Immortality is within our grasps.(Or at least massively slow down aging)

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No, women won't magically grow new eggs :p
On that note, women shouldn't be allowed to age beyond their fertile age.. NO USE!
Well it really depends on how the anti-aging process works, if a lifespan is increased from 80 years to 200 years, will it mean menopause will begin to happen at 125 instead of 50? Will women still be "mature" enough to begin mating at 16? (18 for you Americans).

That's kind of what I was getting at.

@Origin - I agree completely.
 
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Well it really depends on how the anti-aging process works, if a lifespan is increased from 80 years to 200 years, will it mean menopause will begin to happen at 125 instead of 50? Will women still be "mature" enough to begin mating at 16? (18 for you Americans).

That's kind of what I was getting at.

@Origin - I agree completely.
From what I remember in biology class, women are born with a set of eggs and they do not have the functionality to make more eggs.

Also, Origin makes a fair point. We might need to make a few exceptions.
 
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From what I remember in biology class, women are born with a set of eggs and they do not have the functionality to make more eggs.

Also, Origin makes a fair point. We might need to make a few exceptions.
Never heard of anything like that so I'll take your word for it. However, point remains about how it's spread out. Does menstruation still begin at (I'm gonna guess 12 or 14 but I actually have no idea) and end at 50, or will women get their period every 2nd month or something and prolong the process. I mean, if you start ******* with this stuff, who knows which way evolution will turn. Even with the same number of eggs, if women remain fertile for longer due to changes in cell structure, **** gonna go down son!

Anyway this is all hypothetical, I was pretty terrible at biology back in the day and am probably making stuff up.
 
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The dangers of cancer negate the benefits of health care savings from old age diseases, IMO.
 
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Well hopefully it can be used to cure cancer. My father is dealing with it right now, finished his Chemo and radiation, took him brick to the face, with stuff like this, perhaps someday people won't have to experience that.
 
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My mother survived cancer twice now, and it has claimed two of my grandparents, and is in the process of killing my mother in law. Its a terrible disease, and it is very hard to watch someone struggle through it regardless of the outcome.
 
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Yeah, he's doing alright now, going for a PET Scan December 10th, he wouldn't eats for awhile cause he kept throwing up, had to go to the Hospital for malnutrition and get fluids every week or so. He's also pissed because they kept pushing his fluids date off for awhile, and when he had to go the hospital, they said it caused perm kidney damage, and he's all screaming that they're the idiots who kept saying they didn't have any room. Then they said that was not the case, but that my father had said he didn't want to pay the 50$ Co--payments...so they'd let him die over 50$, really got him angry, said he'd rather pay the 50$ than die...so they were really just ******* around with him.

Though, his doctor said he is doing remarkably well in the sense that he took no breaks between his treatment, went straight through, and his neck looks almost as good as it did before the whole thing started, overall said he's way above average in terms of how he took the treatment, his only issue was the whole keeping food down, which is normal. He's slightly depressed about his muscles though, being 59 years old, a steel worker, he always had quite big muscles for his age and kept in shape, but now he's lost like 30 pounds, and most of it seems to be his muscles, he's worried he's to old to regain them, but will try to work them back up.

He had stage 4 neck cancer. Ironically enough, he's never smoked a day in his life, but all his Ex wives did...they said it was second hand smoke. He asked if he could have gotten it from the fumes at his workplace, as he worked at a paper mill when he was younger; but the doctors assured him that was not the case, as this was specific. He had stage 4. How it got that far is another story of the ineffective health system in America...went to the Doctors, he felt around this odd lump my father complained hurt, and said, I heard him, as I was there "That's weird, but it's probably nothing." And collected 50$ big ones, sent him home. For literally 3-4 minutes of going "hmm."

So come several months later when he gets it rechecked, cancer. Really horrible medical system here. At least the Doctor he got is good, met the guy, he actually gives a crap, but that's probably because he's a young doctor.

Nicest guy you'll ever meet, helps anyone, takes care of himself, works hard, old fashioned values ect, a family man, the type that when he arrives at a family reunion everyone comes to greet him one by one. Then he gets cancer, when his ex wife, my whore of a mother, smokes 2 packs a day, for like...the last 30 years, and nothing.

My sister & my mother haven't quit smoking, either. Unbelievable, you'd think your former husband getting cancer from your second hand smoke would make you consider, I dunno, at least going to half a pack a day? My step-sister does like 3...it's disgusting. The y haven't even thought of quitting.

