This blog reports new ideas and work on mind, brain, behavior, psychology, and politics - as well as random curious stuff. (Try the Dynamic Views at top of right column.)
Monday, April 03, 2017
Several takes on extending our lives.
In spite of the fact that I am unsympathetic to efforts to extend our lifespan, I want to pass on several recent articles on the effort. Tad Friend does an excellent article on Silicon Valley money supporting a variety of different efforts to let us attain eternal life, Baar et al. find that an anti-aging protein that causes the apoptosis (death) of senescent cells reverses symptoms of aging, Li et al. show that NAD+ directly regulates protein-protein interactions which may protect against cancer, radiation, and aging; and Rich Handy points to several pieces of research, one by Baar et al. on a peptide that restores fitness, hair density, and renal function in fast and naturally aged mice.
Why on earth are you unsympathetic to efforts to extend human lifespan?
ReplyDeleteI'm sympathetic to efforts to enhance the quality of the ~120 year maximum we currently appear to have, but like the idea of a steady state balance between generating new humans with new forms of genetic and environmental novelty, and retiring old ones whose accumulated mental and physical garbage is very unlikely to be eliminated or reversed.
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