

Life Extension [pdf] - delinquentme
http://www.scienceagainstaging.org/Books/Booklet_25_ENG.pdf

======
delinquentme
Since I'm not seeing too much commentary... I'll bite:

"TLDR" version on 'Idea 01': any cell can be regressed to a less developed
version and can be used as a general purpose "stem cell"

"Did Read" version: One item on this list which looks particular promising is
the idea of "induced pluripotent cells"

literally: gone are the days of embryonic stem cells, and the social injustice
associated with them.

It is in my experience when talking with individuals on this topic in
particular that they really have a hard time disconnecting "stem cells" from
"killing babies"

We literally now have the technology to regress these endo exo and meso (
differentiated cells ) into their previous undifferentiated states.

This is HUGE! Previously once a cell had "differentiated" to one of the above
mentioned states, It could only further develop along that differentiation.
Thus it was excluded from migrating from a endo to exo ... or meso to endo
etc.

~~~
zeteo
The issue was never killing babies. The embryos were going to be destroyed
anyways, and parental consent was needed. It's like organ donation on a
smaller scale.

The real issue is that a large section of the US population is committed to an
ideological social conservatism. "Playing God", i.e. changing the fundamentals
of social relations that were unchanged for millenia, is what really ticks
them off. You see how even a relatively minor thing, like gay marriage, is
heavily opposed; practical biological engineering will face ten times more
vocal opposition, regardless of the way it may be achieved.

~~~
delinquentme
I disagree. I think as soon as you put this into the perspective of personal
gain there is no cap on the change that can be made.

Just look at what the beauty industry sells now... creams that erase years...
I can't begin to comment on the financial windfall of legitimately turning
back the clock.

I don't think anyone legitimately WANTS to get old and accrue physical
decay...

~~~
zeteo
Yes and all the beauty creams are made from "natural" ingredients too. As long
as the fiction that great-grandma could have made the same thing with forest-
picked herbs is maintained, all is great.

~~~
puredemo
Social conservatives eat GMO food all day long while remaining blissfully
unaware of its existence.

------
reasonattlm
Some context from earlier this year:

[http://www.fightaging.org/archives/2011/02/25-scientific-
ide...](http://www.fightaging.org/archives/2011/02/25-scientific-ideas-of-
life-extension.php)

"The Science for Life Extension Foundation is a Russian organization
consisting of advocates and aging researchers. They are similar to the SENS
Foundation in that they undertake a mix of fundraising, directing research,
organizing events, advocacy for longevity science, and publishing on potential
methodologies to extend the healthy human life span."

And another of the rather nice materials from the Science for Life Extension
Foundation here:

[http://www.fightaging.org/archives/2011/07/biomarkers-of-
agi...](http://www.fightaging.org/archives/2011/07/biomarkers-of-aging-and-
age-related-conditions.php)

If you read Russian there's a whole livejournal full of these things from one
of the people involved:

<http://aging-genes.livejournal.com/>

------
TerraHertz
This thread not getting much attention because most HN readers are young and
therefore don't think about their own impending mortality.

~~~
mahmud
Not everyone indifferent to immortality is "young". Some of us actually
appreciate being a life form, expiration date and all. To live long/forever is
to halt evolution. I'm more than happy to take my shot at life, live my 8
decades, then get out of life's way.

After a certain stage in life, we take more than we contribute in terms of
scarce resource. When my time comes, I will be more than happy to get out of
the way and let time march on.

~~~
synth
>Some of us actually appreciate being a life form, expiration date and all.

Good for you. Some of us, however, think that people should be able to choose
their own fates, time of death included. People are not defined by their
expiration dates, but by their lives, accomplishments and so on. To accept
death as "natural" makes as much sense as accepting polio as natural and just
allowing the disease to ravage the body instead of applying medicine. Hey,
it's "natural" after all, right? Can't be bad if it's from nature, right?

>To live long/forever is to halt evolution.

FYI evolution does not mean progress, just adaptation. What does it matter to
halt or slow down this completely arbitrary mechanism at this point in our
evolution? (Which many would argue happened a long time ago anyways.)

>I'm more than happy to take my shot at life, live my 8 decades, then get out
of life's way. After a certain stage in life, we take more than we contribute
in terms of scarce resource.

It's funny to think that the life expectancy has increased so much in the last
few millennia. What would you have said if the average life span was around 25
like it was a few thousand years ago?

>When my time comes, I will be more than happy to get out of the way and let
time march on.

Okay, go ahead and be apathetic about death if you want, but don't pretend
you're some vanguard of the sanctity of life.

I'm not saying life extension will be without problems, of course. All I'm
saying is that accepting death as inevitable when we are ever closer to
conquering it, is not noble, it's defeatist. It's clinging to tradition. I say
research away and may our children live to at least 200.

------
chrisjsmith
I'm against life extension. I think science has the wrong end of the stick.

Whilst death looks like a scary thing and the primary motivation is to avoid
the scary bit, people need to keep dying or the population increase caused by
them not dying is going to make the standard of living for everyone very low.
It's pretty selfish really.

It's better to had a prosperous and happy existence than live 5x as long and
suffer through it.

~~~
astrofinch
What if the problem is not too many people but too few?

[http://www.overcomingbias.com/2010/11/fertility-the-big-
prob...](http://www.overcomingbias.com/2010/11/fertility-the-big-problem.html)

~~~
prodigal_erik
Ending that with the "labor shortage" bit really undermined the rest. I read
that in much of India it's a _faux pas_ to buy a washing machine rather than
hire the little old lady down the block. Labor shortages drive technological
innovation, while labor surpluses lead to desperate workers taking menial jobs
which are beneath their potential as human beings, as well as Luddism.

