How Far Should Scientists Try to Extend the Human Life Span?

June 17, 2008

British biomedical gerontologist Aubrey de Grey might look like a ZZ Top wannabee, but don’t let the beard deter you from contemplating his novel concept of strategies for engineered negligible senescence. Basically, what he wants to do is re-engineer the human body at the cellular level to prevent — or reverse — the aging process, and extend the human life span by centuries or longer. Here’s a video of de Grey explaining SENS, in his wonderful Masterpiece Theatre-esque accent:

Before you dismiss de Grey as some sort of snake-oil salesman, consider that he’s sufficiently brilliant to have been awarded a doctorate by prestigious Cambridge University without having to take any classes, strictly on the merits of The Mitochondrial Free Radical Theory of Aging, a 1999 book in which he made the case that preventing damage to mitochondrial DNA might stem the usual effects of aging and significantly extend the human life span. Indeed, he’s not only published more than 60 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals, but also edits one, the bimonthly Rejuvenation Research. A lot of big-brained Silicon Valley folks take his ideas very seriously; Peter A. Thiel, co-founder and former chief executive officer of PayPal, has donated $3.5 million to de Grey’s Methuselah Foundation, which funds research on anti-aging biomedicine.

According to an explanatory essay on the foundation’s Web site, the increasing physical decrepitude that we associate with aging is the result of cellular and molecular damage that’s a side effect of normal metabolism. De Grey argues that simply medically treating the effects of aging, or trying to slow the metabolic processes that cause the damage, won’t do the trick. Here’s what he would do:

Instead of interfering with the metabolic processes that ongoingly cause aging damage (the “gerontological” approach) or fighting a losing battle to keep badly damaged bodies from falling apart altogether (the “geriatric,” conventional medical approach), the “engineering” strategy is based on the direct repair, replacement or rendering harmless of the damaged structures themselves. In this approach, metabolism still causes ongoing damage, but the total burden of such damage is repaired well enough to prevent eventual pathology indefinitely.

Thus, the engineering strategy avoids both of the problems with the other approaches: it sidesteps our ignorance of metabolism (because it does not attempt to interfere with metabolic processes) but also pre-empts the chaos of pathology (because it prevents the precursors of that pathology from reaching dangerous levels). Instead, this approach allows us to perpetually maintain youthful health and functionality, because the total burden of damage is always maintained at levels similar to a biologically young person's.

In a 2005 LiveScience.com interview, de Grey even set a timetable for victory in the war against old age.

The first part of the project is to get really impressive results in mice. The reason that's important is because mice are sufficiently furry and people can identify with them. If we get really impressive results in mice, then people will believe that it's possible to do it in humans, whereas if you double the life span of a fruit fly, people aren't going to be terribly interested.

Now, what I want to do in mice is not only develop interventions which extend their healthy life span by a substantial amount, but moreover, to do so when the mouse is already in middle age. This is very important, because if you do things to the mouse's genes before the mouse is even conceived, then people who are alive can't really identify with that.

I reckon it will be about 10 years before we can achieve the degree of life extension with late onset interventions that will be necessary to prove to society's satisfaction that this is feasible. It could be longer, but I think that so long as the funding is there, then it should be about 10 years.

Step 2 will involve translating that technology to humans. And because that's further in the future, it's much more speculative about how long that's going to take. But I think we have a 50-50 chance of doing it within about 15 years from the point where we get results with the mice. So 25 years from now.

Quite a few scientists — including the ones who authored this critique of SENS — disagree with de Grey’s rosy scenario for human life span extension. But let’s assume for a moment that he is on to something. If we do develop the means to extend the human life span indefinitely, should we actually do it? In an article about de Grey in Technology Review, Yale University medical school professor and bioethicist Sherwin Nuland had this to say:

For reasons that are pragmatic, scientific, demographic, economic, political, social, emotional and secularly spiritual, I am committed to the notion that both individual fulfillment and the ecological balance of life on this planet are best served by dying when our inherent biology decrees that we do. I am equally committed to making that age as close to our biologically probable maximum of approximately 120 years as modern biomedicine can achieve, and also to efforts at decreasing and compressing the years of morbidity and disabilities now attendant on extreme old age. But I cannot imagine that the consequences of doing a single thing beyond these efforts will be anything but baleful, not only for each of us as an individual, but for every other living creature in our world.

Indeed, eliminating death from old age could have some dire impacts. For one, it might exacerbate the population growth that already has our planet’s stressed-out ecosystem on the verge of collapse. If workers don’t age, they might not ever retire, in which case job prospects for future generations would become pretty bleak. If they don’t, the Social Security system is toast. And with baby boomers possibly surviving into the next millennium, we’re all going to get pretty sick of hearing the same classic rock  hits on the radio, over and over and over.

So what do you think? Should scientists pursue de Grey’s vision of extending the human life span? Or should they leave immortality alone? Post your comments below.

Comments

[Jason]

Dr. Nuland should prevent his social, political, and spiritual views from interfering with good science. If humans are able to increase their lifespan indefinitely, they should not be prevented from doing so. Society and politics can change to fit a new age of near immortal humans; what are most valuable are the precious lives of actual human beings.

[CS]

Dr. de Gray will be speaking at UCLA's Royce Hall on June 27, 2008 at Aging 2008. It's free to the public, but you'll need to register in advance here: http://www.mfoundation.org/Aging2008

[Erik the Viking]

I agree with Jason. People always talk about the downside of life extension, such as population increases. But there would be some major benefits to society as well. Imagine if scientists had hundreds of years to do really long-range experiments or simply to amass more knowledge. That sort of continuity could really advance our civilization.

