what would be ideal age to live to?

[jefhatfield]

having worked in a hospital for three years, most people do not have a good time in their 80s and 90s and what some medically call alive is not living

i think 70, give or take a few years seems ideal to me ;)

35 is middle age, not 50, unless you are going to live to 100 years old and see everything from the first car and airplane to the first 1 ghz personal computer;)

it amazes me what a child born this year will see if they make it to 100 years of age...cures for all diseases, space travel, peace in the middle east, contact with aliens, cars that don't need gasoline, healthier people, time travel? apple regaining the market share and becoming bigger than microsoft? who knows?:D :p

[D0ct0rteeth]

its all relative

I know emotionally dead people at 25 and I know lively 80 year olds.

As long as you do things with your life that is all that matters. I make monthly goals and resolutions in my life and I pack more into a week than lets say my parents do in a year. As long as you are active and seek out new oportunities in your life than god bless ya.

Life is too short as it is.. i can't imagine sitting in a assisted living center eating applesause.. i'd rather die of a heart attack trying to jog a marathon.

I want to live forever. I have too much to do.

[Royal Pineapple]

personally i dont want to live past 65 years of life, but i will never grow older than 15 ;)
forever young

[rainman::|:|]

eleventy-one.

:)
pnw

[MacMaster]

:( :mad: :( :mad: :( :mad: I want to live forever...Death does not sound that great to me...wait! I'm only 14 so that means I have about 66 years for someone to come up with some technology that will let you live forever...:)

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by paulwhannel
eleventy-one.

:)
pnw

110...right?

well, then you may have some issues with wrinkles, gray hair, and memory loss and the most solid food you can chew on will be cream of wheat

and the only thing viagra will do is make an eighty year old look sexy:p

[irmongoose]

Until I have nothing else to do.




irmongoose

[748s]

scientists and futurologists are saying we'll be either the last generation to die or the first to live forever.

[rainman::|:|]

First off, 111 :) secondly, the idea of long prolonged or "indefinite" life is rather scary, Vonnegut has good insight in his ideas about forced sterilization and suicide booths in a world horribly overcrowded... i'd rather bow out gracefully...

:)
pnw

[resm]

at the current level of physical development that our body has reached, the maximum life span we can expect under the best of conditions is 120 yrs (give and take a few).
As more mental and then later spiritual we human beeings are becoming, as longer our physical body will last, since our body will be lesser depending on our physical strenght and more on our mental and spiritual capability.

To assume or dream about that this will be possible within a generation or two is rather silly and not very scientific.

To even try to throw sand into the eyes of people and make them believe that we soon will reach the stage of living forever is nothing else than showtime bull...t since NOTHING in this physical universe last's forever.

And thanks God for that.
If we look at what a mess our dear politicians (the so called leaders of society) have brought humanity into, we can only hope and pray that at least THEY will never last forever :p

Besides, this world is not overcrowded at all but rather our population is very inefficiently distributed.
Overcrowding is another showtime bull...t feed to us by our politicians who are to incompetent, lazy and most of the time to corrupt to establish a system that utilizes our resources properly so that there would be more than enough space and food for every living soul.

And THAT would realy help to increase our life span :)

[Sepulchre]

Originally posted by 748s
scientists and futurologists are saying we'll be either the last generation to die or the first to live forever.

Sounds like a nightmare either way :D

[dnte42]

I figure, once I can't do more than half the things that I want to (physically or mentally) it's getting about time. I definately don't want to live forever...it would just get old after a while. I wanna have an excuse to be old, senile, and grumpy for a few years and call it quits. :p

[Mr. Anderson]

Originally posted by 748s
scientists and futurologists are saying we'll be either the last generation to die or the first to live forever.

with help from the aliens?

sorry, but thowing things in here like this without at least a little backup with links or facts doesn't help.

There is a protein, telemerase (not sure on the spelling) that has been proven to be directly involved with aging in pretty much all animals. Each cell starts out with a certain amount and when the cell divides, it splits the protein. Its needed to keep the cell alive and eventually when there isn't enough of the protein, the cell can't sustain itself. Research has been ongoing to help the cells replace this protein. And it has been done in lab animals, mice and insects.

