A 25 year study of what distingiushes 'Super-Agers'

The results of a long term study by a group at Northwestern University are described by Weintraub et al. (open source). Here is the abstract:  

During late life, “average” does not mean “intact.” For example, cross-sectional data from a common word list learning test show that average delayed word recall raw score at age 80 (5/15) is approximately half that at age 56 to 66 (9/15). Cognitive and neurobiological dissolution is therefore implicitly incorporated into concepts of the aging brain. This position is being challenged through investigations on “superaging,” a term that was coined at the Northwestern Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) to define persons ≥ 80 years with delayed word recall raw scores at least equal to those of individuals 20 to 30 years younger. During the first 25 years of this program we established that superagers constitute not only a neuropsychological but also a neurobiological phenotype distinctive from cognitively average age peers. With respect to brain structure, superagers have cortical volumes no different than neurotypical adults 20 to 30 years younger in contrast to neurotypical peers who do show such age-related shrinkage; they also have a region in the cingulate gyrus that is thicker than younger neurotypical adults. With respect to cellular biology, superagers have fewer Alzheimer's disease–type changes in the brain, greater size of entorhinal neurons, fewer inflammatory microglia in white matter, better preserved cholinergic innervation, and a greater density of evolutionarily progressive von Economo neurons. In the future, deeper characterization of the superaging phenotype may lead to interventions that enhance resistance and resilience to involutional changes considered part of average (i.e., “normal”) brain aging. This line of work is helping to revise common misperceptions about the cognitive potential of senescence and has inspired investigations throughout the United States and abroad.

Highlights

• “Normal cognitive aging” is a term that spans a broad spectrum from average for age to well beyond.
• “Superaging” at the Northwestern University Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) refers to a unique cognitive and biological phenotype.
• Post mortem findings support resilience and resistance to neuropathologic changes of aging.

 

 

An epilogue from Glaude Lévi-Strauss (1908-2009) at 90 years of age

I want to pass on a clip from the epilogue of Jim Holt's  2012 book "Why Does the World Exist?  An Existential Detective Story" in which he describes his attending a small ninetieth birthday celebration for Claude Lévi-Strauss (1908-2009) the famous French anthropologist and ethnologist . The master made the following brief comments:

“Montaigne,” he begins, “said that aging diminishes us each day in a way that, when death finally arrives, it takes away only a quarter or half the man. But Montaigne only lived to be fifty-nine, so he could have no idea of the extreme old age I find myself in today” - which, he adds, was one of the “most curious surprises of my existence.” He says he feels like a “shattered hologram” that has lost its unity but that still retains an image of the whole self.

This is not the speech we were expecting. It is intimate, it is about death.

Lévi-Strauss goes on to talk about the “dialogue” between the eroded self he has become - le moi réel - and the ideal self that coexists with it - le moi métonymique. The latter, planning ambitious new intellectual projects, says to the former, “You must continue.” But the former replies, “That’s your business - only you can see things whole.” Lévi-Strauss then thanks those of us assembled for helping him silence this futile dialogue and allowing his two selves to “coincide” again for a moment - “although,” he adds, “I am well aware that le moi réel will continue to sink toward its ultimate dissolution.” 

(This post appeared first on 8/23/24) 

Losing Loneliness

Paul Bloom has written an insightful article on the use of A.I. ‘companions’ to solve the problem of loneliness.  I pass on a few clips:

For now, the line between person and program is still visible—most of us can see the code beneath the mask. But, as the technology improves, the mask will slip less and less. Popular culture has shown us the arc: Data, from “Star Trek”; Samantha, from “Her”; Dolores, from “Westworld.” Evolution primed us to see minds everywhere; nature never prepared us for machines this adept at pretending to have them. Already, the mimicry is good enough for some—the lonely, the imaginative. Soon, it may be good enough for almost everyone

So what kind of world will we inhabit when A.I. companionship is always within reach? Solitude is the engine of independent thought—a usual precondition for real creativity. It gives us a chance to commune with nature, or, if we’re feeling ambitious, to pursue some kind of spiritual transcendence: Christ in the desert, the Buddha beneath the tree, the poet on her solitary walk. Susan Cain, in her book “Quiet,” describes solitude as a catalyst for discovery: “If you’re in the backyard sitting under a tree while everyone else is clinking glasses on the patio, you’re more likely to have an apple fall on your head.”

