Science removes oxygen to cause suspended animation.

QUICK STORY: oxygen is bad for you, and therefor to save out lives we need to get rid of all our oxygen really quick.

LONG STORY: http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/10/09/cheating.death.suspended.animation/index.html

Quotes (not full article)

You see, Roth thinks he's figured out the puzzle. "While it's true we need oxygen to live, it's also a toxin," he explains. Scientists are starting to understand that death isn't caused by oxygen deprivation itself, but by a chain of damaging chemical reactions that are triggered by sharply dropping oxygen levels.

The thing is, those reactions require the presence of some oxygen. Hydrogen sulfide takes the place of oxygen, preventing those reactions from taking place. No chain reaction, no cell death. The patient lives.

The air we breathe is 21 percent oxygen. At 5 percent, those fish and flies -- like us -- would be dead in a few minutes. At 0.1 percent, it was another story. "You get a state of suspended animation and the creatures do not pass away, and that's the basis of what we see as an alternative way to think about critical care medicine," Roth says. "What you want to do is to have the patient's time slowed down, while everyone around them [like doctors] move at what we would call real time."

The white rat on display in Roth's lab isn't being suspended -- by his description, it's more like a slow-forward button, or a dimmer switch on a light. About 50 minutes after giving the animal a dose of hydrogen sulfide, Roth tells Blackwood to turn off the gas. Normal air flows back into the glass case. The zigzag lines on the monitors shoot upward. In a few minutes, the rat is scurrying around as if nothing had happened.

-Just your everyday NPC

Here's something for immortal for you. http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/aubrey_de_grey_says_we_can_avoid_aging.html
Makes more sense.

okay, took a more serious title (watching vid now)

o.o

Forever young~! I wanna be, forever young...~

Here's something for immortal for you. http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/aubrey_de_grey_says_we_can_avoid_aging.html
Makes more sense.

I don't think that "makes more sense" for the only reason that he never really says HOW except that instead of trying to push back aging we will try to fix it. Do you have any follow up research from this, because this lecture was 4 years ago. Even if whatever grants he is getting does help, it won't be in any of our life times and will be too expensive for the common folk, like us.

That being said, I do hope I'm wrong because being immortal is on the list of stuff I need to do before I die. (In all seriousness, good presentation, want to see follow up)

Well THAT was fascinating. I don't see why not. BTW, NPC, he DID say how it could be done. In the segment over the 7 things that kill you, he said that they could all be cured in mice, at least theoretically, and that's why research must be done now, so we have the technique down in mice. After that, primate and then human trials could begin.

While I said I don't see why not, I am curious as to how the human psyche would adapt should the goal of immortality be reached. If noone died of age-related causes, that would still leave a host of other causes, but they would be more prevalent in some areas than others. It could make birth and death much heavier concerns for humankind simply from there being less of them, and I think that would take some serious getting used to for those of us who are accustomed to those things being everyday facts of existance.

Something else to consider: in the UK and almost every other civilized nation, healthcare is free- noone need be without the treatment to halt aging. But in the USA (at least for the forseeable future) healthcare is for those who can afford insurance. I think a very stark division between the "haves" and "have-nots" would appear in the US should this therapy become reality, and quite frankly, that pisses me off.

Here's something for immortal for you. http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/aubrey_de_grey_says_we_can_avoid_aging.html
Makes more sense.

I don't think that "makes more sense" for the only reason that he never really says HOW except that instead of trying to push back aging we will try to fix it. Do you have any follow up research from this, because this lecture was 4 years ago. Even if whatever grants he is getting does help, it won't be in any of our life times and will be too expensive for the common folk, like us.

That being said, I do hope I'm wrong because being immortal is on the list of stuff I need to do before I die. (In all seriousness, good presentation, want to see follow up)

Look up his other videos on TED. He said multiple times in that video that he couldn't go into details as to how it works because of his talk's time constraint. Also, he did allude multiple times as to HOW to do it, he just didn't go into details. Also, I said it made more sense because it does make more sense. With the article you posted, all I'm reading is "hey let's take away our oxygen and move slow as slugs while people with normal oxygen move at real time speed. since the person with little oxygen is moving so slow, then they die slower. it gives the people not with little oxygen time to fix us medically." I don't want to go slower, i want to go the same speed for longer.