What will that do? It will allow you to look like 30 when you die at 92 of clogged arteries. So you might be able to live a little longer, but until we actually figure out how to prevent strokes and other simillar diseases, you're not going to live forever.

Now, imagine going to a bar and meeting someone who looks like their 30 but actually grew up with your grandparents......and they're hitting on you :D :D

[matthew24]

As long as you know the differnce between OS X and Windows!

[King Cobra]

>First off, 111 :)

You know, Paul, the world's oldest man lived to 111 and was a farmer, but passed away a few years ago. You might break his record. :rolleyes: :p

Too bad I missed seeing Hailey's comet in '86. Well, I plan to live until I see it again in person in 2062. Then I can die happily.

[resm]

Originally posted by dukestreet
with help from the aliens?

why should they be interested in make us live longer ?
They most propably would shake their heads about our stupidity and then get the hell out of here as fast as they could :D

[topicolo]

Originally posted by dukestreet

There is a protein, telemerase (not sure on the spelling) that has been proven to be directly involved with aging in pretty much all animals. Each cell starts out with a certain amount and when the cell divides, it splits the protein. Its needed to keep the cell alive and eventually when there isn't enough of the protein, the cell can't sustain itself. Research has been ongoing to help the cells replace this protein. And it has been done in lab animals, mice and insects.


Actually, you've gotten that all mixed up. Telomerase doesn't split up after cell division at all. What really happens is this:
Cells have chromosomes, these cromosomes are composed of a strand of DNA wrapped around little balls of protein, forming something called a histone. These histones wrap themselves into a coil called a supercoil and theys form the chromosome.
So what are at the ends of the strands of DNA?
Teleomeres (not telomerase. that's the protein). -->Telomeres are sequences of nonsensical DNA which are used to cap the ends of the useful DNA so none of it gets lost during DNA replication. Normally, after a cell replicates its DNA some of the telomeres gets lost (about 100 base pairs). In some cells, a protein called telomerase replaces the lost telomeres. Most somatic cells don't have much telomerase so after a while, the telomerase gets worn off and DNA damage occurs when cells divide. That's when the cell commits suicide (or commits apoptosis if you want the nerdy term). If you give a cell lots of telomerase, the telomeres get replenished, and the cell SHOULDN'T die, but there are still ways that it could suffer enough damage to die eventually.

I hope I cleared up that misconception for you guys. ;)

[tcolling]

yesterday

[topicolo]

uh oh. looks like someone needs some prozac...

[Mr. Anderson]

Originally posted by topicolo

I hope I cleared up that misconception for you guys. ;)

thanks topicolo! I was trying to remember what I had read in an article that had been posted in on CNN a year or so ago.

What they were also discussing was that most researchers invloved in life extention work were treating aging as a disease -- interesting approach. I believe we'll see some benefit in our life time, but being able to indefinitely extend our lifespan doesn't seem possible any time soon. Like you said, there are plenty of other ways for cells to die.

D

[topicolo]

I think they need to find a cure for cancer before this becomes viable. 1/4 of all people will get cancer in their lifetime, all from cellular mutations caused by smoking, ingesting carcinogens, viruses (yes! it happens. You are more likely to get cancer if you've had mono), the sun, random background radiation, nature playing tricks on you, etc.

And this is without an enhanced lifespan! Can you imagine 80% of all "enhanced" people dying of stuff like heart disease and cancer? ugh. I've seen pictures of people rotting away due to cancer, and I sure as hell don't want to go through it myself.

BTW, if you want to support cancer research check out my thread here (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10023)

[DarkNovaMatter]

Hmmm, personally I will go with nanotech- http://itri.loyola.edu/ConvergingTechnologies/

It just seems like a better way and also would be nice to see the technological evolution of mankind, course I could always see the nuke that started WW3 :rolleyes: , but it would be interesting.



P.S.- Take a look at the PDF -watch out a 4.5 meg PDF- 407 pages, overall very interesting career to get into..)

[bousozoku]

It's got to be 21. You've had your fun and lived your life to the fullest and there's no way that you can live down all those things you did while you were having fun. This way, you don't have to face people after you've stopped having fun.

