[extropy-chat] where to go with supplementation in a post-Nick-Lane world ?

[Eugen Leitl]

On Sun, Sep 24, 2006 at 05:02:07PM -0400, Ensel Sharon wrote:

> Ok, great.  That sounds exactly like what I have been doing - green tea +
> 80-90ish cocoa chocolate ... that was until I read that book and did some

You'll notice quite a few other ingriedients in the list above. Some
of them natural, some less so.

> further investigation and found that it is unlikely that the antioxidants
> in tea and cocoa will actually anti-oxidize anything in a useful fashion.

If you're just looking for antioxidants, then yes, green tea/chocolate
are not worth it. However, I'm not just looking at antioxidants.
Hit Medline, you might get a few surprises.
 
> So ... I like tea and chocolate too, but is there any reason either of us
> should consider them any part of a _health regimen_ ?

Yes.
 
> As for flax oil, I'm on board.  As for the wine, I'm on board, although I
> think you hit the point of diminishing marginal returns very quickly
> ... as in one glass every 1-2 days.

Actually, it's 1-2 glasses/day. The point of diminishing returns probably
is somewhere in a bottle/day country.
 
> Agreed, but given a typical bell curve distribution of health effects, if
> we expect tea+pomegranate+cocoa+etc. to significantly prolong life _on
> average_, then we should also expect it to significantly improve life
> _immediately and noticably_ for some small part of the population.

Again, life in around 1006 wasn't anything like 2006. Actually, for most
people today life in 2006 isn't anything like life for you and me.
 
> Which means _some people_ would notice the effects even if they got killed
> off by plague later, at a relatively young age.  Poorly stated, but you
> get the idea I'm sure.

No, I'm not getting the idea why you feel that the average bear
in 1006 would do double-blind experiments. There might have been some
socities in the murk of history who consciously engineered their
diets for longevity, but I'm not historian enough to know whether
this is documented. If anything, I'd look to China for that.
 
> This is incorrect.
> 
> One can hardly get 100 pages through any comprehensive world history
> without coming across accounts of peoples self experimentation and
> theories regarding food, exercise and longevity.

Yes, and belief into gods, demons, curses and witches. Still going
strong in some parts of the world, actually.
 
> In fact, people _have_ noticed calorie reduction, and have noticed it for
> quite some time.  Ghandi preached a low calorie diet rich in nuts and
> berries and spent a fair amount of time in self experimentation with his
> diet, etc.  Ancient Jewish theologians spoke of "(not eating) all day like
> hens"[1] and that "more people die from overeating than from
> undernourishment"[2].

I'm unfamiliar with either sources. Most societies I'm familiar with
valued obesity as a visible sign of wealth and thus fitness. Most
socities valued pallor, not melanin pigmentation from insolation. Etc.
 
> Here is a quote speaking of Maimonides:
> 
> "He warned against overeating: 'The stomach must not be made to swell like
> a tumor'.  he thought that wine was healthful in moderation."[3]
> 
> Thomas Jefferson:
> 
> "I have lived temperately, eating little animal food, and that not as an
> aliment, so much as a condiment for the vegetables which constitute my
> principal diet." (TJ to Dr. Vine Utley, 21 March 1819)
> 
> I could go on and on.  People have been _quite attentive_ to their bodies

Yes, if you cherry-pick your sources you can prove about anything you
set out to. Whatever it is, the archeological evidence speaks against
about your data anecdotes. Let's face it, despite our mounting epidemic
of obesity, we're the healthiest and most long-lived people to live 
on earth as a large society. This is reasonably well documented.

> and their nutrition for thousands of years, and one can barely read a
> western philosopher without reading of theories and cures and ideas from
> everything to diet and sleep and exercise to gout and TB and the decline
> of age.

The point is that diet won't help much against TB, or syphilis, or malaria,
or smallpox.
 
> What we discuss on this list and what we do with our pills and powders and
> teas and juices is nothing new at all.  It is couched in different terms

Yes, it is very much new. I don't use anything which hasn't passed
a double-blind test at least in several animal models if not people, 
and preferrably it should come with a plausible mechanism. 

> and is slightly more informed, and there is larger participation due to
> our increased wealth ... but it's not new.
> 
> Therefore I resubmit that:
> 
> a) a combination of natural substances that greatly increases lifespan
> would have been noticed by now

No, this strikes me as unplausible. Resveratol is natural, but lacking
enrichment (ability to extract) the effect is weak.
 
> and further:
> 
> b) if some combination of natural substances is going to greatly increase
> your lifespan, it must also be immediately noticable in some small portion
> of the population

No, the statistical effect would be very small, and not linked to
a particular cause. Widely. There might have been small socities
which did rationally practise a particular diet. Whatever they did,
it didn't last.
 
> I don't think either are true.  I think that optimization only goes so
> far, and that significant gains over 100-120 years of age will only come
> from a true technological innovation.

Um, CR is the only thing which has been shown to work. And it's perfectly
natural. Notice: you will need supplmentation, or a carefully construed diet,
if you're to engange in severe CR.

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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