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▲ Blood cells from 80-year-old donor become stem cells with molecular age under 20(doi.org)
136 points by arunc 6 hours ago | 98 comments

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC13634082/

▲ympb121 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It may be a dumb reason to do it, but recently I've started to focus on my health a bit more because of news like this (more exercise and healthier food).

The thinking is, if we find a way to massively extend the human lifespan/reverse aging I want to live long enough for that.

I'd be pissed if we as humanity solved aging and I die just before that, not taking any chances.

▲dsign 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I doubt that we will get there in my lifetime. Science is one thing, and maybe AI will super-charge some of it. But experiments will need to be made, and that needs brick and mortar labs, and labs need money, and at least right now, the absurd amounts of investments are not going in that direction. Oh, and did I mention regulators? They are very, very slow.

There could, however, be some promising signs down the road, like more capable in-silico methods, which will make it possible to bypass some/more of the brick and mortar labs. Another sign to watch for are orders of magnitude more companies and cartels of individuals doing advanced bioengineering outside of USA.

▲anotherpaul 14 minutes ago | parent [-]

Actually aging research is probably really well funded in comparison. Loads of billionaires are investing. So at least money is not the issue. Morals and time. Sure, and then regulators.

One big thing with aging research is though that it just needs time. No shortcuts really. You don't know it works until the first people love another few years.

▲c22 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Better stack your chips too. At this point I think there's a fair chance massive life extension will be available before I die, but I likely wont be able to afford it.

▲cryptoegorophy 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Why? If you can live 500 years just focus 20 years on compound interest hard, then retire for 400 years?

▲Swizec 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> Why? If you can live 500 years just focus 20 years on compound interest hard, then retire for 400 years?

The first version of this technology will only be available to billionaires. So if you reach 70 when it’s invented and are not a billionaire, you’ll never get to try the 500 years of compounding trick

We’re likely to see this stuff get invented in our lifetimes (I’m 38), maybe practical, but we’re def all too old to see it become widely available.

Then again, life extension will not be a singular technology. You could argue antibiotics and vaccines were the first big step and those became affordable within a few decades of invention

▲giardini an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Make a loan and pay for the life extension treatment over your extended lifetime.

▲kcarter80 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Seems like you are interested in living longer. One cool trick to doing that has always been to focus on your health. Are you saying that before recent developments the extension of life benefit wasn't worth it for you? By the way, when you die it's impossible to be "pissed".

▲easygenes 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Maybe they mean the compromises they're making didn't weigh out enough to be motivating over the thought of just a few more years, but if those few years might make the difference to catching an opportunity for double or more the years it's suddenly motivating enough.

▲ 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]
[deleted]
▲androiddrew 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

lol, I am kind of in the same mode of thought but just kind of expect it not to happen.

There was a really shitty movie starring Jared Leto I think about the same problem. Being the last guy to miss out on being immortal

▲smotched 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Mr. Nobody is not a bad movie!

▲vinyl7 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I'm not so sure humanity will be around that long

▲downrightmike an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

massive calorie deficit seems to be the best. But then you need to be on the edge of starvation the whole time

▲SubiculumCode 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

More like we solve aging but then we get smacked down by our new AI overlords

▲inshard 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Slightly tangential: Michael Levin’s work on bioelectricity and cell reprogramming is pretty interesting in context of emergent behaviors in groups of cells. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Levin_(biologist)

▲taneq 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Sounds like the immortal jellyfish solution. We squeeze entropy out of our DNA by creating a new fresh cell (ovum) that’s very sensitive to genetic defects, meaning if it survives it’s probably good. The jellyfish just shrinks back to a single cell (presumably with some mechanism for keeping the ‘best’ cell) to reset the damage. This is doing the same thing, but piece by piece.

Edit: And wow, that abstract appears to have eaten an entire thesaurus.

▲bitwize 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Because this is the worst timeline, we're getting cell reprogramming used to grow artificial brains to run AI workloads before functional aging remediation... let alone GTA VI.

▲layer8 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

If something like this ever becomes a practical application on the organismal level, the octogenarian dictators of the world will rejoice.

▲mullingitover 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

An individual pancreas cell discovering the secret to immortality is a triumph for that cell, and a real bad thing for the body. This is like that, but for the entire human population.

▲skissane 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Even if medical science one day eliminates aging and disease, nobody is going to live forever—eventually you’ll succumb to an accident, or war, or homicide.