My dad nearly broke down in tears when he applied for foodstamps. He's very proud, had jobs since he was 13, never bummed off anyone.
 
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That's quite a journey, and I'm glad he made it out of it alive. As a provider for my family, I can't imagine getting that sick and losing my job and having to apply for any type of welfare. It would break my heart too. As for relatives smoking, its a drug, people get hooked. They call themselves smokers, I call them junkies.

As for your impressions of doctors, they are people like everyone else. There are good ones who take their oath to heart, and those who see it only as a means to their ends.
 
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By they time they can install a telomerase "switch" in human DNA, I'm pretty sure most cancers will either be rare, treatable, or non-existent.
 
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well i'm not sure if this has been said, didn't read all pages

but slowing ageing down doesn't that mean a woman's period would be so much longer
being pregnant will carry a child much longer then normal
being sick will take much longer?
If the effects wear off wouldn't that dramatically hurt the body?

I think finding a solution for living longer will only bring new problems to the world

can you imagine if you were badly traumatised of something that happened when you were 7y old and have to live with it for the next 2 to 300years?
I can already imagine you bumb up to someone hey aren't you the girl I dated 200y ago I took your virginity haha good times gooood times, ok bye now :)
 
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Never heard of anything like that so I'll take your word for it. However, point remains about how it's spread out. Does menstruation still begin at (I'm gonna guess 12 or 14 but I actually have no idea) and end at 50, or will women get their period every 2nd month or something and prolong the process. I mean, if you start ******* with this stuff, who knows which way evolution will turn. Even with the same number of eggs, if women remain fertile for longer due to changes in cell structure, **** gonna go down son!

Anyway this is all hypothetical, I was pretty terrible at biology back in the day and am probably making stuff up.
The error you made here is the assumption that the extension of life comes from slowing everything down. That's not the case, everything will move at it's normal speed but just continue to do so at that normal speed. The aging is slowed down due to the cell copying mechanism working with less decay.
 
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From what I remember in biology class, women are born with a set of eggs and they do not have the functionality to make more eggs.

Also, Origin makes a fair point. We might need to make a few exceptions.
If I remeber correctly, women have thousands of eggs, most of them not used after the menopause, menopause just stops the production of the hormone that releases these eggs. Do correct me if I am wrong, though.
 
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If I remeber correctly, women have thousands of eggs, most of them not used after the menopause, menopause just stops the production of the hormone that releases these eggs. Do correct me if I am wrong, though.
at birth yes, but eggs get absorbed by the body too, when girls start menstruating I think about 25% of those eggs are left and dwindling fast after that. however I don't know if menopause is the cause of eggs running out or just something that's supposed to happen at a set time, eggs or not. We need more female users on these boards!
 
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So we're gonna be immortal?
 
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I was hoping to achieve immortality... either through an artificial, biological, or spiritual method.

I want to see Star Wars, Star Trek, Mass Effect, Gundam, etc, etc.... with my own eyes.
 
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Interesting read, but I don't really think this discovery alone will boost our lifespan. Or at all. Basically what they did is create mice that age early (by knocking out their telomerase) and then showed that they regenerated when the telomerase was reactivated again.
The telomerase switch they used would most likely not be needed for human application, they inserted it to have controllable mice. As a matter of fact I don't think we'll see the switch ever in humans, as it's a genetic modification. Most likely application would be a drug that either stimulates your own telomerase or is converted into telomerase when taken in by the cells.

Important quote:
The telomerase boost also lengthened the rodents’ life spans compared to their untreated counterparts — but they did not live longer than normal mice, said the researchers.
Bold emphasis mine.
The interesting part about this study is that the negative effect introduced by the artificial aging actually reversed. I think most people expected it would simply stop the process. However I did not read anything about how those rejuvenated mice compare to regular, healthy mice.
Also of note is, that while mice are a nice model organism for a lot of things they is no guarantee that these findings can be applied to humans. I've seen countless promising cancer studies conducted in mice that do not translate to humans at all.

Also, tinkering with telomerases or life prolonging in general is not wise I think. I think this mechanism is in place to kill off cells after x amount of divisions. DNA replication is not fault free. After some 80 years of replications some serious modifications can sneak themselves in. Preventing these cells from dying (ie to achieve 200 year lifespans) can and will cause trouble in your body.
If it translates to humans I think we'll have a drug that will make you stay young until your 60s/80s, but not make you live longer per se.
 

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