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The Island Where People Forget to Die

nytimes.com

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Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#11

Post by thret »

petercooper wrote: post #3

I don't know if his story checks out, but I was intrigued by the idea of cancers going away on their own, as if they were a typical illness. It turns out, sometimes they do: http://bigthink.com/videos/can-cancer-cure-itself-4 - and even weirder (to me), many cancers are self limited in nature and more harmful to treat than just leave in place: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/health/cancer-screening-ma...

Doyle Brunson is one particularly famous person who had his cancer just vanish (this is mentioned in the intro to Super System 2). It does happen, either through initial mis-diagnoses or some other mechanism.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#12

Post by EarthLaunch »

> It’s easy to get enough rest if no one else wakes up early and the village goes dead during afternoon naptime. It helps that the cheapest, most accessible foods are also the most healthful — and that your ancestors have spent centuries developing ways to make them taste good. It’s hard to get through the day in Ikaria without walking up 20 hills. You’re not likely to ever feel the existential pain of not belonging or even the simple stress of arriving late. Your community makes sure you’ll always have something to eat, but peer pressure will get you to contribute something too. You’re going to grow a garden, because that’s what your parents did, and that’s what your neighbors are doing.

Great article. This importance of pervasive cultural factors was the key insight for me. I follow an unusual diet that happens to consist of 100% unprocessed foods. I allow myself to sleep when I'm tired. I live somewhere I can enjoy long walks and other fun exercise. I'm never late because I don't set schedules.

> In the United States, you can’t go to a movie, walk through the airport or buy cough medicine without being routed through a gantlet of candy bars, salty snacks and sugar-sweetened beverages. The processed-food industry spends more than $4 billion a year tempting us to eat. How do you combat that? Discipline is a good thing, but discipline is a muscle that fatigues. Sooner or later, most people cave in to relentless temptation.

This is the trouble with following a different lifestyle; almost every aspect of it conflicts with modern culture. Buying vegetables at a store, there's tasty frozen pizza across the isle. Going out with friends, for variety and a normal social atmosphere, modern-influenced food is the only option. Walk into a gas station and there's the chips. Look at cat pics on the internet and there's pictures of beer and bacon. Everyone wants to set a schedule, out of habit if not the belief that stress increases productivity. People call to talk late at night.

Even after forming good habits, every instance of conflict with the culture requires some willpower, and socially, each requires an explanation. The only way I've succeeded is when living a more isolated lifestyle, somewhere remote. That leaves out cultural enjoyment and reinforcement.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#13

Post by makeitsuckless »

sotirisk wrote: post #4
frik wrote: post #2

As the side note says: "The key to Ikarian longevity is not simply a healthful diet; daily socializing may be just as crucial." And taking a daily nap and drink vine. This is probably true and helps a lot. But who created the statistics? The pension system there is widely misused. People keep their death parents "alive" on paper to receive their pension for many years. It was so widespread and the loss so great in Cr…

And where have you read about this "widely misused pension system"? I am Greek and I can asure you that this is another one of the "rumors" floating around about Greece which, as all rumors, is a blatant lie. In fact, the pension system in Greece has been following the European standards since at least 10 years. I am so sick and tired of outsiders spewing nonsense all of the internet about Greece without knowing any…

There are no European standards for pension systems. It's typically one of those things that hasn't been unified.

Both the pension fraud and the early retirement age in Greece where hotly debated and well documented topics, not "rumors".

I think the problem here lies in the different cultural perception of the phrase "widely misused". For Greek values, 1% is a bureaucratic rounding error. For North European values it's sign of massive corruption.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#14

Post by skriticos2 »

thret wrote: post #10
Stratoscope wrote: post #7

Olives, hummus, and sourdough bread. Herbal teas, coffee and wine. Goat's milk and honey. Wild greens, beans, and olive oil. Work in the fields, gathering it all. A nap in the afternoon, and plenty of sex. This is a recipe for a long life.

Also happiness!

