/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.3022075]

/sci/, Why do we die?
It doesn't seem to benefit anything.

One might say its to clean out the gene pool of inferior versions but if that were true wouldn't those inferiors just natural die from factors they can't adapt to.

Don't make much sense

[Scientist !!ThFjnJh4EkH No.3022090]

>>3022075
Evolution doesn't favor long life nor health. That is a common mistake. It favors reproduction fitness. To borrow an example, imagination that there was a mutation which made your bones heal twice as fast, but it caused a slow calcium buildup in your blood stream which killed you by the time you were 100. It would be selected for, because it is better for reproductive fitness. Doesn't matter if it causes you die if it has a great advantage to living to reproduction age.

[Anonymous No.3022088]

>>3022075

When the body gets too old, it can't reproduce anymore. Evolutionarily, living well past the reproductive age serves no benefit to the species. Hence, we don't evolve to live forever.

[Anonymous No.3022094]

Mutations build up in cells each time they divide. Every organism will get cancer eventually if something else doesn't kill them first.

[Anonymous No.3022096]

if einstein and tesla were so smart how come they didnt come up with inmortality or atleast how to live longer?

[Anonymous No.3022098]

we wouldn't die except for the fact that their are other variables in the equation viruses for example kill people they kill them by sucking the foodstuffs out of their body causing them to die, i agree though that out body's way of dealing with them is like getting a baby to shut up by shooting yourself in the head

[Anonymous No.3022101]

>>3022088

But why does it get old? telomerase has shown us that we can stay young for hundreds of years but our bodies for some reasons cut off our supply. Why?

P.S this tis op

[Anonymous No.3022102]

I invoke the second law of thermodynamics!

[Anonymous No.3022108]

-No evolutionary benefit to eternal life
-Older, inferior versions do die from factors they can't adapt to; see: 1) genetic inability to perfectly repair and replicate DNA, eventually leading to things like cancer, 2) genetic inability to clear arteries of plaque, eventually leading to heart disease, 3) biological inability to defend oneself from a bear attack

etc etc etc

Death isn't some magical result that was programmed into our genes for the good of species. It is simply that no species has yet adapted to all the risks and changes necessary to cease dying.

Some will claim that is for the good of the species, in that mutations and adaptations can continue with further generations, but there isn't a gene god out there making sure we get no mutations that aren't good for future generations. If a specimen of a species came along that could remain in perfect health for eternity, he'd continually pass his genes on and eventually his kind would be likely to dominate the population, leading to a deathless species. It simply hasn't happened, it isn't about benefit or detriment.

[Anonymous No.3022118]

I learned this in bio. Life itself is just our cells reading DNA and using that information to make proteins. after a while, our bodies either use up all of that information, or can properly read it. When this happens things start shutting down and we die. If we only had DNA information that could reproduce itself and create new DNA we could theoretically live as long as our bodies don't sustain irrepairable damage.

[Anonymous No.3022125]

>>3022075
same reason threads on 4chan die: too many trolls

[Anonymous No.3022142]

>>3022118
>If only we had DNA information that could reproduce itself
>our bodies use up all that information

High school biofag detected :)
Just playing with you, kid. Look up how DNA is used to create RNA, which in turn is used to create DNA. Technically DNA is responsible for creating more DNA.
And DNA isn't what we run out of. The average 80 year old grandma has more DNA than a newborn baby, because she has more cells. It's DNA replication errors that give us problems. We don't run out of DNA.
The only thing I know of that we run out of that gives us aging problems is a cell's telomeres.

[Anonymous No.3022167]

Hey, here's something I've wondered about telomeres; maybe you brainiacs on /sci/ can help me out.

>telemeres shorten when cells split
>older people can only make new cells with shorter telomeres, part of the reason why cells get old and die
>older people can also create babies from their own cells, and the babies have long telomeres.

Doesn't this mean that the body already has a function that is naturally capable of creating cells with longer telomeres, even at older ages?
Has this been explored? Is there something I'm missing as to why we haven't tried to do some genetic work to get our non-sexual cells to exploit this capacity, so we don't have to shoot up with telomerase?

[Anonymous No.3022175]

Thanks. We're talking about this In bio, I'm definitely going to bookmark this thread and show it to my professor. He definitely have some very interesting incites on this topic. Lucky me my bio teacher has a PhD... Not a lot of doctors teach at the high-school level unfortunately

[Cracked No.3022203]

http://www.cracked.com/article_19161_the-6-creepiest-things-hiding-in-your-dna.html

ogodogodogodogod

[Anonymous No.3022206]

*He'll
sorry

[Anonymous No.3022245]

>>3022175
Cool. I'd be interested to see what he has to say, if you'd come back and post his response on /sci/.

[Anonymous No.3022263]

[Anonymous No.3022302]

>>3022075
because you touch yourself

[Anonymous No.3022308]

Will do.

[Anonymous No.3022320]

What sciences field can those who have no sense of where the planes in the Earth region??

[Anonymous No.3022337]

>>3022075

>implying that in the cold neutrality of this universe there is yet a "purpose," "goal," or "motive" to discover. That the process which alters the nature and structure of life over time is building toward something.

It's not.