[Nathalie]

If life is extended, automatically the population will increase. We need to feed this population and find place to live. We cannot feed all the population on earth at this moment. You cannot talk about extending life without consequence. I agree that scientist would be a great asset, but will criminals be? And we cannot choose who gets to live longer. What will we do with all this time to live? Once we achieve our goals and experience everything, what's next?

[Sweet Zombie Jesus]

If they can extend the human life span long enough, maybe I can finally get around to watching all those TV episodes that I've got recorded on my TiVo.

[Tavernier]

Immortality would be wasted on people like you.

[Caffeine Driven Stress Magnet]

I could see the advantages of living for 100 years, as long as you're healthy. But several centuries might be too much.

[Joey]

I wonder if there was a time, earlier in human existence, when people repaired their cells naturally through diet and meditation. There are stories of monks in China and elsewhere who had very long lifespans. What de Grey is proposing is perhaps a modern technological approach to this.

[Ted]

Even if you could reverse aging, what about diseases?

[Ted]

I do not agree with Dr. de Grey's theory of anti-aging. I believe that yes it is technologically possible, but it is not ethically probable.
Every human being wishes to live forever, even I do, but what we wish for comes at a price. How many times have the human race seen our experiments gone out of hand? How many times have we approached the threshold of God and nature and be thrown down? History tells us not to do this. Look at the atomic bomb and how it changed our world forever. That was a result of pure, simple human curiosity. And also at a more literary perspective, look at Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. What Victor Frankenstein did was wrong because he challenged not only God, but he challenged nature. And I believe we all know what happens when we challenge nature, look at at our present state of global warming. Global warming is a result of humans taking earth by the horns and trying to wrestle it to the ground, and it will destroy us. If we engineer ourselves to be immortal, nature will lash out at us violently.
Now I do not want to seem like I am admonishing Dr. de Grey's work. I think it is fabulous work. But before we move forward, look at the clear warning signs from our past. The human experience is about learning from our past mistakes, not repeating them.

[Immortal]

Check out the Immortality Institute http://imminst.org/

[Michael Peters]

Mankind has already extended his natural lifespan by quite a bit since his early history. We have always relied on our skill at manipulating the things around us to survive. The first element we learned to use was fire, and this supplied us with an ally that would protect us from almost every natural threat around us. The manipulation of nature is our nature, and this will most certainly lead us down a path to longer and longer lifespans.

[Pal74]

I think Dr. de Grey should proceed with his research - if he succeeds it only means that immortality is possible, not that people have to do it. In the end I believe that it will come down to a personal choice as to whether a person wants to be immortal or not. Some might live a few hundred years, but after the "originality" wears off people might not really want to live forever.

The increase in population might not be as big a problem as you might think. The only reason why the Earth seems crowded is because everybody wants to live in the exact same place as everybody else. True, humans would have to adapt to many changes but we have been doing that for thousands of years. On the bright side a large population might get the work week shortened to say, three four hour work days.

[Natural Man]

Think of how hard it will be to get concert tickets, though.

[Mothra]

If bodies don't wear out...it might be kind of interesting. You wouldn't get bored because you would constantly be creating new stuff.

[Vicki]

I dont know why everyone, ie the medical profession, assumes that everyone wants to live forever. I certainly do not, I am 65 years old and I am waiting for my "time" to go to leave this place. I have had quite enough thank you.

[Patrick Kiger]

Well, I hope you hang around a bit longer--I need all the readers I can get!

[madd]

"Immortality" is not possible, accidental deaths, however improbable they become, will still occur. Perhaps humans may employ their cognitive skills sufficiently to continue their recreational sexual activities without the attendant procreation - perhaps. If someone wishes to opt-out of an extended lifespan, let them.

[Angie]

Why mess with nature anymore then we already have. Humans are a selfish species, and we are destroying the earth. The world is already over-populated as it is. Think about the big picture not just "scientists having 100's of years to work on things"....criminals will be in prisons for hundreds of years, and we'll being paying for their stay for hundreds of years..The ill will be in hospitals much longer, the poor suffering through desparate times for a very long time, when will you retire?? after you are 1,097 years old...No thank you.

[Angie]

"The increase in population might not be as big a problem as you might think. The only reason why the Earth seems crowded is because everybody wants to live in the exact same place as everybody else. True, humans would have to adapt to many changes but we have been doing that for thousands of years. On the bright side a large population might get the work week shortened to say, three four hour work days."

In response to this...(applying to the USA) It's hard enough to find jobs now...how would more people living longer (and not retiring) benefit the situation??

Also with people living for hundreds of years, my guess is that they would be having more children being that their bodies would age at a much slower pace. Meaning that yes, overpopulation would be an issue! I just think the entire idea is silly.

[Cynthia]

The truth is this technology would probably be expensive at first and not available to all, especially the criminals and the very poor.

[Jenni]

I think this is a very great idea. The only problem would be who it would be avalible to and the problem with managing population. As you can already see, we're living longer and unfortunately our population is booming exponentionally as well. If they do figure out how to reverse aging, they will have to set some sort of limits and boundries to maintain balance with humans and nature.

[Pete Canfield]

I am reminded of a line from "All My Trials" (a negro spiritual from the 19th century) that goes: "If life were a thing money could buy, the rich would live, and the poor would die...". Need I say more?

[Kain]

Humans should use any and all advantages that our science and technology can give us and the question of what to do with these immortal humans is colonization. whether it be to engineered floating cities or underwater anchored cities their is still space on this planet, after all the planet is covered in 75% water. After that there is the final frontier, space. Let the old and the new be remade with our new understanding of genetics. Let us find a new idea of the human potential and give it to all.