[mischief]

Oddly enough I have the feeling that Cancer is the key to immortality.

What is the only other kind of Cell that behaves as Cancer does when it divides?

Stem cells.

What if Cancer was begun in the Stem cells that exist in most every tissue?


Nobody has (to my knowledge) witnessed a cell going cancerous. Perhaps they have stimulated a few in a dish with chemicals at high concentrations but such tests are meaningless if not on living, connected tissue.

I wonder if the concentration of Stem Cells in a tissue correlate with it's likelihood of going malignant?

If Cancer is just a misfire of Stem cells than we have 2 issues:


What can be used to buffer stem cells (chemically) so that they are more stable?

What can be used to trigger Stem cells such that they replenish old tissue rather than just going nuts occasionally?



The answer to these and many more questions can be found where Nanotech and Tissue engineering from stem cells collide methinks. :D

[topicolo]

Whoa, that's just messed up.

Cancer cells arise because of damage to the cell's DNA. They are undiffferentiated and resemble scar tissue more than other cells, especially stem cells. Like stem cells, they can divide indefinately, but unlike them, cancer cells do so because the genes that tell the cell to stop are damaged. A cancer cell divides so quickly that most of the time, it doesn't even fully duplicate it's organelles for distribution to each daughter cell. Stem cells don't do that.

Stem cells ARE NOT found in every tissue, as you say. They are found only in select places, such as your bone marrow, your umbilical cord, or the cells of an early embryo. If cancer happened to an embryo, the embryo would just die very early and be flushed from the mother's womb.

The factors that affect the probability of a tissue going malignant are, like I've stated before, based on your exposure to carcinogens such as radiation, certain compounds, etc. Stem cells have NOTHING special to do with cancer cells. They can become carcinogenic, but the probability of that happening is as high as any other cell.

Learn about stem cells here (http://www.nih.gov/news/stemcell/primer.htm)
It's on the NIH (National Institute for Health) website. Read about it, and you won't be making crazy statements like that again :)

[Ifeelbloated]

I don't know but whenever it is, I hope I can face it both feet planted on the ground, face in the wind, defiant. Dying old, frail, and senile just doesn't sound all that great.

[mischief]

"The pluripotent stem cells undergo further specialization into stem cells that are committed to give rise to cells that have a particular function. Examples of this include blood stem cells which give rise to red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets; and skin stem cells that give rise to the various types of skin cells. These more specialized stem cells are called multipotent. "

I said "most every" I never mentioned Pluripotent versus Multipotent. I said Stem Cells.

I suppose I should have said "Many types of tissue, accounting for a significant portion of the body's mass."

I am aware that Cancer occurs for only 4 reasons: Radiative, chemical , viral dammage to DNA at even a single (perhaps one in particular?) nucleic acid pair, or the invasion of a cancerous cell from somewhere else. What I was asking is: Do we have any conclusive evidence that any random cell can go malignant or is there a specific pre-existing condition?


Another angle without the nasty headline:

" Pluripotent stem cells, stimulated to develop into specialized cells, offer the possibility of a renewable source of replacement cells and tissue to treat a myriad of diseases, conditions, and disabilities including Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases, spinal cord injury, stroke, burns, heart disease, diabetes, osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. There is almost no realm of medicine that might not be touched by this innovation. Some details of two of these examples follow. "

What if you could permiate the body with stem cells, each tuned to it's surrounding tissue? Makes excellent sci-fi and I AM writing a Game here..... Nanotech and another 30 years and we could see some very pronounced changes in our species.

[resm]

Originally posted by Ifeelbloated
I don't know but whenever it is, I hope I can face it both feet planted on the ground, face in the wind, defiant. Dying old, frail, and senile just doesn't sound all that great.

The Fear of death is a basic instinct inherent in every life form that has just the slightest developed consciousness and that includes Humans, Animals and plants.

The baby's initial struggle is to survive, getting food and beeing cared for.

Having survived that, we are going on to accumulate knowledge.
We explore our surroundings, establish bonds with others and getting our first experiences with what is wrong and what is right and by the age of 6 we have established our basic personality that will affect us for the rest of our lifes.

