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I wonder what the evolutionary engineering trade-off is there. Put it another way, it seems our systems are balanced to regulate cancer during our youth and re

I wonder what the evolutionary engineering trade-off is there. Put it another way, it seems our systems are balanced to regulate cancer during our youth and reproductive years to a low but non-zero level. Why hasn't evolution turned the dial up another couple of notches? Could be simple metabolic cost, or could be something else.

inglor_cz 1y ago
Not everything is necessarily a trade-off. Perhaps the bats just randomly hit a sweet spot that most of other species missed. As you say, things that happen later in the organism's life usually don't result in strong evolutionary effects.
- Earw0rm 1y ago
  Perhaps, but AFAIK similar things show up in other metabolically "different" animals - sharks, naked mole rats - whereas rodents adapted to a "run hot and fast" kind of a lifeplan seem to be especially prone. We know that the body has cancer suppressor mechanisms, because when they fail (due to HIV or genetic mutations) people suffer higher rates of the disease. So it's reasonable to guess that evolution has chosen not to dial them up further. It feels like the immune/inflammatory system is something we understand about as well as the brain, which is to say pretty good at a gross anatomical level, and also at the fine molecular level, but with a heck of a lot of complex system dynamics in between remaining to be mapped out.
coldtea 1y ago
>Why hasn't evolution turned the dial up another couple of notches? Because evolution doesn't care about us beyond reproduction age (after which is when most cancers occur, especially considering that historically that age was between say 16 and 35). Or even better phrased, because evolution doesn't care or plan at all, it's a blind mechanism. If a local minimum is ok, we'll stay there for as long as some environmental or other evolutionary pressure gets to move us further. Cancer wasn't a big issue for most of our existance as species, especially with lower life expectancies, more active lifestyles, zero obesity, zero pollutants, etc. In evolutionary terms, modern lifestyles are not even a blip, especially post-industrial ones which don't even register.
- wqaatwt 1y ago
  > zero pollutants In some cases it was pretty extreme by modern standards. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96tzi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96tzi Living in a longhouse full of smoke and no chimney might not be the healthiest thing.
  - coldtea 1y ago
    That's a very late specimen, and in fact one which "led scientists to speculate that he was involved in copper smelting", hardly typical of revolutionary timescales. In evolutionary timescales, agriculture and permanent houses are a dot in the timeline, there were no longhouse dwellers for 95% of homo sapiens' history, and none at all for hominids before homo sapiens. They were nomadic foragers.
- selcuka 1y ago
  > Because evolution doesn't care about us beyond reproduction age (after which is when most cancers occur, especially considering that historically that age was between say 16 and 35). True. If we can find a drug or gene therapy that extends the reproductive age of humans, evolution will take care of all diseases in a few million years, give or take.
- wyldfire 1y ago
  > Because evolution doesn't care about us beyond reproduction age I wonder if that's true. There's bound to be some benefits or drawbacks to aggregate fitness when people age. Sure, the contribution is very indirect and so it'll happen yet slower. But imagine if people lived until they were 300 years old. Depending on how frail they are, that could be a drag on reproduction and resources.
  - james_marks 1y ago
    My first take was, what’s the feedback mechanism? The benefits and drawbacks that appear after reproduction age can’t be passed on. But perhaps there’s social factor, like a better ability to protect offspring would pass traits down after DNA transfer.
laszlojamf 1y ago
Could be a cliff fitness function. Heard about this relativ typ schizophrenia here on HN a while back. The idea is that some phenotypes promote survival of the species overall, but due to random mutations are sometimes detrimental to individual members of that species
- sigmoid10 1y ago
  It could also be indirectly linked to other benefits. Humans have lost the CMAH gene, making us able to run long distances and hunt down large prey animals. But because of this we can no longer process specific sugars that you will still find in mammalian meat. That causes inflammation and arteriosclerosis. But those things only kill you after many decades, so there seems to have been a net positive effect on evolution.
  - bonsai_spool 1y ago
    This idea can generally work, but one should be careful of 'just-so' stories in evolutionary biology. It appears this deletion happens in other animals and may be attributable to pathogen pressure. It's arisen multiple times, which makes it hard to claim that it has a specific role in primates (beyond its presumed antimicrobial benefit, which any animal should enjoy). https://inflammregen.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s41232-025-00368-3 https://inflammregen.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s412...
    - sigmoid10 1y ago
      Evading pathogen pressure is just another benefit behind the scenes. The point is that I would be careful to attribute any of these things to such weird mechanisms when there are so many much more realistic explanations that we just haven't fully uncovered yet.
      - bonsai_spool 1y ago
        > Evading pathogen pressure is just another benefit behind the scenes. I'm imagining that this relates to a specific pathogen that may no longer exist (like the presumed mechanism of the most common cystic fibrosis mutations and cholera). I'm not sure how this would relate to humans running, however.
FollowingTheDao 1y ago
> it seems our systems are balanced to regulate cancer during our youth and reproductive years Yes, the most important question, and an easy answer if you know where to look. What is it that we lose when we age? Mineral and vitamin deficiencies can accelerate the mitochondrial decay of aging https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16102804/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16102804/ Age-associated B vitamin deficiency as a determinant of chronic diseases https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nutrition-research-reviews/article/ageassociated-b-vitamin-deficiency-as-a-determinant-of-chronic-diseases/29B81CEAEE37BB13C7373AFDE358070F https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nutrition-research-r... Emerging Roles of Vitamin B12 in Aging and Inflammation https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/25/9/5044 https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/25/9/5044 There is more if you want to look. Lots more.

inglor_cz 1y ago

Not everything is necessarily a trade-off. Perhaps the bats just randomly hit a sweet spot that most of other species missed. As you say, things that happen later in the organism's life usually don't result in strong evolutionary effects.

