Question: Can Aging Be Stopped?
Aging is something we would all like to stop (or at least slow down). Most anti-aging plans involve keeping yourself healthy and avoiding chronic illness. But there are people, smart people, out there who believe that aging can be stopped, or at least slowed down a lot. Are they right?
Answer: The field of exploration that looks into stopping or dramatically slowing aging is called life extension. The main goal of life extension is to slow aging to the point where it greatly increases the life span of a species. Researchers have had success in increasing the life span of mice, monkey, worms and other creatures in the laboratory. Here are some of the most popular theories about slowing aging:
- Calorie Restriction: The theory goes like this: the more your body metabolizes calories, the more harmful by products; the more harmful by products, the quicker you will age. Therefore, if you eat less (like 30% below the recommended amount) you will live longer. It has been shown to be true in monkey and mice - but not in humans (yet).
- SENS - Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence: Aubrey du Grey, a researcher and thinker, has come up with this list of strategies that, when perfected, could lead to extremely slow (negligibile) aging. His strategies include exercise, genetic changes and "cleaning" harmful toxins and by products from your body.
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