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WORK TITLE: Cracking the Aging Code
WORK NOTES: with Dorion Sagan
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://mathforum.org/~josh/
CITY: Philadelphia
STATE: PA
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
http://us.macmillan.com/crackingtheagingcode/joshmitteldorf/9781250061706/ * au science blog: http://joshmitteldorf.scienceblog.com/ * au aging blog: http://agingadvice.org/ *
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Married; wife’s name Alice Ballard; children: Sarah and Madeline.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Evolutionary biology and theorist on aging. Affiliated with the Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; affiliated with the Biology Department of Washington University St Louis.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Josh Mitteldorf is an evolutionary biologist who specializes in the human aging process. He is also a theorist who uses computer simulations that show how natural selection influences communities and groups of people. Mitteldorf is affiliated with the Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and with the Biology Department of Washington University St Louis. He writes a blog on aging science and has worked in astrophysics, optical design, and energy conservation. He also taught statistics, physics, math, astronomy, evolution at Harvard, Berkeley, Temple, Bryn Mawr, La Salle, and the University of Pennsylvania.
In 2016, Mitteldorf wrote Aging Is a Group-Selected Adaptation: Theory, Evidence, and Medical Implications, a book that examines aging as an adaptive program. Mitteldorf explains how the aging process works in the context of evolutionary theory, and he also describes the implications of recent research on aging genetics and proposes a new way of looking at human aging. The aging process, he notes, is not universally the same for all animals; rather, it is subject to the demographic theory of senescence. According to that theory, aging is naturally selected toward death in order to help stabilize population increases. This natural-selection process prevents one species from becoming dominant, and it also prevents the extinction of smaller subspecies and ensures biological diversity. Using this premise, he shows how studies have shown that seemingly adverse conditions like starvation and small amounts of poison have actually expanded the lifespans of some animals.
Mitteldorf also discusses anti-aging medications, such as melatonin, the diabetes drug metformin, the Parkinson’s drug selegiline, large doses of vitamin D, and herbs that supposedly can restore telomeres. No study yet has conclusively proven the efficacy of these drug regimens, says Mitteldorf. Writing in Science News, Cori Vanchieri remarked: “The book spends much less real estate describing the research behind all of these recommendations, perhaps because the human studies haven’t been done yet.”
With coauthor Dorion Sagan, an award-winning writer and ecological philosopher, Mitteldorf published Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old—And What It Means for Staying Young in 2016. In the book, the authors explain why evolution accepts the aging and dying process, which is to prevent zero population growth and to allow populations to evolve. Steady, predictable death rates are necessary to maintain stable ecosystems. Through the mechanics of evolution and multidisciplinary studies, Mitteldorf and Sagan explain how aging puts a time limit on reproduction, and why an unchecked lifespan would put a species in danger of being wiped out by plague or famine.
A Publishers Weekly reviewer called Cracking the Aging Code “a fun, provocative read” but also thought that “it is marred by too much hyperbole and too little support.” On the other hand, a Kirkus Reviews contributor said the authors “make a convincing case for broadening the generally accepted neo-Darwinian framework,” adding that the book is “a thoughtful examination of the role of aging and death in supporting life.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, May 15, 2016, Miksanek, Tony, review of Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old–and What It Means for Staying Young, p. 8.
Library Journal, May 1, 2016, Eileen H. Kramer, review of Cracking the Aging Code, p. 90.
Science News, July 23, 2016, Vanchieri, Cori, “Aging Examined from a Different Lens,” p. 32.
ONLINE
BookPage, https://bookpage.com (June 14, 2016 ), review of Cracking the Aging Code.
Josh Mitteldorf Blog, (How to Live a Long Time), http://agingadvice.org/ (May 20, 2017).
Josh Mitteldorf Home Page, http://joshmitteldorf.scienceblog.com/ (May 20, 2017).
Kirkus Reviews, https://www.kirkusreviews.com (April 7, 2016), review of Cracking the Aging Code.
Macmillan, http://us.macmillan.com/ (May 20, 2017), publisher’s information page for Cracking the Aging Code.
Math Forum, http://mathforum.org/~josh/ (May 20, 2017), faculty profile.
Publishers Weekly, http://www.publishersweekly.com (October 10, 2016), review of Cracking the Aging Code.
Ronin Institute Web site, http://ronininstitute.org/ (May 20, 2017), profile of Josh Mitteldorf.
No bio
My primary occupation these days is evolutionary biology. I am a theorist, specializing in computer simulations that demonstrate how groups and communities are shaped by natural selection. I am affiliated with the EAPS at MIT, and also with the Biology Dept of Washington University St Louis. My book on aging from an evolutionary perspective, co-authored by Dorion Sagan, is due out next year from Flatiron Books. In it I explore the conundrum: if aging destroys our fitness, then why does evolution put up with it? Indeed, why do we have genes whose purpose is to kill us on a schedule? The short answer is that without aging, no one would die until everyone was dying, in an epidemic or a famine. Steady, predictable death rates are necessary to build stable ecosystems. More about this subject on my biology page.
