Vaniver comments on Announcing the Quantified Health Prize - Less Wrong

50 Post author: Zvi 02 December 2011 06:01AM

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Comment author: gwern 30 December 2011 02:57:43AM 0 points [-]

It would be nice to know about energy levels, fragility, and so on, but from reading the study it seems pretty clear something is better about the CR group than the control group, and reasonable to suspect CR is better overall than neutral or worse. It's actually not even clear the CR group was more susceptible to injury, because the higher rates of non-age death among CR monkeys (9 instead of 7) could just be due to there being more CR monkeys (since more of the controls are buried).

The age-related diseases was encouraging, yes, but we could've said as much just by pointing to the human study of CRs which has thus found various heart and other improvements.

Energy levels and fragility are huge questions, since they are the obvious answer to 'what is the tradeoff for fewer age-related diseases through CR' - they make one fragile or reduce one's quality of life, and additional deaths manifest some other way.

We, or at least I, are not interested in CR (as compared to gorging ourselves ad libitum) as a method of reaching our life expectancy of 77 or whatever in good shape; I'm barely even interested in it if it gains me a decade or so. (It's a serious hit to self-control and quality of life, I think.) I'm interested in its potential for serious life-extension and breaking the usual 120-year-old limit to one's lifespan. If it can't deliver that, I will be disappointed.

Comment author: Vaniver 30 December 2011 05:05:54AM 0 points [-]

Are there people who hit 120 who were not in good shape at 77? If not, then it seems like improving your status at 77 is a necessary step.

Beyond that, if you wouldn't do it for an EV of 1 decade, but would do it because it gives you a chance at hitting 120, I think our priorities are very different. (Indeed, referring to 120 as the 'usual' limit seems odd to me. It's five years longer than any man has survived, and there are only 6 men above 110. I wouldn't call that usual- indeed, the 'usual' limit seems like it would be the median age at death. But I count my remaining lifespan up from 0, which is not a universal approach.)

Comment author: gwern 30 December 2011 04:08:27PM 0 points [-]

Are there people who hit 120 who were not in good shape at 77? If not, then it seems like improving your status at 77 is a necessary step.

Necessary, but not sufficient, even if one grants the claim that CR results in an overall improvement (rather than a dramatic improvement on some age-related diseases and unknown compensating penalties).

Beyond that, if you wouldn't do it for an EV of 1 decade, but would do it because it gives you a chance at hitting 120, I think our priorities are very different.

Yes. A treatment that gives another 20 years and breaks the 120 barrier is many times more interesting and full of potential than a treatment that only gives 10 years and respects the old longevity barrier.

Comment author: Vaniver 30 December 2011 04:30:27PM 0 points [-]

A treatment that gives another 20 years and breaks the 120 barrier is many times more interesting and full of potential than a treatment that only gives 10 years and respects the old longevity barrier.

I agree that 20 more years is more interesting than 10 more years. What I find confusing is the probability on living past 100 without CR that's implied by the longevity barrier being relevant.

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