▲consp 11 minutes ago | parent [-]

I'd say famine is equally as likely if not more at scale.

▲torben-friis 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Eh, we might see some benefit to leaders having a reason to care about stuff 10+ years from now.

▲Waterluvian 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I feel like AI has opened a door of plausibility to Black Mirror or Twilight Zone concepts more than any other novel technology in my lifetime.

What if living 300 years meant the entire tempo of human living changes. That we all just slow right down because having control over our aging and when it happens. To be able to decide to extend your 20s… or not. To spend decades in your 30s. How would that change what’s important to us?

▲idiotsecant 2 hours ago | parent [-]

I think it's much more likely that those who were first to 200-300 years old will use those years to build resources and deny them to others, especially those not yet modified. It would be a permanent over class. Less Issac Asimov, more Richard K. Morgan.

▲axus 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

That'll be the commoners' problem; they'll be planning out how to survive the next 300 years.

▲deadbabe 5 hours ago | parent [-]

They cannot survive the next 300 years unless we all survive the next 300 years. A dictator is motivated by having power over others, not being some lone survivalist fending for himself in nature.

▲LastTrain an hour ago | parent [-]

Playing along here, they don’t need /all/ of us to survive, just the desirable ones.

▲malloryerik 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Putin keeps talking about living forever, which makes his nuclear threats a bit less worrisome.

▲neom 4 hours ago | parent [-]

If you're listening just covered this the other day, they did a good job, worth a watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQFE_3Mr4yQ (If you're listening is generally pretty good)

▲EA-3167 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I’d be far more worried about this causing turbo cancer than immortality in dictators.

▲King-Aaron 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It might be beneficial if it gives turbo cancer to the dictators, of course.

▲bitwize 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It turns out that if you trigger all four Yamanaka factors—yeah, turbo cancer. But if you trigger only three of the four, you can trigger a reversion to the stem cell state without the increased cancer risk.

▲robwwilliams 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Dubious. Do you have a reference or two? In general biological systems are not this simple.

▲deadbabe 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

What if we cure cancer with AI very soon? Give it 10 years.

▲vibrio 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Remind me of the chance some same AI kills us all before 10 years?

▲EA-3167 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Funny you mention that, I guess this is a new cult maxim for the faithful?

https://fixvx.com/Kalshi/status/2109791302674235656?s=20

Save us all from people like this.

▲robwwilliams 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not to mention the two leading septuagenarian dictators: Putin and Xi.

▲lilycarranza999 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[dead]

▲yieldcrv 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

and the bourgeoisie, a temporary regulation would be needed in those areas of the world to separate the upper class from the capability of the rulers

in western nations where that’s not possible, I could see national bans, but one weak link globally and everyone wealthy will get their treatment there

▲SOLAR_FIELDS 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The world of Altered Carbon seems more and more possible every day.

▲Bluestein 5 hours ago | parent [-]

My goodness, what a show that was.-

▲clem 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I heard they based a book on it.

▲walterbell 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Co-produced by David Ellison and James Vanderbilt.

▲Loughla 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

An undying trillionaire class definitely sounds like a possible future. Not an ideal one, mind you, but definitely in the realm of possibilities.

I'm calling it now, Qatar will be the place that allows these treatments once they're a real thing.

I have to imagine the Uber wealthy are pouring money into youthful longevity science.

▲selimthegrim 5 hours ago | parent [-]

The Island of Dr. Ellison

▲lilycarranza999 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[dead]

▲moralestapia 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

To expand, we might find out the hard way that having an expiration date was a feature of our species, not a flaw.

▲card_zero 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Walk me through it: in order to get dictators killed, because they defend themselves very effectively, we should put everybody on the planet under a biological death sentence, which will get the dictators too.

No, I cannot endorse this.

▲setr 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Science moves forward one death at a time

So at least two systems run better with the implicit time limit.

▲card_zero 4 hours ago | parent [-]

We should kill the dictators deliberately, improve our biology deliberately, and get stuffy old people like me to change their minds deliberately. No stupid use of death as a proxy, it's a horribly blunt instrument. "Let your ideas die in your place".

Besides, maybe it's the young people who are the most dogmatic. Studies are inconclusive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck%27s_principle#Rebuttal If we're going to go around killing people for having rigid ideas, perhaps concentrate on the young ones, for statistical reasons.