John Cacioppo, the late neuroscientist who pioneered the science of loneliness, described it as a biological signal, akin to hunger, thirst, or pain. For most of human history, being cut off from others wasn’t merely uncomfortable; it was dangerous. From an evolutionary perspective, isolation meant not just the risk of death but, worse, the risk of leaving no descendants.

In this sense, loneliness is corrective feedback: a nudge, or sometimes a shove, pushing us toward connection. Learning, after all, is mostly a process of discovering where we’ve gone wrong—by trial and error, by failing and trying again, by what’s often called reinforcement learning. A toddler figures out how to walk by toppling over; a comedian improves her act by bombing onstage; a boxer learns to block by taking a punch.

Loneliness is what failure feels like in the social realm; it makes isolation intolerable. It can push us to text a friend, show up for brunch, open the dating app. It can also make us try harder with the people already in our lives—working to regulate our moods, to manage conflict, to be genuinely interested in others.

…..there’s a cold Darwinian logic to the sting of loneliness: if it didn’t hurt, we’d have no reason to change. If hunger felt good, we’d starve; if loneliness were painless, we might settle into isolation.

Without this kind of corrective feedback, bad habits have a way of flourishing. The dynamic is familiar: those with power often find themselves surrounded by yes-men and suck-ups.

There’s a risk in becoming too attached to these fawning A.I.s. Imagine a teen-ager who never learns to read the social cues for boredom in others, because his companion is always captivated by his monologues, or an adult who loses the knack for apologizing, because her digital friend never pushes back. Imagine a world in which the answer to “Am I the asshole?” is always a firm, reassuring no.

A.I. companions should be available to those who need them most. Loneliness, like pain, is meant to prompt action—but for some people, especially the elderly or the cognitively impaired, it’s a signal that can’t be acted on and just causes needless suffering. For these people, offering comfort is simply humane.

As for the rest of us? I’m not a catastrophist. Nobody is going to be forced into an A.I. friendship or romance; plenty of people will abstain. Even in a world brimming with easy distractions—TikTok, Pornhub, Candy Crush, Sudoku—people still manage to meet for drinks, work out at the gym, go on dates, muddle through real life. And those who do turn to A.I. companions can tinker with the settings, asking for less flattery, more pushback, even the occasional note of tough love.

But I do worry that many will find the prospect of a world without loneliness irresistible—and that something essential could be lost, especially for the young. When we numb ourselves to loneliness, we give up the hard work of making ourselves understood, of striving for true connection, of forging relationships built on mutual effort. In muting the signal, we risk losing part of what  makes us human.  

Poof! I'm 15-20 years younger...

A Wall Street Journal article recently pointed me to two websites using AI to estimate one's biological age. So....I took a selfie of my 82 year old face with my iPhone to get novoslabs.com's and facialage.com's estimates that I am 63 and 67 years old, respectively!  Now, two weeks later, I have asked my stable of bots (GPT 4o, Perplexity, etc) for other vendors providing the same service and found four more sites to try. Here are the reactions of all six sites to a further selfie I just took with my iPhone:

https://novoslabs.com/faceage/#test  reported the same result, facial age 63 years old, , in reaction to the new picture, and also reported Eye Age (54 years), Eye Bags (72/100) and Facial Wrinkles (18/100)

https://www.facialage.com/   reported 66 years old,  close to the 67 years old estimate of the previous selfie

reports from other apps:

https://age.toolpie.com/       66 years old

https://faceagecalculator.com/   51  years old 

https://howolddoyoulook.com/    58 years old

https://www.howolddoilook.io/  29  years old

All of the 60-something estimates feel in the right ball park, but heading below that gets into fantasy territory. 

 

The Neurobiology of Aging

I want to point to the Jan. 8 issue of the journal "Neuron" which is largely devoted to the neuroscience of aging.  A number of its review articles are open source. The writing is mostly gibble-gabble, but many useful references can be extracted, particularly on interactions between the immune and nervous systems relevant to aging. 

An epilogue from Glaude Lévi-Strauss (1908-2009) at 90 years of age

I want to pass on a clip from the epilogue of Jim Holt's  2012 book "Why Does the World Exist?  An Existential Detective Story" in which he describes his attending a small ninetieth birthday celebration for Claude Lévi-Strauss (1908-2009) the famous French anthropologist and ethnologist . The master made the following brief comments:

“Montaigne,” he begins, “said that aging diminishes us each day in a way that, when death finally arrives, it takes away only a quarter or half the man. But Montaigne only lived to be fifty-nine, so he could have no idea of the extreme old age I find myself in today” - which, he adds, was one of the “most curious surprises of my existence.” He says he feels like a “shattered hologram” that has lost its unity but that still retains an image of the whole self.

