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This post fills me with questions. Foremost: What makes anti-aging technology unnatural compared to other medical treatments? To take one example, the smallpox

by rictic 13y ago

This post fills me with questions. Foremost: What makes anti-aging technology unnatural compared to other medical treatments? To take one example, the smallpox vaccine was initially considered unnatural, and an affront to God[1]. [1] http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/whitem10.html http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/whitem10.html

wpietri 13y ago
I think it's fair to call most medical treatments unnatural. That doesn't make them bad, but it should make us thoughtful and careful. Natural systems are often, thanks to evolution and adaptation, complicated and delicately balanced. I think reflexive appeals to tradition and novelty are both kind of dumb. But if people are going to err, I'd rather they erred on the side of tradition: at least that shit has been demonstrated to work in one fashion or another. I always try to keep in mind examples like Eben Byers [1], the THERAC 25 [2], and rabbits in Australia [3]. All sorts of stupid ideas look appealing at first. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Byers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Byers [2] http://courses.cs.vt.edu/cs3604/lib/Therac_25/Therac_1.html http://courses.cs.vt.edu/cs3604/lib/Therac_25/Therac_1.html [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbits_in_Australia#Effects_on_Australia.27s_ecology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbits_in_Australia#Effects_on...
- 31reasons 13y ago
  With your attitude I don't think we would ever invent or discover any medicine or treatment. Agreed, natural systems are complicated and delicately balanced, but we have Physics, Math, Chemistry and Computer Science to help us understand those delicately balanced and complicated systems. Please give some credit to Human Intelligence that itself is a product of millions of years of evolution. I often hear people saying "X can't be done because evolution perfected it". I call it bullshit. Evolutionary systems are not perfect and can be improved with right tools and we do have the tools.
  - wpietri 13y ago
    You seem to be arguing with a bunch of things I didn't say, while ignoring the things I did. I'm a giant fan of technology, and there are many amazing advances in medical tech. But I'm not a fan of thoughtless adoption of something just because it a) sounds good and b) is shiny and new.
- Udo 13y ago
  Sorry, I fat-fingered on the downvote button with my iDevice, I meant to vote you up (because of the first paragraph specifically, not so much the rest). Could someone counteract me, please?
  - pfortuny 13y ago
    Done.... Just you make a little sport in my stead and get a thinner thumb will you? Just kidding.
    - Udo 13y ago
      Thanks! Maybe I'll consider thumb-thinning surgery instead ;)
      - crgt 13y ago
        Sounds unnatural.
  - kbenson 13y ago
    That's a nice way to get at least a few upvotes for them, since I doubt you'll get just one taker.
- chc 13y ago
  Eben Byers was a victim of quack medicine, much like people nowadays who try to use magnets and sugar water to cure cancer. Bringing him up in a discussion of real medicine is frankly an insult to the researchers who do this stuff.
  - wpietri 13y ago