▲idiotsecant 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Humans who get old and comfortable often become quite terrible people.

▲card_zero an hour ago | parent [-]

That's a perception. Do they, though? If so, why? "I hope I die before I get old", sang The Who. Roger Daltrey is 82. Trump (slightly younger) was one of His Generation, although I expect he probably wasn't a mod. But what I mean is, the coercive oppression visited upon you by your elders is coming from the youth of yesterday, who had it lurking in them latently, waiting to gain status and money and influence. Those things arrive gradually (if at all) along with age, and I guess they make a person complacently comfortable, but the driving cause is that the person is a coercive dogmatist with a drive to oppress inferiors, and always was in most cases, because we don't usually learn to be wronger,* only how to express our terrible attitudes. So age isn't doing this, it's just revealing it.

* Undoubtedly sometimes the spark of malevolence develops into more coherent and sophisticated badness, I have to admit, so an old person has had more time to mature into being truly terrible. But this is against the pressure of rationality.

▲mullingitover 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's a feature of every species that evolves. You can't evolve if you're striving to outcompete your offspring. You quickly game out that not having offspring is the winning chess move there. Now you're not having offspring, and thus you're not evolving. Then the environment changes and you, being unable to adapt in any way, go extinct.

▲robwwilliams 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Definitely a feature: Disposable soma theory of Kirkwood. Your germline is the real “you”.

▲suslik 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Of course it's a feature; it still doesn't mean it cannot be stopped or considerably postponed.

▲TedDoesntTalk 5 hours ago | parent [-]

I’m always fascinated by people who think death can be “stopped” (not postponed, but eliminated). Fascinating.

▲suslik 5 hours ago | parent [-]

Is there a reason why it can't possibly be stopped?

▲TedDoesntTalk 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Everything we have witnessed that arises also passes away. Every living thing, every dead thing - even stars and planets - arise and pass away.

I feel it’s the ultimate hubris to think we can cheat death.

Moreover, why would you want immortality?

Many books of fiction and poetry discuss the curse of immortality.

Here are a few:

The Immortal, Jorge Luis Borges (1947)

A man discovers a source of immortality, but eternity eventually destroys the significance of individual experiences. When everything can happen infinitely, nothing feels particularly important.

The Mortal Immortal — Mary Shelley (1833) - also wrote Frankenstein

A man drinks an elixir and lives for centuries without substantially aging. He watches his wife grow old and die, and becomes increasingly alienated from humanity. Shelley focuses on loneliness and the psychological weight of endless time.

All Men Are Mortal — Simone de Beauvoir (1946)

An immortal man lives through centuries of history, relationships, and political upheaval. Gradually he discovers that even extraordinary achievements seem meaningless when time is unlimited.

The Makropulos Affair — Karel Čapek (1922)

A woman lives more than 300 years through an elixir. She retains her youth but becomes emotionally exhausted, cynical, and incapable of finding pleasure.

—

There are more. Sure, these are fiction. But use your imagination. Why would you want immortality, even if you could retain perfect health indefinitely?

▲ryuuseijin 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Great list. Also, Anne Rice's Vampire stories.

I like Alan Watt's view on death: "it's absurd to worry about death because when you're dead, you've got nothing to worry about, so you'll be alright".

And Neil deGrasse Tyson, I think in reference to life after death: "it's the same as before you were born". Kind of mindblowing perspective - you've already experienced the state of not existing, it's the same as before you were born.

This brings it home that really it's the now you should learn to live and appreciate to the fullest instead, not some future you have no control over. Still struggling how that translates into worrying about my future health, but I suppose there is still the now of the future to worry about.

▲rootusrootus an hour ago | parent [-]

> it's the same as before you were born.

That's how I've long viewed it. As a practical matter we live "forever." Still makes me a tad nervous if I find myself thinking about it in the dark at 2am, but during the day it is a satisfactory explanation.

▲RuslanL 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Or perhaps these authors could not imagine what being 100+ years of healthspan person would actually be like.

Imagine a civilization where death from biological aging would've happened at the age of 12. Would authors from such civilization be able to predict how a 45 year old would function? Or just extrapolate their (maximum 12) years old experience and come to the conclusion that being past 40 is so psychologically damaging that it would've been better to keep things the default way?

Note that I have just used my imagination, and came to different conclusions, so we are on the equal terms with said authors.

