The Straight Dope
April 5, 2009 at 5:00 am by Web Editor in Bad Habits
With modern medicine and hygiene and diet, we’ve extended life expectancy far beyond what it’s ever been. Yet we all still get old and die. Few make it past 80 or 90 years, and almost nobody makes it past 100. Is there any real hope of something that could allow humans to stop or slow the aging process?
— Eric R., Los Angeles
My initial reply was: Want to stop aging? Move to the developing world, where they’ve got the problem licked. With frequent war, famine, and disease, getting old isn’t an issue for vast swaths of the population. On reading your note more carefully, however, I see your beef about aging is that it makes you die, meaning early death probably isn’t the strategy for you. So instead, I give you Cecil’s Guaranteed Longevity Plan. We’ll start with the easy steps and work up.
Continue reading Straight Dope.
(Illustration by Slug Signorino)
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