Check out my page on how to live a long life, and weekly blog on aging science.
In the past, I have worked in astrophysics, optical design, and energy conservation. I have taught (statistics, physics, math, astronomy, evolution) at Harvard, Berkeley, Temple, UPenn, LaSalle and Bryn Mawr.
Since the 2004 presidential election, I've been part of a net-organized coalition of statisticians who analyze voting patterns for evidence of errors or fraud. I work closely with Election Integrity, and the Election Defense Alliance.
In the past, I was active at the Drexel Math Forum , where students from around the world submit questions that are fielded by a loose network of volunteer experts and educators. The Northwestern University Center for Connected Learning , where I am a consultant, is pioneering the idea of computer simulation as a flexible learning tool.
My two commercial software packages are intended to make smart financial analysis accessible to people of limited math background - they're available for free download below and at the Per%Sense web site.
I'm a peace activist and an environmentalist, a retired board member at Philadelphia's Energy Coordinating Agency. and past president of the Coalition for a Tobacco-Free Pennsylvania.
For almost thirty years, I've been teaching a weekly yoga class through Mount Airy Learning Tree, an education coop named for my neighborhood in Philadelphia. This is my own brand of public health activism, as well as a way to keep my own spiritual practice alive. I enjoy the support of the meditation community at Springboard Studio in Mt Airy.
I am active in Philadelphia's amateur music community, playing piano in chamber ensemble, French horn in the Olney Symphony, and trombone in the Merion Concert Band. Summers, my family and I have enjoyed the music camp in Quebec operated by CAMMAC, the Bennington summer program for chamber musicians, and a Pennsylvania music camp called Summertrios. I'm an avid member of the Amateur Chamber Musician Players.
For twenty years, I was married to Alice Ballard, a civil rights attorney in Philadelphia. Our two daughters, Sarah and Madeline, are among the first children adopted from China in the mid-1980s. Sarah is a graduate of Reed College, building a career as a theater director with her own experimental company in Philadelphia. After graduating from Eugene Lang College, Maddy is volunteering in the field for wildlife conservation. This fall, (2014) she is in Madagascar.
Josh Mitteldorf
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAStandard models of Darwinian evolution focus on individual reproductive output as a measure of fitness. From this perspective, aging is the opposite of fitness. It is inconceivable that aging could be regarded as an adaptation.
And yet there is abundant evidence for a genetic program that fixes a maximum life span. There are genes that enforce aging, genes that seem to have no other purpose than to kill the individual who carries them. What is more, some of these genes have been conserved across the biosphere. Aging genes have been preserved over a billion years of evolutionary history, since the first eukaryotes. It sure looks as though evolution wants us to die.
How can we imagine a Darwinian process directed toward the loss of fitness? Certainly this must be a sort of evolutionary altruism, but the individual costs are too high, the group benefits too weak and too widely dispersed among non-relatives to be explained by inclusive fitness models or even multi-level selection theory.
My hypothesis is that entire ecosystems are co-adapted for demographic homeostasis. Without aging, the principal causes of animal mortality would be starvation and epidemics. These phenomena are very “lumpy”, in the sense that either everyone is fine, or everyone is in trouble. But when deaths are so tightly clustered, populations can be dangerously unstable, leading to population crashes and extinctions.
Aging has evolved as a way to level the death rate in good times and bad, to stabilize population dynamics and avoid extinctions.
The implications for evolutionary theory are profound, and so are the implications for medical research. If aging is a pro-active genetic program, then targeting that program pharmaceutically may be the most productive medical intervention of all time.
Research page, with links to publications: http://SimEvolution.org
Individual anti-aging program: http://AgingAdvice.org
Blog, with weekly articles on topics in longevity: JoshMitteldorf.scienceblog.com
Uplifting quotes, unexpected science, poetry, music and anything else that inspires wonder: http://Daily-Inspiration.org
Contact Josh at josh@mathforum.org
After 30 years wandering in the plasma physics of extragalactic radio sources, Mitteldorf came to the study of aging in 1996 to correct a fundamental error in the foundations of evolutionary theory. After 20 years, the revolution in biological concept of aging that he initiated is only now coming to fruition.
Along the way, he learned to keep his own body young. Mitteldorf shares a comprehensive health program at AgingAdvice.org, and writes a regular aging column for ScienceBlog.com.
His political writings appear at OpEdNews.com, and his poetry is featured at PoemHunter.com. In private life, Mitteldorf teaches yoga, advocates for fair elections, plays piano and French horn. His two grown daughters were among the first girls adopted from China in the 1980s.
