this post was submitted on 16 Jul 2023
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Age Reversal Breakthrough: Harvard/MIT Discovery Could Enable Whole-Body Rejuvenation::In a pioneering study, researchers from Harvard Medical School, University of Maine, and MIT have introduced a chemical method for reversing cellular aging. This revolutionary approach offers a potential alternative to gene therapy for age reversal. The findings could transform treatments for age-re

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[–] [email protected] 200 points 11 months ago (8 children)

Horray, the rich will live forever! All hail our immortal overlords!

[–] [email protected] 45 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Don’t worry we'll live forever too since now we won't have to retire

[–] [email protected] 20 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Yeah, check out Altered Carbon (the first book or the first season) for how this would likely play out.

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[–] zikk_transport2 17 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I guess this is the future that will come sooner or later...

Btw if someone doubts about it - it's already happening. Here is the example.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago

All technology is initially available to only the rich. But it can be widely available, if people demand it.

Also, those pills don’t work anyway so don’t get too worried yet.

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[–] [email protected] 101 points 11 months ago (1 children)

So aging will become a sign of poverty?

[–] cheeseandkrakens 88 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I'm greying before 30, this feels accurate.

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[–] drapermache 80 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Couldn’t you wait until Mitch Mconnell died until you released this? I’d rather not him be in the senate forever.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 11 months ago

I was thinking Henry Kissinger

[–] [email protected] 71 points 11 months ago

Full text of actual paper: https://www.aging-us.com/full/204896

Tldr; seems like decent science and the compounds used are fairly ordinary ones for the most part. Note however this is all in vitro so far and it might be a challenge to deliver the same chemicals in the same concentrations to all the senescent cells of the body.

Prepare to see these ingredients added in insignificant amounts to expensive skin creams before the year is out, whether they can penetrate the epidermis or not

[–] CaffeinatedOne 40 points 11 months ago (6 children)

Even if for the rich, this would be good news. The rich and powerful will stop ignoring things like distant climate related deadlines, if they think they'll be alive to feel their effects.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 11 months ago

This is the such a silver lining take I never would have thought of. Well done.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 11 months ago

No they won't. The answer remains hard vore.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I honestly don't think so. I don't think they care of the condition worsen, including theirs as long as they stay above the poorer people.

Like, if we look at the living condition of a medieval era king. You live in a stone castle do your bedroom as freezing temperature in winter, terrible healthcare so you might be in terrible pain for things that easily treatable, no hygiene the smells everywhere must be horrible... Compared with the comfort of a normal person in a developed country. ( Not the US though, now like Denmark or Switzerland) the modern life is clearly way more comfortable.

However I suspect that a lot of people, especially richer people would prefer to be the king, despite the conditions.

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[–] zensoup 31 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Ahh, immortal super-rich people whose views get more and more conservative as they age forever... What an exciting future to look forward to!

[–] [email protected] 26 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The only upside I can think of is they'd actually start caring about the planet instead of thinking they'll be dead in 100 years anyway.

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[–] TheCraiggers 8 points 11 months ago

I see one potential good thing though: maybe people would be less interested in killing the only planet that supports human life if they knew they were going to be on it forever.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 11 months ago

“As long as men die. Liberty will never fail.”

[–] [email protected] 22 points 11 months ago (10 children)

The sci-fi type implications of this would be astounding. We would see a rapidly increasing global population with high natural resource use. On a philosophical level, is living forever a blessing or a curse?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

I doubt it works on anything but skin cells.

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[–] mook71 20 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

i can browse the page without paywall in Firefox android

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

Sometimes paywalls only hit you after you've visited a handful of articles.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Why does the woman in the first photo appear to be molding?

[–] leapingleopard 4 points 11 months ago

can you name a better way to ride in the multipassenger HOV lane when nobody else is going your direction?

save that shit, molts come in handy

[–] Piecemakers3Dprints 4 points 11 months ago
[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Biochemist here, It's almost certainly an overhyped study. The operative term being used here is "potentially" full body rejuvenation is possible. It doesn't address issues such as administration of the therapy in tissues with virtually no turnover rate, including cardiac tissue, skeletal muscle, and nervous tissue. You cannot renew something that the body doesn't naturally replace via the cell cycle.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow - Kurt Vonnegut, 1953

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[–] nitefox 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The comments be like: I didn’t read the article, here my pissed off reaction calling for 1984

[–] [email protected] 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Good thing you brought us a bunch of useful information with you from the other side.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

Op didn't read the article either

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Ugh. I barely want to live my whole life on this planet with the ways it is going.. let alone reverse back into my 20s with no actual "new game+"

[–] TheCraiggers 5 points 11 months ago

I would think suddenly being able to go back to your 20s is the NG+.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Before people lose their minds, this research, while interesting, is very far from true aging reversal. At most it could be one aspect of it.

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[–] feedum_sneedson 6 points 11 months ago

Heh, science journalism.

[–] belshamharoth 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Why a cure for ageing would benefit everyone and not solely the ultra wealthy

If you put aside ethical and humanitarian reasons for making a cure for ageing widely available, there is still economic considerations, i.e. if you are a government you will be presented with a choice between:

Do I pay to treat people for ageing, even though the treatment might initially be expensive, or do I let them age without intervention?

The former option might actually be significantly cheaper because people in an advanced state of ageing cost more money. They have more diseases, since many diseases are age related such as dementia, cancer and cardiac disease, and need more healthcare and also can't work anymore.

If instead, the government pays for rejuvenation treatment they save on all the other healthcare costs and their people don't have to stop being productive.

So perhaps in the future when a cure for ageing is actually developed it will be made available for everyone rich and poor alike

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[–] mintiefresh 4 points 11 months ago

This feels like stuff from a Star Trek episode.

Our society is so far from that though. I feel like this would break our society currently where the rich will only have access to it.

[–] belshamharoth 4 points 11 months ago

Full journal article here

https://www.aging-us.com/article/204896/text

"Thus, rejuvenation by age reversal can be achieved, not only by genetic, but also chemical means."

-- Journal article abstract

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