5 ms·

Proof if it were needed that money can’t buy you brains. Making the leap from rodent models where a juvenile and elderly rodent shared a circulatory system to t

Proof if it were needed that money can’t buy you brains. Making the leap from rodent models where a juvenile and elderly rodent shared a circulatory system to transfusions is so breathtaking in its lack of basic sense that you have to wonder how these guys made it in tech to begin with. Never mind that we’re not rodents, and if we were we’d already be immortal with all we’ve cured mice of. Never mind the morality or risks, just focus on the stupidity of equivocating a pint of “young blood” with hooking your circulatory system to another organism! Is it really shocking that cadging the use of a young endocrine system, kidneys, lungs etc might help an older organism? No. Is it shocking that supposedly intelligent people have managed to conflate that with a transfusion? Yes!

Hasz 8y ago
I think you've been downvoted for conflating "good idea" with "good product". There's plenty of polished turds, that, marketed appropriately, will make their promoters and founders millions. I agree with you though -- the leaps here are tremendous, and likely unfounded.
tomp 8y ago
But why not? It seems that blood donation is a well-established medical practice, so presumably safe... So for minimal risk, you get a low-probability chance of tremendous benefit (life extension). Sounds very worth it.
- gotocake 8y ago
  Blood transfusion comes with a host of risks which increase the more you do it. Call me old fashioned, but I’d like to save up for a time when my life depends on not having an infusion reaction! I’m also getting the sense that you’re not quite getting what I’m saying about the difference between getting a bag of blood from a teenager, and having your circulatory system grafted onto a teenager. Even leaving aside the “we’re not mice” issue, you do see the difference not only in scale, but type right? Please say yes...
  - gscott 8y ago
    > having your circulatory system grafted onto a teenager. College students need money and spring break is a good time to be grafted onto an old rich guy for a week.
    - stickfigure 8y ago
      I'm mentally adjusting the applicability of Poe's Law to @awakeasleep's above comment: It's typically a blood plasma internship, done for exposure to the wealthy clients.
  - buboard 8y ago
    makes one wonder. what is the cost of a grafted teenager?
  - tomp 8y ago
    Sure, but that's just you. Personally, I definitely support people electing to do experimental treatments on themselves, as long as there's sufficient oversight. Especially people who are close to dying anyways (e.g. maybe not at 35, maybe yes at 95). Not sure what you're getting at with transfusion vs. circulatory system... I see 3 options: (1) works in mice but not in humans, (2) works in humans with just blood, (3) works in humans but needs more than blood (either whole "young circulatory system" or just parts of it, e.g. hormones etc.). So, you might be willing to experiment that (2) holds. I mean, if you're opposed to this, if you're certain it's immoral, wouldn't you also be opposed to any trials as well? After all, this is similar to a trial... Sure, it doesn't have as much value to the society, as it's not blind randomized, but it might still have tremendous value to an individual.
    - Junk_Collector 8y ago
      "Not sure what you're getting at with transfusion vs. circulatory system" Because having a graft like they did to the mice is closer to the equivalent of a new kidney, liver, lung, and pancreas transplant than it is to a blood transfusion. The original experiment is no where near close to what is being sold and there are no controlled trials that show a "young blood" transfusion provides benefit.
- Junk_Collector 8y ago
  Blood transfusion has a number of significant risks, just not in comparison to the cases where it is employed. From the FDA, "The more common risks are allergic reactions and transfusion associated circulatory overload and less common risks include transfusion related acute lung injury or transfusion associated circulatory overload and infectious disease transmission." A Sense of impending doom is a side effect of an incompatible blood transfusion and is typically followed by death. These companies are also mostly fly by night "move fast and break things" motto companies that do not undergo rigorous medical evaluations. A large part of the FDAs concern in their official statement is that these companies are not conducting clinical trials.
- devwastaken 8y ago
  "why not" is always a good way of killing people. If you don't know why and how, you don't know it's effects. The whole 'well it won't kill you' mentality of false medicine ends up prolonging the time, if ever, of a person getting real treatments. This is an infectious mentality, not just one individuals choice for themselves.
- notahacker 8y ago
  Another way of framing it is that by regularly accepting a low but non-zero risk of very serious consequences of blood transfusion, you get a possibility of magic happening which currently exists in the realm of conjecture. Not to mention that some people have established medical needs for plasma donations and the number of donors is not unlimited...
- daveFNbuck 8y ago
  Well-established medical practices aren't necessarily safe, they just have benefits that tend to outweigh the risks in normal use. When there are no established benefits, even a small risk is too much.
  - SilasX 8y ago
    >When there are no established benefits, even a small risk is too much. Then how are you ever supposed to establish the benefits in the first place?
    - daveFNbuck 8y ago
      Through the same scientific processes we use for to verify all medicine and medicinal procedures. You don't establish benefits by selling it to the public.
      - SilasX 8y ago
        Yes, but that would still be disallowed under the claim that “even a small risk is too much”, hence my point :-p
        daveFNbuck 8y ago
        I was saying this in the context of offering a treatment to the general public. That's very different from a clinical trial, where there are benefits beyond the immediate effects on the patient that help to justify the individual risk. The benefits of scientific studies on medical treatments are well-established. Even if you think you can find some weird corner case where this doesn't apply, do you disagree with the general principle that benefits should outweigh risks for medical procedures?
- DoreenMichele 8y ago
  Aside from very real medical concerns being covered in other comments, donors are typically anonymous. So I would be extremely leery of claims that it's from "young people" to begin with. Blood intended to save your life makes no unverifiable claims about the age of the donor. They are pretty strict about who can give blood, but this is not per se a pertinent metric normally.
- PhasmaFelis 8y ago
  > But why not? It seems that blood donation is a well-established medical practice, so presumably safe. It's safer than bleeding out and dying. That doesn't necessarily mean it's 100% risk free.
Junk_Collector 8y ago
The only thing that advances faster than science is the rate at which psuedo-science co-opts it to sell people snake oil.