I think that's also on the list of requirements (for living to an old age). And peace of mind.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#16

Post by XorNot »

eru wrote: post #5
petercooper wrote: post #3

I don't know if his story checks out, but I was intrigued by the idea of cancers going away on their own, as if they were a typical illness. It turns out, sometimes they do: http://bigthink.com/videos/can-cancer-cure-itself-4 - and even weirder (to me), many cancers are self limited in nature and more harmful to treat than just leave in place: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/health/cancer-screening-ma...

Isn't that what they call a benign tumour?

Seriously, cancer is not 1 disease.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#17

Post by chroma »

Let's assume every claim in this article is true. Let's say that if you follow a certain diet, move to a certain island, make certain friends, and have certain genes, you will live to the age of 100.

So what?

Best case, you get an extra decade or two of life. This may seem amazing, but to be honest, it's ineffectual life. This extra time will be spent being old. Whether you're 70 or 100, you will be frail, dim-witted[1], and unattractive. If you doubt this, consider that practically any old person would be willing to give up all of their material possessions to inhabit the body of a 20 year-old.

The real solution is not to extend natural human life by a fraction. The real solution is to make frailty and death voluntary. If this achievement seems ridiculous, remember how many technologies were once placed in the same category of improbability. To someone from a couple centuries ago, antibiotics would be witchcraft.

While I recognize that such disruptions would cause chaos and unrest, I also recognize that the current "solution" is far worse. In fact, it is reprehensible. On average, over 100,000 people die of aging every day. Whatever benefits aging may create, the costs are far worse. To put it concretely: imagine a Boxing Day tsunami happening every two days. That is what aging does to humanity right now. Imagine the sun flickering once a second. A human being dies more often than that. To accept this is obscene. It is is immoral. It is insane. And yet, most people do. Shame on us.

1. If you doubt that cognition declines as one ages, please read When does age-related cognitive decline begin? (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2683339/pdf/nihm...). If you aren't willing to read the paper, at least view the figures on pages 11 & 12.

Edit: I am amused by the replies speculating about my age. Even if I was young, how does that refute my arguments? At the risk of revealing my identity: I'm halfway through a typical human life. My values have shifted since I was young, but my disapproval of aging hasn't changed. Ever since I realized that people died through no fault of their own, I've been against it.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#18

Post by petercooper »

eru wrote: post #5
petercooper wrote: post #3

I don't know if his story checks out, but I was intrigued by the idea of cancers going away on their own, as if they were a typical illness. It turns out, sometimes they do: http://bigthink.com/videos/can-cancer-cure-itself-4 - and even weirder (to me), many cancers are self limited in nature and more harmful to treat than just leave in place: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/health/cancer-screening-ma...

Isn't that what they call a benign tumour?

However, benign tumors are not cancerous. While 'cancer' is often used interchangeably with 'tumor', I was referring to malignant tumors as it's common knowledge benign tumors can lay dormant.

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/benigntumors.html

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#19

Post by b6 »

meric wrote: post #9
visakanv wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds identical to the opening chapter of Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers! [1] 'What Wolf slowly realized was that the secret of Roseto wasn't diet or exercise or genes or the region where Roseto was situated. It had to be the Roseto itself. As Bruhn and Wolf walked around the town, they began to realize why. They looked at how the Rosetans visited each other, stopping to chat with each other in Italian on the…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roseto_effect Wow, that is patriarchal oppression and stifling familial roles.

I see the part I think you're talking about, but actually, it does not say that there was any oppression or that anyone was stifled.

Re: The Island Where People Forget to Die

#20

Post by jbb555 »

chroma wrote: post #17

Let's assume every claim in this article is true. Let's say that if you follow a certain diet, move to a certain island, make certain friends, and have certain genes, you will live to the age of 100. So what ? Best case, you get an extra decade or two of life. This may seem amazing, but to be honest, it's ineffectual life. This extra time will be spent being old . Whether you're 70 or 100, you will be frail, dim-witt…

See if still think that you don't want an extra 20 years to live when you get to 70?
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