

Should the United States fund a "War on Aging"? - jackhoy
http://questions.sciencedebate.org/forums/149344-the-top-science-questions-facing-america-2012-edi/suggestions/2693427-should-the-united-states-fund-a-war-on-aging-

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derekja
The US shouldn't fund anymore "wars on" anything. Bad metaphor, bad approach.

But a nice targeted NIH funding campaign on ameliorating age-related diseases
sounds a great idea.

~~~
Gormo
...if only the United States weren't $15 trillion in debt.

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jackhoy
Yeah - I guess it's really unlikely that this will be solved by Government.
Perhaps rightfully so this shouldn't be at the top of their agenda.

I think it will be non profits (<http://www.sens.org/>) or private companies
(<http://halcyonmolecular.com/>) that lead the way.

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sirclueless
Questions to which the answer is no.

<http://blogs.independent.co.uk/tag/headline/>

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kwk
Why isn't this part of the national defense budget? You know, we've sunk
>$1.5T over the past decade into preventing our citizens from becoming
casualties of "terrorism", which account for ~0% of all fatalities in a given
year.

I don't know about you, but I'd feel much better about our leadership if that
money would have been spent on something more relevant to the health of the
average citizen, such as anti-aging research.

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zanny
Why are they spending the money? Why aren't billionaires trying to extend
their lives with private research they fund?

The US is already doomed to an economic disaster from the current debt
combined with unfunded commitments down the road. I guess get as much good out
of the sinking ship as possible?

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wkearney99
7 billion people on the planet already, and you want us to fund keeping them
alive longer? What a fantasically stupid idea. You're given a decent amount of
time on this Earth, already make it count and move on.

Not to mention the idiocy of calling it a 'war on' anything. That pretty much
guarantees it'll fail, like all of the other 'war on' something efforts.

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kwk
"You're given a decent amount of time on this Earth, already make it count and
move on."

I hear this all the time, but I still can't wrap my head around it. If you
value life, why wouldn't you want to sustain it? If you're content to die, why
don't you get it over with?

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graeme
I don't know how I feel about immortality or hyper-long lives (not sure which
one you meant). It's a complex question.

So I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with your conclusion. But your argument
isn't very good. I've made one that is _exactly_ parallel.

"If you value pizza, why wouldn't you eat it forever? If you're content to one
day stop eating pizza, why not stop eating it right now?"

Replace "pizza" or "life" with "X" and you have a parallel argument.

The (potential) answer is that some things change qualitatively over time, or
with quantity. Life may be one of them, or it might not.

I don't think we're capable of imagining the answer. Everything we know about
society is based on humans coming and going in cycles. To change this would
change everything. It feels like it would be a good change, but the upsides
are easier to imagine than the downsides.

"No one wants to die, ergo humanity would be better off without death." is not
sound logic. We _might_ be better off without death, but it's truly hard to
say.

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zanny
They are tangential arguments. We get more people through reproduction and we
lose people to ageing, disease, and trauma. We don't even need to make
Americans live longer to realize soon that we need to cut back heavily on the
first.

Regardless of any new contributions to ageing research, the reality is that in
this century we have over a hundred countries yet to enter the first world
where births per family nears ~2 and until then medical and social advances in
those countries will explode their populations.

We are already unsustainable, so the problem of stopping people from spawning
more is really unrelated to medical advances in the longevity of first world
inhabitants. The population explosion is happening elsewhere but is still a
real problem.

Not saying first world countries have nothing to work on. We still consume as
many raw resources as 3 - 50 Africans depending on where you live.

At that, scientific progress is always essential. I don't want to live to be
300 where I spend 225 years a vegetable or that my quality of life still free-
falls past 60 like it does today. Extending quality of life has the added
benefit of meaning you get more bang for your buck per person - if you spent
30 years training a doctor from birth to functionality, and their quality of
life starts slipping 30 years later, you only get 30 prime years from them. If
you can keep them at middle-age fitness and well being for 70 years, you get
significantly more doctor per time spent on the person.

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kwk
"We are already unsustainable, so the problem of stopping people from spawning
more is really unrelated..."

"Extending quality of life has the added benefit of meaning you get more bang
for your buck per person..."

Amen.

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fumar
Even if the United States funded anti-aging. Would the results of its research
trickle down to the masses. Or would it stay with the upper tier of society?

It could create a greater class divide.

I am in no position to speculate who actually makes money of our wars. I would
love to know. Transparency should be a greater topic of debate.

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zanny
For the wars question, the most obvious beneficiaries is military arms
manufacture all the weapons and vehicles used, the suppliers of perishables to
troops (not just food, other supplies). Those two constitute a very huge chunk
of the US militaries budget and if that budget disappeared they would as well
- private defence contractors have a much smaller market demand for aircraft
carriers.

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angdis
Instead of starting a half-baked "war on aging" we should perhaps consider
trying to improve quality of life for people of all ages. Quality not
quantity, people!

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orangecat
If you can't use the bathroom without assistance or recognize your family,
that puts a sharp upper bound on your quality of life.

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pippy
A war on aging would be 1000 times more constructive than our current 'wars'.
The war on terror cost us fundamental rights and the war on drugs didn't
change the percentage of people who abuse them.

It would have many positive outcomes; technology, healthcare, jobs and
understanding of the human body. Even if it doesn't reach its goal of
extending lives.

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zanny
The war on drugs also violates fundamental rights. From a distance, anything a
person does to themselves should be their right and nobody else’s business,
because anything less violates your freedom in general. As long as you are not
harming others with your actions, whatever you do should be nobodies business
in abstract.

By even saying drugs should be illegal you tell people what they can and can't
possess personally, or do in their own homes without impacting anyone else,
and that is as much a rights violation as wire tapping or eavesdropping.

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hkmurakami
I'll take 60 years of a sharp mind and body over 40 years of productivity and
50 years of senility any day.

What exactly is "aging" in the context of the OP? Would this "War on Aging"
actually solve the right problem? Would it even be the right problem to solve
for everyone... or even just a majority of the population?

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nopinsight
It is very likely that if we can extend human life to any significant degree,
we would need to extend the time it is in a healthy state.

Therefore, we don't need to choose or prioritize between senile long life or
productive short one. Both go together.

Some more info here: <http://www.sens.org/sens-research/what-is-sens>

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afarrell
I'm pretty sure that would just worsen our budget problem unless we focus on
lengthening the period of time when people can work so that we can raise the
retirement age. If we have people retire at 65 and live until 120, they will
only have spent 40-45 of those years working. That is unsustainable.

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jackhoy
Yes I can't see how that would be sustainable in the current economic state.
Perhaps the retirement age would have to increase in line with the years added
to the average lifespan.

Obviously the economic/social impact would be enormous and would require many
difficult decisions but difficult != impossible. These are challenges that
would surely be worth overcoming?

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orangecat
The whole reason that we have Social Security and Medicare is that as people
get old, they lose the physical and often mental capabilities needed for work.
Fix that and there's no need for permanent retirement, and medical expenses
fall drastically.

