Friday, June 20, 2008

Aging

There's nothing wrong with becoming old, but everything wrong with aging. Old means experienced, invested, wealthier, time-tested and just all-round better for having been around the block. Aging, on the other hand, is the direct result of biochemical damage you picked up along the way - ongoing deterioration that is a side-effect of being alive. The passage of years brings a constant flow of opportunities for growth and self-improvement, until aging takes away your ability to compete, your ability to take care of yourself, and eventually your life. Someone should look into that. If you're not one to think much about medical research, you might be under the impression that aging is fairly mysterious, a primal and inevitably metered process quite separate from the diseases of old age. In fact that's not the case. Aging is exactly and precisely the root cause of those diseases of old age, and scientists have a good understanding of what aging actually is, once you get under the hood and start looking at cells and the cellular environment: Loss of important cells without replacement over the years Accumulation of damaged, malfunctioning and senescent cells Free radical damage resulting from damaged mitochondrial DNA Accumulation of...