Reaching Puberty we develop our personality to the fullest, learning the difference between male and female and establishing our position in family and society such as school etc. and accumulate theoretical knowledge.

At 35 we have reached the physical peak of our bodies and from there we start to realize that "we are no longer 16".

At every stage our mental outlook on life is changing due to our experiences.

Reaching 50/60/70/80 does not mean that our basic instinct of survival will have diminished.
We have seen and experienced things a 16 years old still has to go trough yet and our values will change. We will appreciate things that we didn't even know about in our early age.

Believe me, when you reach 60 or 70 your will to survive will be as strong as it is when you are born and if we have been living a reasonably healthy life style our quality of life will be as good to us as it is to a teenager, even though our physical and mental capabilities may not be as perfect anymore as they have been when we where young.

I think only very extreme cases of physically or mentally sick people (at any age) may have the wish to terminate their life prematurely and that again is based on their realization (or lack of that) what life is all about. :)

[topicolo]

I said "most every" I never mentioned Pluripotent versus Multipotent. I said Stem Cells.

I never mentioned Pluripotent versus Multipotent either. You got that quote off of the website I referred you to. Besides, Pluripotent and Multipotent cells ARE stem cells.


I suppose I should have said "Many types of tissue, accounting for a significant portion of the body's mass."

Stem cells account for very little of the body's mass. If you read further into that article, you would've found out that stem cells haven't been found for many of the body's tissues yet.

I am aware that Cancer occurs for only 4 reasons: Radiative, chemical , viral dammage to DNA at even a single (perhaps one in particular?) nucleic acid pair, or the invasion of a cancerous cell from somewhere else. What I was asking is: Do we have any conclusive evidence that any random cell can go malignant or is there a specific pre-existing condition?

Yes. This was proven very early on in cancer research. In 1911, Peyton Rous discovered that when he took a cell-free extract of the tumour of a chicken, and injected it into another chicken, the new chicken would also develop a tumour. This happened to pretty much any tissue he injected the fluid into because the serum contained what is called an oncogenic virus. This oncogenic virus is basically what is known now as a special retrovirus, a virus that transforms its RNA into DNA and inserts it into its cellular host's genetic info. If the viral RNA contains an oncogene, or a gene that causes the cell to divide uncontrollably, it will insert that into the healthy cell's DNA and cause it to become cancerous. This can happen to any practically cell--you just need a living cell with DNA (many muscle cells lose their nucleus so they shouldn't be affected).

BTW, don't forget normal cell duplication errors as a source for cancer.


What if you could permiate the body with stem cells, each tuned to it's surrounding tissue? Makes excellent sci-fi and I AM writing a Game here..... Nanotech and another 30 years and we could see some very pronounced changes in our species.
If you could permeate the various tissue of a body with pluripotent stem cells, you may have extra regenerative possibilities, BUT it would fail in the long run (as in if you try to live forever) because sooner or later, those stem cells will accumulate enough genetic damage to either commit apoptosis or to become cancerous. You would have to devise nanomachines that would be able to cruise through your body, repairing DNA to sustain yourself. They would have to be accurate themselves because if they weren't, they may cause cancer themselves. Suffice it to say that if these nanomachines were running a version of Windows CE, you'd get cancer within a day :D

Good luck with your game. Personally, I hope we don't become immortal because it's not what we were meant to do. We'd have problems with overpopulation and the rich will become even further separated from the poor if they're the only ones who could afford the procedures. Oligarchies suck.

[scem0]

Right now I would think a good age would be late 70's but being the oldest person to ever live might be kinda tight. You would be in guiness just for - living :D...

[Durandal7]

It all depends, if I'm able to live to an obscene age then science probably would have slowed the aging process which wouldn't be all that bad. I would prefer to become primarily cybernetic. Maybe 160, that seems like a good age.

