X-Message-Number: 26188 Date: Tue, 17 May 2005 10:42:24 -0400 From: Thomas Donaldson <> Subject: Evolution and reasons for aging To Anthony: As I understand aging, the problem is that every one of the factors you list occur as we age. It's not a matter of one or another. You do omit one other kind of event that happens: apparently as cells age they not only cease to divide but also cease to keep themselves alive. However this idea as a basic change causing aging once more falls afoul of various tissues which show no such changes. On the other hand gerontologists have gone very deeply (with the tools we have now) into the biochemistry of aging, and may have (for instance) found drugs which cause the same changes as calorie restriction does, at least in a species of worm. They might even work with mammals, if tested. I suspect that there IS a basic change (which may involve changes in a system of biochemicals essential to our survival) that can be prevented, and if prevented will cause US, as mammals rather than worms, to live much longer. To Basie: Your argument that the changes of aging evolved to prevent inbreeding seems unlikely to begin with. However it also suffers from a failure to distinguish the levels at which a factor may work: even if your evolutionary explanation is correct, it says nothing about the exact metabolic and biochemical changes which cause aging and which might be stopped or edited to keep them from doing so. All of the proposed explanations weren't concerned at all about evolutionary reasons for aging, they were theories about how it happens. Moreover evolutionists have actually come up with a basic theory on the evolution of aging --- though it says nothing at all about what would happen if we stopped aging ourselves. In the wild most animals live for much less time than they would in zoos where we care for them carefully. This happens not because they age faster in the wild, but because they're subject to all kinds of stress and diseases they don't get at all in zoos or as pets. This means that any gene that prolonged the lifespan of the animal would simply fail to have much effect, because those having this gene would die before it came into effect, not because of aging but the stress and diseases from living in the wild. And so such genes disappear. This theory actually predicts that we will live longer by evolution alone --- though I doubt that anyone reading this would be interested in that. You see, everyone now lives much longer than people did even 200 years ago. That survival actually promotes genes which slow aging and causes longer lifespans. Not only finding ways to prolong our lives doesn't work against evolution, evolution is actually working to do the same. Best wishes and long long life to all, Thomas Donaldson Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=26188