    Once you're done stroking your outrage gland, you might note that I didn't suggest an equivalence between these researchers and, well, anybody. I was talking about ideas made appealing by ignorance, ones that are dumb only in retrospect. The patent medicine Byers took was legal. Indeed his doctor recommended it to him. Unsurprising given that its seller, William J. A. Bailey, offered doctors a 17% kickback to prescribe the stuff. Even after this product was banned (because it finally killed a rich guy?), Bailey was never prosecuted, and continued to sell radium-related products after this. He died wealthy and free at the age of 64, nearly 14 years after killing Byers, and who knows how many other people. It's a fine example of what I was talking about, where erring on the side of the shiny and new was not a good heuristic; the people who stuck with the traditional and natural did better for themselves despite Bailey and Byers surely scoffing at them.
- itchitawa 13y ago
  One of the Therac-25 victims died 3 months later from cancer. Presumably the same cancer they were trying to treat, and thus avoided needing a hip replacement for the radiation damage. If your life is in such extreme danger from the disease itself, it can be worth taking risks with novel treatments. I'm sure some very old people with nothing to lose will be willing to try anti-aging, no matter how risky.
  - wpietri 13y ago
    The supposedly good idea I'm referring to for the Therac-25 isn't radiation therapy. It was using software to make something snazzily digital, but in a way that ignored the novel safety issues with digital devices.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
VLM 13y ago
Wouldn't this treatment system create an immense selection pressure against irrational belief? So kids born to families who think its an affront to god would not have the social / cultural / monetary resources to even begin to compete with kids born to more rational families? Not that I'm saying a selection pressure against irrational belief would be a negative or a problem, I'm just saying it would be strongly selected against?
- acgourley 13y ago
  Only if people who take this anti-aging have more offspring. It's quite possible the opposite would be true.. "oh there is no rush, maybe next decade"
  - VLM 13y ago
    I was thinking more in terms of reproductive success of kids who have enormous very old and presumably wise family members to act as mentors and advisors. I had a grandfather who rose to pretty high levels in the Army and executive level in a major national railroad, he could provide some advice about management. A G-Grandfather who was a good enough CPA to never end up unemployed in the great depression, he presumably could teach me a thing or two about accounting. A grandpa-in-law who was a successful combat medic, after treating combat injuries normal lifestyle trauma would make him handy to have around (edited to add, patching up blown off limbs made him a peace activist type in his later years, another good reason to keep him around). One of my grandma was one of those flapper / womens suffrage / womens lib radical types and she'd be a good influence on my daughter. If we extend life over 200 years, I have a Harvard lit prof in my ancestry who would be a handy tutor for my kids, and a civil war era land surveyor who could probably teach even me a thing or two about wilderness hiking and survival, etc. If you do enough genealogy, everyone's got enough "cool" in their ancestry, that if those ancestors were still alive, kids lifestyle would be radically improved compared to folks with dead ancestors. Of course human nature being what it is, the 10% of cool would come with 90% of hatred, bigotry, ignorance, blah blah, so you'd have to take it all with a grain of salt. (edited to add, and learning the critical thinking skills to take it all with a grain of salt, would overall be one of the most valuable skills...)
api 13y ago
"To take one example, the smallpox vaccine was initially considered unnatural, and an affront to God[1]." In hell, conservatives will have the ability to turn off the flames.
sytelus 13y ago
If something can be done, it can't be "unnatural". Unnatural things or processes DO NOT exists by definition.

