So this is it...we're going to die

[andrewducker]

I was reading the Hacker News discussion of yesterday's link on death and doctors' views on it, and came across this comment which highlighted how small the gains in lifespan over the last hundred years are

Comments

[ciphergoth]

AFAIK very little research effort has gone into attacking ageing itself. It's fair enough to consider someone like Aubrey de Grey as fringe, but where are the non-fringe researchers? How come it's not worthy of mainstream attention?

[andrewducker]

And violate God's will? Insanity!

[randomchris]

I think the pensions crisis that would result from a cure for aging is of rather more concern :)

[ciphergoth]

Apply the reversal test to that? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reversal_test

[pozorvlak]

Nah, just debt-enslave all the oldsters and put them to work in the landfill mines for a couple of centuries until they've paid off the cost of the rejuvenation tech :-)

[pozorvlak]

Slightly off-topic, but there was a post I wanted to share with you about mortality statistics, how they rule out several possible models of the ageing process, and some possible implications for life-extension tech. Unfortunately, I can no longer find it. Do you know the piece I'm talking about? If not, I'll look harder. One conclusion that I remember was that a simple "accumulate X hit points and then you die" model can't account for observed mortality patterns.

[andrewducker]

Was it this?
http://gravityandlevity.wordpress.com/2009/07/08/your-body-wasnt-built-to-last-a-lesson-from-human-mortality-rates/

(if so you'd have found it on http://delicious.com/AndrewDucker/death )

[pozorvlak]

Yes! That's the one. Thanks!

[andrewducker]

No problem - you want me to point ciphergoth at it, or would you like to?

[ciphergoth]

Got it! :-)

[pozorvlak]

Hurrah! Does it have any relevance to de Grey's programme? AIUI some of his ideas (eg, about telomeres) fail under that analysis, but it's been a while since I've looked into SENS.