Life expectancy rise in rich countries slows down: took 30 years to prove

(www.nature.com)

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taeric ◴[15 Oct 24 22:17 UTC] No.41853681[source]▶

I'm actually a little surprised at the framing here. I didn't realize anyone thought we could overcome aging. I thought the goal was to live longer, but not to completely overcome aging. That sounds somewhat foreign to me. Is that a commonly reasonable goal for folks?

That is to say, I'm not clear that "beating aging" is what is required for "long life." Is that definitionally required and I'm just being dense?

I'm assuming this is a tiered discussion? In that nobody thinks we should freeze aging at baby stages for someone. Such that we would still want some aging, but would then try and fix a point where all aging can be stopped?

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Loughla ◴[15 Oct 24 22:24 UTC] No.41853758[source]▶

>>41853681 #

I honestly thought the whole point was beating aging. Whether that's longer life or cancer or whatever. The point is to stay 20-40 forever, from what I can tell.

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1. taeric ◴[15 Oct 24 22:29 UTC] No.41853793[source]▶

>>41853758 #

But, by the time you hit 20-40, you have already done a ton of aging?

Fair that I don't expect to be as strong in my 60s as I am now. Or when I hit 70+. If I get that far. Light weight training is plenty to get to be in good physical shape, though? Get to where you can do 10-30 pushups and run a continuous mile, and you are probably doing fine?

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2. throaway2112 ◴[15 Oct 24 23:04 UTC] No.41854015[source]▶

>>41853793 (TP) #

But why would you not want to beat aging in a medical sense? I don't really understand your logic here.

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3. taeric ◴[15 Oct 24 23:12 UTC] No.41854065[source]▶

>>41854015 #

But this gets to my question, essentially? Is "aging for the elderly" different than "aging for the middle aged?"

So, what does it mean to "beat aging in a medical sense?" If it is just definitionally to not have any of the bad effects of aging, then sure. Of course I would want that. What are the names for the good things that are generally along for the ride with aging?

Going back to my earlier quip, if you could turn off aging for babies/toddlers, how would that be a good thing?

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4. throaway2112 ◴[15 Oct 24 23:18 UTC] No.41854107{3}[source]▶

>>41854065 #

It wouldn't. So you wouldn't do that. It would be like giving an insulin pump to someone who wasn't diabetic. Why would you?

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5. taeric ◴[15 Oct 24 23:23 UTC] No.41854131{4}[source]▶

>>41854107 #

This may somewhat surprise you, but I would ask the same for people in the 30s. 40s even, at this point. Freezing someone at that age doesn't sound appealing to me. At all.

So the heart of my question is why do we view "defeating aging" as the same as "living longer?" Or is this something where the target age that people would want to be generally coalesces on a common number?

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6. Dalewyn ◴[16 Oct 24 00:09 UTC] No.41854363{5}[source]▶

>>41854131 #

"Aging" in the context of "defeating aging" refers to the phenomena of declining metabolism and deteriorating genetic data.

Wrinkling skin, graying hair, loss of muscle mass and bone density, loss of mental acuity, decline of libido, late-life diseases (eg: cancer, Alzheimer's, type-2 diabetes), and so on.

It's scientifically proven that our bodies spend enormous amounts of energy up into our 20s when we reach sexual maturity and then glide through on momentum through our 30s into our 40s when we are raising our children.

Once we're in our late 40s to early 50s we're done spawning new life and our bodies throw in the towel, starting the slow but inevitable deterioration culminating in death.

It's that whole physical process that we as a species want to overcome, we want to defy being just machines for spawning more machines. Life is fucking evil.

Growing wiser from more and more life experiences is also part of aging, but it's not what we refer to when we say "defeat aging".

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