This is not the speech we were expecting. It is intimate, it is about death.

Lévi-Strauss goes on to talk about the “dialogue” between the eroded self he has become - le moi réel - and the ideal self that coexists with it - le moi métonymique. The latter, planning ambitious new intellectual projects, says to the former, “You must continue.” But the former replies, “That’s your business - only you can see things whole.” Lévi-Strauss then thanks those of us assembled for helping him silence this futile dialogue and allowing his two selves to “coincide” again for a moment - “although,” he adds, “I am well aware that le moi réel will continue to sink toward its ultimate dissolution.”

Positive effects of aging on cognition and emotion regulation

After I returned to Austin Texas in late 2017 to live in the family house of my childhood I started a discussion group (The Austin Rainbow Forum) that meets on the first Sunday of every month at 2 p.m.  to discuss a contemporary topic or idea, with background reading usually provided before each meeting. On this coming Sunday, August 4, our topic is "Positive Aspects of Aging."  I thought I would share with MindBlog readers the background material I recently sent out to the group:

Here is an article that summarizes studies on factors that influence longevity :
The Key to Longevity is Boring

And here is the response to my asking ChatGPT 4o :

“Can you summarize and point to research showing that senior adult brains are better at some cognitive and emotional functions than younger brains?”

The bot’s response:
 
Research indicates that senior adult brains can outperform younger brains in several cognitive and emotional functions due to a variety of factors including accumulated knowledge, experience, and certain adaptive changes in the brain.

Cognitive Abilities: Older adults often have larger vocabularies and a greater depth of word knowledge than younger adults. They excel in tasks that rely on accumulated knowledge and experience, such as language comprehension and usage (https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/brain-health/how-aging-brain-affects-thinking) (https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/some-brain-functions-may-improve-age) .

Emotional Regulation: Seniors tend to exhibit greater emotional stability, experiencing fewer negative emotions and showing reduced emotional reactivity compared to younger adults. This improved emotional regulation is linked to better overall well-being and mental health (https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/brain-health/how-aging-brain-affects-thinking) (https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/cognitive-super-agers-defy-typical-age-related-decline-brainpower)

Attention and Distraction Management: Studies have shown that older adults can become more efficient at focusing their attention and ignoring distractions as they age. This ability, part of what is termed "executive control," often improves into the mid-to-late 70s (https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/some-brain-functions-may-improve-age) .

Judgment and Decision-Making: Older adults are generally better at making rational decisions and demonstrating improved judgment. This may be due to the brain’s ability to adapt and recruit additional neural resources to compensate for age-related declines in other areas (https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/brain-health/how-aging-brain-affects-thinking) .

Cognitive Reserve and Brain Maintenance: Some seniors, referred to as "cognitive super agers," maintain cognitive functions on par with much younger individuals. These super agers typically have slower rates of brain volume loss, and their brains show structural characteristics similar to those of younger people, such as a thicker cortex and a larger hippocampus (https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/cognitive-super-agers-defy-typical-age-related-decline-brainpower) .

These findings illustrate that while certain cognitive functions may decline with age, other areas can improve or remain stable, leading to a nuanced understanding of cognitive aging. For further reading, you can refer to the research conducted by the National Institute on Aging and other related studies (https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/brain-health/how-aging-brain-affects-thinking) (https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/cognitive-super-agers-defy-typical-age-related-decline-brainpower) (https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/some-brain-functions-may-improve-age) .
 

The tyranny of words

During a brief waking period in the middle of the night...Mulling on the tyranny of thought as a ruminating mind calms down and refuge is found in a quiet space from which words rise like wisps or vapors, a space free of subjects and objects in which there can be no hurry. 

Grateful to be experiencing an aging process that enables a de-differentiating 82 year old brain to experience a return towards its youth, letting go of the clouds of senolytic discourse that have come to clutter it and increasingly experience being the calm and quiet space from which everything rises. 

Feeling sympathy for public intellectuals whose writing I follow, immersed in their addiction to words as they oblige themselves, many due to financial necessity, to keep writing a stream that includes mediocre as well as brilliant work, each generating a rivulet in the streams of discourse diverging and merging in an infosphere that is becoming increasingly contaminated by the words of robots that duplicate and obscure their efforts.  Grateful for the retired professor’s pension that  permits optional association with, or dissociation from, this world of words.