Earw0rm 1y ago
Perhaps, but AFAIK similar things show up in other metabolically "different" animals - sharks, naked mole rats - whereas rodents adapted to a "run hot and fast" kind of a lifeplan seem to be especially prone. We know that the body has cancer suppressor mechanisms, because when they fail (due to HIV or genetic mutations) people suffer higher rates of the disease. So it's reasonable to guess that evolution has chosen not to dial them up further. It feels like the immune/inflammatory system is something we understand about as well as the brain, which is to say pretty good at a gross anatomical level, and also at the fine molecular level, but with a heck of a lot of complex system dynamics in between remaining to be mapped out.

coldtea 1y ago

>Why hasn't evolution turned the dial up another couple of notches? Because evolution doesn't care about us beyond reproduction age (after which is when most cancers occur, especially considering that historically that age was between say 16 and 35). Or even better phrased, because evolution doesn't care or plan at all, it's a blind mechanism. If a local minimum is ok, we'll stay there for as long as some environmental or other evolutionary pressure gets to move us further. Cancer wasn't a big issue for most of our existance as species, especially with lower life expectancies, more active lifestyles, zero obesity, zero pollutants, etc. In evolutionary terms, modern lifestyles are not even a blip, especially post-industrial ones which don't even register.

wqaatwt 1y ago
> zero pollutants In some cases it was pretty extreme by modern standards. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96tzi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96tzi Living in a longhouse full of smoke and no chimney might not be the healthiest thing.
- coldtea 1y ago
  That's a very late specimen, and in fact one which "led scientists to speculate that he was involved in copper smelting", hardly typical of revolutionary timescales. In evolutionary timescales, agriculture and permanent houses are a dot in the timeline, there were no longhouse dwellers for 95% of homo sapiens' history, and none at all for hominids before homo sapiens. They were nomadic foragers.
selcuka 1y ago
> Because evolution doesn't care about us beyond reproduction age (after which is when most cancers occur, especially considering that historically that age was between say 16 and 35). True. If we can find a drug or gene therapy that extends the reproductive age of humans, evolution will take care of all diseases in a few million years, give or take.
wyldfire 1y ago
> Because evolution doesn't care about us beyond reproduction age I wonder if that's true. There's bound to be some benefits or drawbacks to aggregate fitness when people age. Sure, the contribution is very indirect and so it'll happen yet slower. But imagine if people lived until they were 300 years old. Depending on how frail they are, that could be a drag on reproduction and resources.
- james_marks 1y ago
  My first take was, what’s the feedback mechanism? The benefits and drawbacks that appear after reproduction age can’t be passed on. But perhaps there’s social factor, like a better ability to protect offspring would pass traits down after DNA transfer.

laszlojamf 1y ago

Could be a cliff fitness function. Heard about this relativ typ schizophrenia here on HN a while back. The idea is that some phenotypes promote survival of the species overall, but due to random mutations are sometimes detrimental to individual members of that species

sigmoid10 1y ago
It could also be indirectly linked to other benefits. Humans have lost the CMAH gene, making us able to run long distances and hunt down large prey animals. But because of this we can no longer process specific sugars that you will still find in mammalian meat. That causes inflammation and arteriosclerosis. But those things only kill you after many decades, so there seems to have been a net positive effect on evolution.
- bonsai_spool 1y ago
  This idea can generally work, but one should be careful of 'just-so' stories in evolutionary biology. It appears this deletion happens in other animals and may be attributable to pathogen pressure. It's arisen multiple times, which makes it hard to claim that it has a specific role in primates (beyond its presumed antimicrobial benefit, which any animal should enjoy). https://inflammregen.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s41232-025-00368-3 https://inflammregen.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s412...
  - sigmoid10 1y ago
    Evading pathogen pressure is just another benefit behind the scenes. The point is that I would be careful to attribute any of these things to such weird mechanisms when there are so many much more realistic explanations that we just haven't fully uncovered yet.
    - bonsai_spool 1y ago
      > Evading pathogen pressure is just another benefit behind the scenes. I'm imagining that this relates to a specific pathogen that may no longer exist (like the presumed mechanism of the most common cystic fibrosis mutations and cholera). I'm not sure how this would relate to humans running, however.

FollowingTheDao 1y ago

> it seems our systems are balanced to regulate cancer during our youth and reproductive years Yes, the most important question, and an easy answer if you know where to look. What is it that we lose when we age? Mineral and vitamin deficiencies can accelerate the mitochondrial decay of aging https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16102804/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16102804/ Age-associated B vitamin deficiency as a determinant of chronic diseases https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nutrition-research-reviews/article/ageassociated-b-vitamin-deficiency-as-a-determinant-of-chronic-diseases/29B81CEAEE37BB13C7373AFDE358070F https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nutrition-research-r... Emerging Roles of Vitamin B12 in Aging and Inflammation https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/25/9/5044 https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/25/9/5044 There is more if you want to look. Lots more.