Mitteldorf, Josh & Dorion Sagan. Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old--and What it Means for Staying Young
Eileen H. Kramer
141.8 (May 1, 2016): p90.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
Mitteldorf, Josh & Dorion Sagan. Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old--and What it Means for Staying Young. Flatiron: Macmillan. Jun. 2016. 320p. notes. ISBN 9781250061706. $27.99; ebk. ISBN 9781250061720. SCI
Mitteldorf (Ctr. for Connected Learning, Northwestern Univ.) and Sagan (Cosmic Apprentice; Death and Sex) assert that aging, which is preprogrammed at the cellular level, provides ecosystems with stability and survival. They detail aging's molecular mechanisms and origins in protozoans, from which multicellular life descends. The authors also demonstrate the shortcomings of other aging theories. Their theory that aging results in population stability is plausible but needs more research. However, Mitteldorf and Sagan do not explain how aging works alongside coevolution and infant mortality or its place in ecosystems with boom-bust cycles. And the authors never tackle the arguments against life extension nor seriously consider competing funding priorities or extended lifetimes with depleted savings. They anticipate unlocking cellular telomerase to reverse senescence without mentioning that cells regulate this enzyme's production with multiple triggers because it runs amok in tumors. Maxine Weinstein and Meredith Lane's Sociality, Hierarchy, Health is a current, scholarly alternative; Sonia Arrison's W0 Plus tackles longevity, while David Stipp's The Youth Pill covers life extension. VERDICT Despite some flaws, this accessible science is the first worthwhile popular book on the evolution and biology of aging in years.--Eileen H. Kramer, Georgia Perimeter Coll. Lib., Clarkston
Kramer, Eileen H.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Kramer, Eileen H. "Mitteldorf, Josh & Dorion Sagan. Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old--and What it Means for Staying Young." Library Journal, 1 May 2016, p. 90. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA450998949&it=r&asid=d758a364f7a9a29339527bfc28859234. Accessed 27 Mar. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A450998949
Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old--and What It Means for Staying Young
Tony Miksanek
112.18 (May 15, 2016): p8.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old-and What It Means for Staying Young. By Josh Mitteldorf and Dorion Sagan. June 2016.320p. Flatiron, $27.99 (9781250061706).610.
"Evolution and ecology have inscribed a death sentence in our genes." And while that proclamation portends bad news for individuals, aging and a programmed span of life stabilize the ecosystem by smoothing out the death rate, providing an opportunity for the next generation to mature, and encouraging population diversity. Theoretical biologist Mitteldorf and writer Sagan (Dazzle Gradually, 2007) explain how aging "has evolved as part of nature's four-billion-year construction kit" and is controlled by our genes. For proof, they cite research in which the life span of a simple organism is extended by knocking out specific genes. A dash of Dorian Gray, royal jelly (which suspends the aging of queen bees), and trees that survive thousands of years enliven the discussion, along with hormesis, the noteworthy concept that a life span can be lengthened by moderate stress. Calorie restriction, exercise, and even exposure to low doses of radiation appear to impede aging. Suggestions for adding years to one's life are included, but the authors eagerly await imminent advances in telomerase activation, stem-cell therapy, and epigenetics that promise much greater gains.--Tony Miksanek
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Miksanek, Tony. "Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old--and What It Means for Staying Young." Booklist, 15 May 2016, p. 8. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA453913506&it=r&asid=efac72edd49d9e7db5f727f2ee5786c0. Accessed 27 Mar. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A453913506
Aging examined from a different lens
Cori Vanchieri
190.2 (July 23, 2016): p32.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Science Service, Inc.
http://www.sciencenews.org
Cracking the Aging Code
Josh Mitteldorf and Dorion Sagan
FLATIRON BOOKS.
$27.99
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
A new book on aging starts with what sounds like a promise: "It is a common belief that aging is inevitable and universal. Nothing could be further from the truth." From this, you might expect the final pages to offer a list of options for fending off the ravages of time. But this is less a how-to guide and more of a dive into why aging happens.
The authors, theoretical biologist Josh Mitteldorf and writer Dorion Sagan, take an extensive stroll through evolutionary theory and aging research in support of an off-center view. After pointing out problems with several theories of why aging evolved, the authors present the controversial premise that aging is a programmed march toward oblivion that evolved as a form of population control. "Aging in animals enforces a common, predictable life span, helping to prevent the dominance of any one individual or one gene type. Diversity is preserved for the health of the community." Other researchers have been skeptical of that idea.