▲snk 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not everything; only 93% of humans have died, for example. Past != future.

▲orangecat 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I feel it’s the ultimate hubris to think we can cheat death.

And if we were meant to fly we'd have wings, and diseases are the gods punishing us for our sins.

Moreover, why would you want immortality?

I don't know about immortality, but I'd definitely like more than 80 years, and I'd like to be in good health for as long as I am alive.

Many books of fiction and poetry discuss the curse of immortality.

Yes, and those are almost entirely cope.

▲Nursie 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Because one lifetime is not enough to experience everything the world has to offer.

If one doesn't have to watch ones spouse, friends and family grow old and die, because it is available widely, that removes some of your objections.

Personally I don't subscribe to the idea that things lose meaning in a longer life, I find it a 'just so' story of self comfort in the face of the inevitable.

▲ribosometronome 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Why would someone want to live 100 years? 80? 60? 40? 20? Were ultimately just saying we like living and would like to keep living until we decide we don’t want to anymore. The thought that people might like living longer than they get is pretty well supported by every dying person who doesn’t want to die rather than just some speculative fiction.

▲card_zero 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

That is a really wanky, lazy, cliched, annoying trope - to a longevity advocate, of course. For the many people who inexplicably think death is friendly and wonderful, these tired old storylines are utterly insightful. (see also: Doctor Who, they did stories about immortality-seeking villains a few times.)

▲RuslanL 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> Doctor Who

This is a bit ironic, considering the lifespan of Time Lords in that universe.

▲jojobas 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Well if one can live to the heat death of the universe I'll count it as prevented, not postponed, death.

▲card_zero 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Well, accidents. Inconveniently close supernovas. Something is likely to get you eventually, some few millennia later.

▲bloqs 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Neurogenesis slows for a similar reason

▲ 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]
[deleted]
▲lilycarranza999 6 hours ago | parent [-]

[dead]

▲dyauspitr 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

That’s a coping mechanism because we can’t change it.

▲hootz 5 hours ago | parent [-]

Wasn't death a requirement for us to reach this current stage of human evolution? I don't think it is a good idea to stop it entirely.

▲jeremyjh 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Evolution of humans by natural selection is already over with - or at least proceeding at time scales irrelevant to our civilization.

▲card_zero 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

"Contrary to popular belief," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recent_human_evolution

I don't think it matters, mind you.

▲snk 4 hours ago | parent [-]

If it doesn't matter then it is not evolution, right?

▲card_zero 4 hours ago | parent [-]

So it's things like: some people died because there was a famine and they didn't have lactose tolerance (and thus didn't have any cows, or they'd just eat the cows, a detail). Some people died due to having unnecessarily large and sturdy jaws in the era of cooked food. (Not sure how this would cause death, perhaps due to greater surface area for tooth trouble? It's always the teeth.) Then, their offspring - wait, I mean other people's offspring - are more adapted and less vulnerable.

Well sure, we should become less vulnerable, including biologically. But there are better ways to accomplish this than having people killed.

▲ 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]
[deleted]
▲bravoetch 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not sure about death being required. It's more that life after reproductive success is not required.

▲robwwilliams 4 hours ago | parent [-]

…that longer life after reproductive exhaustion is not under selection.”

▲idle_zealot 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Curing aging doesn't stop death entirely. There's still the attrition of living in the physical world. Some portion of the population will trip and break their necks every year.

▲shrubble 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

All it would take would be one billionaire who invested in long term bonds, à la Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy…

▲LoganDark 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Indeed; the biggest reason is surely cancer.

▲lilycarranza999 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[dead]

▲sgnelson 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

My nightmare is that we solve aging just in time for the Baby Boomers to live forever.

▲dang 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Please keep generational flamewar off HN.

▲plutomeetsyou 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

not if every other generation also lives long enough to become the baby boomers.

▲ 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]
[deleted]
▲black_13 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[dead]

▲m463 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

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sigh.
▲someothherguyy 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC13634082/

▲m463 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

awesome, thanks!

▲lilycarranza999 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[dead]

▲yieldcrv 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I’m on a ton of lists and I still have tsa pre and global entry

▲OJFord 6 hours ago | parent [-]

Interesting flex, is that a metric or an American tonne?

▲yieldcrv 5 hours ago | parent [-]

there’s enough context to guess