
Cracking the Aging Code
The New Science of Growing Old - and What It Means for Staying Young
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Narrated by:
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Stephen McLaughlin
About this listen
A revolutionary examination of why we age, what it means for our health, and how we just might be able to fight it.
In Cracking the Aging Code, theoretical biologist Josh Mitteldorf and award-winning writer and ecological philosopher Dorion Sagan reveal that evolution and aging are even more complex and breathtaking than we originally thought. Using meticulous multidisciplinary science as well as reviewing the history of our understanding about evolution, this book makes the case that aging is not something that "just happens", nor is it the result of wear and tear or a genetic inevitability. Rather, aging has a fascinating evolutionary purpose: to stabilize populations and ecosystems, which are ever threatened by cyclic swings that can lead to extinction. When a population grows too fast, it can put itself at risk of a wholesale wipeout.
Aging has evolved to help us adjust our growth in a sustainable fashion as well as prevent an ecological crisis from starvation, predation, pollution, or infection. This dynamic new understanding of aging is provocative, entertaining, and pioneering and will challenge the way we understand aging, death, and just what makes us human.
©2016 Josh Mitteldorf and Dorion Sagan (P)2016 Macmillan AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Outstanding
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Before this book I read Sinclair's Lifespan. While Sinclair's book presents some very profound experiments, this text is on a different level. It pulls together evolutionary biology and modern bioscience. There is a very large chunk of the book where the author is arguing group selection theory that can be skipped over if you are not a hardcore neo-darwinist type (i.e. prestigious old school evolutionary biologist.) The last 1/3 of the book is gold when it comes to helping you understand aging and what you can do about it. My favorite take away tip is the concept of mutually redundant benefit, where you end up adding the same 3 years to your life over and over again (this is bad, or a waste of money at best.) He outlines the different pathways which work separately which you can activate. However, the author also heavily focuses on what is missing in current science and where we need to go. Some of this has been addressed over the last 10 years but sadly some science is lagging. According to the author, "winding back the aging clock 4 years would save more lives than a perfect cure for cancer."
A credible hypothesis of aging
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A mix of good and bad
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Fascinating!
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Good attempt to cover a big subject
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What would have made Cracking the Aging Code better?
Stick with science and not go off on tangents on how socialism is better than capitalism.What was most disappointing about Josh Mitteldorf and Dorion Sagan ’s story?
Too biased.Liberal agenda
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No new information just arguing
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Not what I expected.
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