of helping humanity evolve.

We're not undoing death, dying healthy would be better than aging the way we do right now.

Increasing healthspans as a society would be great in a more family integrated society rather than an individualistic one.

I'd love my retirement years to be spent helping my kids and grand-kids instead of the other way around.

A senior community that can stay involved actively has been part of the "it takes a village" until very recent times.

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