Slowing down Onset of Diseases Common to Old Age -- Instapundit.com

Instapundit.com:

"AFTER READING ARNOLD KLING'S ARTICLE that mentioned it, I ordered Robert Fogel's new book, The Escape from Hunger and Premature Death, about changes in the human condition since 1700. I finished it last night -- it is, as Arnold says, short but information-packed -- and found it very interesting. It fits nicely into a project I'm working on, and supports the thesis in this piece that we've already had a chance to see how extending lives dramatically would effect society. Fogel even notes that many chronic illnesses associated with aging (such as arthritis) now strike much later than they used to, meaning that, in a way, we can be said to have slowed the aging process already via better nutrition and living conditions."

We may have slowed down the onset of some of these diseases, however we may have also sped up other mechanisims of our bodies. Girls are now reaching puberty at ages 7-8, which I believe is 2-4 years ealier than prior history would show.

"More young girls are showing signs of puberty as early as 7 or 8 and beginning to menstruate two to three years later."

"It used to be that the average age of beginning of menstruation (menarche) in the 1800s was 16-17 years, whereas now it is between 12-13 years. Some girls are seen developing breasts as early as 7 or 8 years old."

We are very careless with our environment, our water supply, and our food supply. We change these things and assume the effects on our bodies will be non-existent, when in reality we don't really know the effects these changes will bring. This is true especially for long term effects. The scarry part is that all our food is genetically modified these days. We have no choice but to eat the genetically modified crops, the natural crops no longer exist in the US.