[SilvorX]

america's oldest person died today of age 114...RIP

http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/08/23/obit.oldest.american.ap/index.html

[topicolo]

So I guess Queen Kobra was wrong about the world's oldest man living until he was 111 :)

[MacMaster]

Originally posted by asurace
It all depends, if I'm able to live to an obscene age then science probably would have slowed the aging process which wouldn't be all that bad. I would prefer to become primarily cybernetic. Maybe 160, that seems like a good age.
Cybernetics, that's what I was thinking...It seems like the only way...:(

[topicolo]

I'd like them to stick my brain into that crazy robot in Robocop 2. I could then walk around and blow **** up :)

[diorio]

The ideal age to live to is 98 years 2 months and 3 days. Why? I don't know it just seemed like a good idea.

[TimDaddy]

Originally posted by resm



Besides, this world is not overcrowded at all but rather our population is very inefficiently distributed.
Overcrowding is another showtime bull...t feed to us by our politicians who are to incompetent, lazy and most of the time to corrupt to establish a system that utilizes our resources properly so that there would be more than enough space and food for every living soul.

And THAT would realy help to increase our life span :)

I read somewhere, but I can't remember where, that if every man, woman, and child had 1200 square feet each, we would all fit in Texas. I did the math, and it fit, but I think it was based on a worldwide population of 5 billion. We're over six now, I think. But the point is, that's plenty of room per person, all in a reletively small area on the map.

[Mr. Anderson]

Originally posted by MacMaster

Cybernetics, that's what I was thinking...It seems like the only way...:(

now here's a bit of scifi that seems like its possible in the next century or so. What if you could map the human brain and create a copy of all the knowledge, experience, memories, etc on a computer? It would react to every situation like you would - and you'd have to give it input. Sort of like the ultimate A.I. - then you could live forever - in a different manner, but still the same.

Don't even bother with the scrap book - just download the grandparents and visit them any time you want. Create virtual worlds in the computer where everyone could meet....it would be a bit crazy, that's for sure. And what about multiple copies of your self?

D

[King Cobra]

>(topicolo) So I guess Queen Kobra was wrong about the world's oldest man living until he was 111 :)

Ah. That would be three years ago from when Altavista incorporated their news w/o linking onto another site. He was 111 and was a farmer.

PS: I trust Altavista and what they say, tipicola. :p

[dnte42]

Originally posted by TimDaddy


I read somewhere, but I can't remember where, that if every man, woman, and child had 1200 square feet each, we would all fit in Texas. I did the math, and it fit, but I think it was based on a worldwide population of 5 billion. We're over six now, I think. But the point is, that's plenty of room per person, all in a reletively small area on the map.

Yeah, I've read the same thing. Also, all the garbage in America (or was it the world...?) could be condensed into a 14 mile by 14 mile by 20 feet landfill (although the surrounding 1-2 mile radius would probably not be fit for much of anything :p). There is a lot of space, but it just depends on how much everyone wants for themselves, how much if left to nature, and how alarmist we want to get :D

[topicolo]

Originally posted by King Cobra
tipicola. :p

Sounds like a tasty soft-drink. I'm thirsty now.;)

[DavPeanut]

Originally posted by King Cobra
Too bad I missed seeing Hailey's comet in '86. Well, I plan to live until I see it again in person in 2062. Then I can die happily.
Same here. Actually, I want to live to be at least 150, so I can see Hailey's comet twice

[Gelfin]

Oh, I don't know, ten billion or so should about do it. Of course, I don't believe I get anything after I die, so I've got no particular reason to hurry on the end.

[King Cobra]

That is, if you can still se at 150. :rolleyes: :D

What I meant was that when I missed it in '86, I was alive back then, but I never remembered seeing it. The earliest I can remember anything was when I was three, not one. :(

>Sounds like a tasty soft-drink.

Sounds like it, but it isn't. :p

[Spike Spiegel]

while the population may be inefficiently distributed, there is also the factor that there is a lot of space on earth that is not pleasant to live on, under, in, whatever. Another inteesting observation: as civilization progresses, we lose some of our previous survival instincts;not lose per se, but we hide them to make way for social conventions and preconceived notions about how life should be lived. Hopefully, future generaltions will have what it takes to survive given the unstable nature of technology. As for the ideal age, it is natural to want to live for ever, and to deny that we WILL get old. Also, as medical technology increases and, say, if nano life-support ever becomes viable, what if all the nano machines crash or fail, there will always be diseases/bugs/events that threaten life on earth