by rictic 13y ago

wpietri 13y ago

I think it's fair to call most medical treatments unnatural. That doesn't make them bad, but it should make us thoughtful and careful. Natural systems are often, thanks to evolution and adaptation, complicated and delicately balanced. I think reflexive appeals to tradition and novelty are both kind of dumb. But if people are going to err, I'd rather they erred on the side of tradition: at least that shit has been demonstrated to work in one fashion or another. I always try to keep in mind examples like Eben Byers [1], the THERAC 25 [2], and rabbits in Australia [3]. All sorts of stupid ideas look appealing at first. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Byers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Byers [2] http://courses.cs.vt.edu/cs3604/lib/Therac_25/Therac_1.html http://courses.cs.vt.edu/cs3604/lib/Therac_25/Therac_1.html [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbits_in_Australia#Effects_on_Australia.27s_ecology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbits_in_Australia#Effects_on...

31reasons 13y ago
With your attitude I don't think we would ever invent or discover any medicine or treatment. Agreed, natural systems are complicated and delicately balanced, but we have Physics, Math, Chemistry and Computer Science to help us understand those delicately balanced and complicated systems. Please give some credit to Human Intelligence that itself is a product of millions of years of evolution. I often hear people saying "X can't be done because evolution perfected it". I call it bullshit. Evolutionary systems are not perfect and can be improved with right tools and we do have the tools.
- wpietri 13y ago
  You seem to be arguing with a bunch of things I didn't say, while ignoring the things I did. I'm a giant fan of technology, and there are many amazing advances in medical tech. But I'm not a fan of thoughtless adoption of something just because it a) sounds good and b) is shiny and new.
Udo 13y ago
Sorry, I fat-fingered on the downvote button with my iDevice, I meant to vote you up (because of the first paragraph specifically, not so much the rest). Could someone counteract me, please?
- pfortuny 13y ago
  Done.... Just you make a little sport in my stead and get a thinner thumb will you? Just kidding.
  - Udo 13y ago
    Thanks! Maybe I'll consider thumb-thinning surgery instead ;)
    - crgt 13y ago
      Sounds unnatural.
- kbenson 13y ago
  That's a nice way to get at least a few upvotes for them, since I doubt you'll get just one taker.
chc 13y ago
Eben Byers was a victim of quack medicine, much like people nowadays who try to use magnets and sugar water to cure cancer. Bringing him up in a discussion of real medicine is frankly an insult to the researchers who do this stuff.
- wpietri 13y ago
  Once you're done stroking your outrage gland, you might note that I didn't suggest an equivalence between these researchers and, well, anybody. I was talking about ideas made appealing by ignorance, ones that are dumb only in retrospect. The patent medicine Byers took was legal. Indeed his doctor recommended it to him. Unsurprising given that its seller, William J. A. Bailey, offered doctors a 17% kickback to prescribe the stuff. Even after this product was banned (because it finally killed a rich guy?), Bailey was never prosecuted, and continued to sell radium-related products after this. He died wealthy and free at the age of 64, nearly 14 years after killing Byers, and who knows how many other people. It's a fine example of what I was talking about, where erring on the side of the shiny and new was not a good heuristic; the people who stuck with the traditional and natural did better for themselves despite Bailey and Byers surely scoffing at them.
itchitawa 13y ago
One of the Therac-25 victims died 3 months later from cancer. Presumably the same cancer they were trying to treat, and thus avoided needing a hip replacement for the radiation damage. If your life is in such extreme danger from the disease itself, it can be worth taking risks with novel treatments. I'm sure some very old people with nothing to lose will be willing to try anti-aging, no matter how risky.
- wpietri 13y ago
  The supposedly good idea I'm referring to for the Therac-25 isn't radiation therapy. It was using software to make something snazzily digital, but in a way that ignored the novel safety issues with digital devices.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

VLM 13y ago

Wouldn't this treatment system create an immense selection pressure against irrational belief? So kids born to families who think its an affront to god would not have the social / cultural / monetary resources to even begin to compete with kids born to more rational families? Not that I'm saying a selection pressure against irrational belief would be a negative or a problem, I'm just saying it would be strongly selected against?

acgourley 13y ago
Only if people who take this anti-aging have more offspring. It's quite possible the opposite would be true.. "oh there is no rush, maybe next decade"
- VLM 13y ago
  I was thinking more in terms of reproductive success of kids who have enormous very old and presumably wise family members to act as mentors and advisors. I had a grandfather who rose to pretty high levels in the Army and executive level in a major national railroad, he could provide some advice about management. A G-Grandfather who was a good enough CPA to never end up unemployed in the great depression, he presumably could teach me a thing or two about accounting. A grandpa-in-law who was a successful combat medic, after treating combat injuries normal lifestyle trauma would make him handy to have around (edited to add, patching up blown off limbs made him a peace activist type in his later years, another good reason to keep him around). One of my grandma was one of those flapper / womens suffrage / womens lib radical types and she'd be a good influence on my daughter. If we extend life over 200 years, I have a Harvard lit prof in my ancestry who would be a handy tutor for my kids, and a civil war era land surveyor who could probably teach even me a thing or two about wilderness hiking and survival, etc. If you do enough genealogy, everyone's got enough "cool" in their ancestry, that if those ancestors were still alive, kids lifestyle would be radically improved compared to folks with dead ancestors. Of course human nature being what it is, the 10% of cool would come with 90% of hatred, bigotry, ignorance, blah blah, so you'd have to take it all with a grain of salt. (edited to add, and learning the critical thinking skills to take it all with a grain of salt, would overall be one of the most valuable skills...)

api 13y ago

"To take one example, the smallpox vaccine was initially considered unnatural, and an affront to God[1]." In hell, conservatives will have the ability to turn off the flames.

sytelus 13y ago

If something can be done, it can't be "unnatural". Unnatural things or processes DO NOT exists by definition.