I see widespread longevity to be a bad thing. It would completely stagnate humankind, not just in terms of evolution, but in terms of human thought. Low birth rate = less people coming along to think about things differently. Each generation of thought changes our societies. I think that is a more important goal than living forever; I don't see death as a bad thing, but I certainly see high birth rates as crucial. Imagine if Aristotle had lived for 1000 years. Sure, he was brilliant, but people don't change opinions that much over their lifetimes and certainly the way they think remains the same. Who knows how long it would take to escape from those kinds of thoughts?

His argument about "forcing that choice on future generations" is total bullshit. For sustainability reasons, future generations would barely exist. If people had longer lifespans, there would have to be rules implemented to substantially control birth rates - if he's concerned about the potential effects on the not yet born, than the fact that most of the not yet born would never be born would have to weigh in to it. It makes no sense to exclude that when the argument is predicated on the existence of imaginary future people.

A larger fear in my mind would be the birth rate remaining the same while death rate lowered incredibly, eventually there would be less space for the incredibly larger, younger generation to live in. Even if people do not try to have more then 2 or 3 children, don't you think that you would make a mistake every hundred or so years for eternity.

Also, I originally posted the subject as a joke, I did not imply that we could prosper without oxygen, just thought that the fact that we would not die without it was interesting.

I'd assume Woman would still go through a menopause at 40-50?

If so, then it'd be a very difficult thing. Because if no one had babies, then everyone would eventually become infertile, and humankind will die out.

However, if people continued having babies, obviously over-population would occur.

This will all get solved when we move to Saturn and form colonies in our big space rocket made out of cold-resistant paper

I'd assume Woman would still go through a menopause at 40-50?

If so, then it'd be a very difficult thing. Because if no one had babies, then everyone would eventually become infertile, and humankind will die out.

However, if people continued having babies, obviously over-population would occur.

i remember at some point in the TED video, the guy talking about less babies. Figure you can only get em before like 50 years old. You'll go through menopause but i assume that you'll look like you're 25 or something. I think that was like one of the major issues, it's either having less babies and living longer or staying now and having a lot of babies and living less (compared to the longer alternative). I would choose to have less babies. I find that a lot of people just need to stop procreating. lol

The way it was describes you would slow down aging starting at the point treatment was originally given, therefor all hormonal actions (puberty, menopause, balding ext...) would be delayed at the same relative rate (think elves).

Most likely this will be put in place right after a person is exiting puberty so we will have a society of late 20 year olds. However, women could still have the problem of running out of eggs. Another issue may be that pregnancy would take considerably longer, because you may slow down the growth of the fetus inside the mother as well.

Also, the paper rocket would probably have a little problem going threw the asteroid field, why not land on Mars first, or have an awesome moon base. However if you are serious I'm ready to help folding that paper  .

The larger issue to slow aging would be how to fix telomerase so that cellular replication could continue. After a certain time, your dna replication starts chopping off the last few base pairs each time it replicates.

I would assume that the problem of both menopause and cell replication would be solved by stopping the metabolic processes which contribute to aging. Running out of eggs could be solved by implantation; as long as the uterus still works, the eggs would implant. What would be interesting to see is if older "ageless" women would want to do that. Kinda brings up images of a eugenics program.

Unless it stops your cells from going through regular replication to replace/grow areas, like old skin cells and worn out organ cells, your cells are constantly replicating, thus shortening DNA.

Okay, how about gene therapy? Could that conceivably "tack on" what your DNA is losing as cells divide? I'm not all that knowledgable about gene stuff...

Telomerase production and function is being studied pretty actively studied right now, so it's a open question. No one knows why it stops working after adolescence.