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> Our maximum lifespan may not have changed much, if at all. But that’s not to delegitimise the extraordinary advances of the last few decades which have helped

> Our maximum lifespan may not have changed much, if at all. But that’s not to delegitimise the extraordinary advances of the last few decades which have helped so many more people reach that maximum lifespan, and live healthier lives overall. Sure, maximum might not be changing much, but the fact that the average has changed so drastically means there has been unfathomably less death and suffering than otherwise would have been. Also, the advances have not been just over the last few decades, but more likely one or two hundred years (i.e. since the industrial revolution). There are also serious thinkers (e.g. Kurzweil) who think that biotechnology will increase maximum lifespan pretty soon. I found it strange for an article tagged with 'Biology' to not talk about biotechnology potential related to longevity.

b_tterc_p 8y ago
Useful biotechnology may increase life expectancy in the near term, but not so differently as has been discussed here. We have basically zero chance of counteracting a life time of bioaccumulant toxins, telomere shortening, and numerous other shortcomings such that actual maximum lifespan sees a meaningful bump.
- schizoidboy 8y ago
  Why do you think it's basically zero? To me, it just seems like an (admittedly difficult) engineering problem that we're likely to make a lot of progress on. I'm currently studying biology and it's pretty amazing what humans have discovered in the last ~100 years about how the body works at the atomic level. As a meta-point, I find it fascinating how nearly completely divergent our bayesian priors are (I think our chances of counteracting all of those forces you mentioned are, on a long enough timeline and assuming we're not destroyed and we have sufficient energy, greater than 90%).
- Erlich_Bachman 8y ago
  There are other organisms that do this, so there is no physical limit in this. It's just an engineering problem. For example, telomere shortening is already being worked on. Look up Bioviva science, they have made first human experiments and results look very promising. I think people just got used to being fatalist in this regard, because it is psychologically easier than to tackle this problem.

b_tterc_p 8y ago

Useful biotechnology may increase life expectancy in the near term, but not so differently as has been discussed here. We have basically zero chance of counteracting a life time of bioaccumulant toxins, telomere shortening, and numerous other shortcomings such that actual maximum lifespan sees a meaningful bump.

schizoidboy 8y ago
Why do you think it's basically zero? To me, it just seems like an (admittedly difficult) engineering problem that we're likely to make a lot of progress on. I'm currently studying biology and it's pretty amazing what humans have discovered in the last ~100 years about how the body works at the atomic level. As a meta-point, I find it fascinating how nearly completely divergent our bayesian priors are (I think our chances of counteracting all of those forces you mentioned are, on a long enough timeline and assuming we're not destroyed and we have sufficient energy, greater than 90%).
Erlich_Bachman 8y ago
There are other organisms that do this, so there is no physical limit in this. It's just an engineering problem. For example, telomere shortening is already being worked on. Look up Bioviva science, they have made first human experiments and results look very promising. I think people just got used to being fatalist in this regard, because it is psychologically easier than to tackle this problem.