Hasz 8y ago

I think you've been downvoted for conflating "good idea" with "good product". There's plenty of polished turds, that, marketed appropriately, will make their promoters and founders millions. I agree with you though -- the leaps here are tremendous, and likely unfounded.

tomp 8y ago

But why not? It seems that blood donation is a well-established medical practice, so presumably safe... So for minimal risk, you get a low-probability chance of tremendous benefit (life extension). Sounds very worth it.

gotocake 8y ago
Blood transfusion comes with a host of risks which increase the more you do it. Call me old fashioned, but I’d like to save up for a time when my life depends on not having an infusion reaction! I’m also getting the sense that you’re not quite getting what I’m saying about the difference between getting a bag of blood from a teenager, and having your circulatory system grafted onto a teenager. Even leaving aside the “we’re not mice” issue, you do see the difference not only in scale, but type right? Please say yes...
- gscott 8y ago
  > having your circulatory system grafted onto a teenager. College students need money and spring break is a good time to be grafted onto an old rich guy for a week.
  - stickfigure 8y ago
    I'm mentally adjusting the applicability of Poe's Law to @awakeasleep's above comment: It's typically a blood plasma internship, done for exposure to the wealthy clients.
- buboard 8y ago
  makes one wonder. what is the cost of a grafted teenager?
- tomp 8y ago
  Sure, but that's just you. Personally, I definitely support people electing to do experimental treatments on themselves, as long as there's sufficient oversight. Especially people who are close to dying anyways (e.g. maybe not at 35, maybe yes at 95). Not sure what you're getting at with transfusion vs. circulatory system... I see 3 options: (1) works in mice but not in humans, (2) works in humans with just blood, (3) works in humans but needs more than blood (either whole "young circulatory system" or just parts of it, e.g. hormones etc.). So, you might be willing to experiment that (2) holds. I mean, if you're opposed to this, if you're certain it's immoral, wouldn't you also be opposed to any trials as well? After all, this is similar to a trial... Sure, it doesn't have as much value to the society, as it's not blind randomized, but it might still have tremendous value to an individual.
  - Junk_Collector 8y ago
    "Not sure what you're getting at with transfusion vs. circulatory system" Because having a graft like they did to the mice is closer to the equivalent of a new kidney, liver, lung, and pancreas transplant than it is to a blood transfusion. The original experiment is no where near close to what is being sold and there are no controlled trials that show a "young blood" transfusion provides benefit.
Junk_Collector 8y ago
Blood transfusion has a number of significant risks, just not in comparison to the cases where it is employed. From the FDA, "The more common risks are allergic reactions and transfusion associated circulatory overload and less common risks include transfusion related acute lung injury or transfusion associated circulatory overload and infectious disease transmission." A Sense of impending doom is a side effect of an incompatible blood transfusion and is typically followed by death. These companies are also mostly fly by night "move fast and break things" motto companies that do not undergo rigorous medical evaluations. A large part of the FDAs concern in their official statement is that these companies are not conducting clinical trials.
devwastaken 8y ago
"why not" is always a good way of killing people. If you don't know why and how, you don't know it's effects. The whole 'well it won't kill you' mentality of false medicine ends up prolonging the time, if ever, of a person getting real treatments. This is an infectious mentality, not just one individuals choice for themselves.
notahacker 8y ago
Another way of framing it is that by regularly accepting a low but non-zero risk of very serious consequences of blood transfusion, you get a possibility of magic happening which currently exists in the realm of conjecture. Not to mention that some people have established medical needs for plasma donations and the number of donors is not unlimited...
daveFNbuck 8y ago
Well-established medical practices aren't necessarily safe, they just have benefits that tend to outweigh the risks in normal use. When there are no established benefits, even a small risk is too much.
- SilasX 8y ago
  >When there are no established benefits, even a small risk is too much. Then how are you ever supposed to establish the benefits in the first place?
  - daveFNbuck 8y ago
    Through the same scientific processes we use for to verify all medicine and medicinal procedures. You don't establish benefits by selling it to the public.
    - SilasX 8y ago
      Yes, but that would still be disallowed under the claim that “even a small risk is too much”, hence my point :-p
      - daveFNbuck 8y ago
        I was saying this in the context of offering a treatment to the general public. That's very different from a clinical trial, where there are benefits beyond the immediate effects on the patient that help to justify the individual risk. The benefits of scientific studies on medical treatments are well-established. Even if you think you can find some weird corner case where this doesn't apply, do you disagree with the general principle that benefits should outweigh risks for medical procedures?
DoreenMichele 8y ago
Aside from very real medical concerns being covered in other comments, donors are typically anonymous. So I would be extremely leery of claims that it's from "young people" to begin with. Blood intended to save your life makes no unverifiable claims about the age of the donor. They are pretty strict about who can give blood, but this is not per se a pertinent metric normally.
PhasmaFelis 8y ago
> But why not? It seems that blood donation is a well-established medical practice, so presumably safe. It's safer than bleeding out and dying. That doesn't necessarily mean it's 100% risk free.

Junk_Collector 8y ago

The only thing that advances faster than science is the rate at which psuedo-science co-opts it to sell people snake oil.