Aging, however, is unyielding. The authors describe how certain hardships--starvation, exertion, even small amounts of poison--can paradoxically lead to life extension in lab animals. From these findings, Mitteldorf and Sagan make antiaging recommendations that start with familiar medical advice: exercise, lose weight and take a daily aspirin or ibuprofen. But then they jump to suggestions that have not yet been proven, including supplementation with "huge doses of vitamin D" and melatonin, plus metformin (a diabetes drug) and selegiline (a drug used to treat early Parkinson's and depression). Next comes a list of herbs that could restore telomeres, the protective tips of chromosomes. The book spends much less real estate describing the research behind all of these recommendations, perhaps because the human studies haven't been done yet.
The crystal ball section of the book is an optimistic look at very preliminary research on the benefits of lengthening telomeres, removing senescent cells from the body and regrowing the shrinking thymus, the organ that produces immune system T cells. The authors may be onto something. But none of these ideas have yet had a chance to mature. --Cori Vanchieri
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Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Vanchieri, Cori. "Aging examined from a different lens." Science News, 23 July 2016, p. 32. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA459075185&it=r&asid=45bca4c15884133a72821374e5dd71fc. Accessed 27 Mar. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A459075185
CRACKING THE AGING CODE
The New Science of Growing Old—and What It Means For Staying Young
by Dorion Sagan, Josh Mitteldorf
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KIRKUS REVIEW
An advancement of the challenging theory that, along with growth and puberty, aging also unfolds “on a schedule programmed into the regulatory portion of our DNA.”
At first glance, this would appear to contradict “the fundamental premise of Darwinian evolution,” survival of the fittest, the principle of natural selection epitomized by the “selfish gene,” a term coined by Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene (1976). Theoretical biologist Mitteldorf and ecological philosopher Sagan (Cosmic Apprentice: Dispatches from the Edges of Science, 2013, etc.) make a convincing case for broadening the generally accepted neo-Darwinian framework, which incorporates the role of the genome in shaping the individual, to include species evolution and the relationship between individual survival and survival of the ecosystem on which it depends. They address the seeming paradox that “genes for aging have been fixed in the genome, despite the fact that these genes work against themselves.” By limiting the reproductive potential of the aging individual, they play an important role in evolution. The authors contend that death and aging are crucial to the existence of “stable ecosystems in nature.” Without them, unchecked reproduction would lead to major extinction events and the destruction of ecosystems. Mitteldorf and Sagan suggest that aging and death have evolved to moderate what might otherwise be untrammeled reproduction by predators, leading to the destruction of their prey and their own extinction. Natural selection operates to create a balance between longer life expectancy and greater fertility. Death and aging play a necessary role by regulating population growth in order to create the space for “populations of living things to evolve rapidly and efficiently.” This leads the authors to the provocative conclusion that if we accept the goal of increasing longevity and the long-term survival of the human species, we must also accept the idea of zero population growth.
A thoughtful examination of the role of aging and death in supporting life.
Pub Date: June 14th, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-250-06170-6
Page count: 336pp
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: April 7th, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1st, 2016
Web Exclusive – June 14, 2016
Cracking the Aging Code
Matters of life and death
BookPage review by Alison Hood
Theoretical biologist Josh Mitteldorf and writer and ecological philosopher Dorian Sagan have teamed up to give us a thorough examination of human aging in Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old—And What It Means for Staying Young. The subtitle is somewhat misleading, though: This is not a book on how to reverse aging or achieve immortality. Rather, the authors show us how various life forms age and offer a reflective look at how aging serves as a biological means of maintaining species survival (read: zero population growth).
“Aging,” Mitteldorf writes, “is built into our bodies. . . . Aging doesn’t just happen, but is regulated and controlled by our genes.” This fact, which evolutionists have a hard time making sense of (why, after all, would the body produce a process of weakening and dying that runs contrary to humans’ more robust genes for growth and sexual reproduction?), is the engine of the book, which is also fueled by the tension between what we now know about genetics and the various postulations about human evolution and longevity.
Mitteldorf and Sagan convincingly defend the positive argument for natural selection. The “death program” in our genes prevents limitless life spans, thus circumventing unsustainable population levels, a teardown of ecological systems and eventual species extinction. But there is a secondary, paradoxical theme upon which the book revolves: Though aging is inevitable (despite all the human genome tinkering now going on in many quarters, such as California’s J. Craig Venter Institute), “clever humans can defeat nature’s death program and gain . . . much longer and healthier lives.”
Though modern medicine and science are gaining ground against the delay of debilitating disease and frailty, we humans, the authors say, must address “the fundamental mortality of our physical bodies: Infinity is not part of physics, let alone biology.”
Cracking the Aging Code: The New Science of Growing Old—and What It Means for Staying Young
Josh Mitteldorf and Dorion Sagan. Flatiron, $27.99 (336p) ISBN 978-1-250-06170-6
Mitteldorf, a theoretical biologist, and Sagan, a science writer (and the son of science educators Carl Sagan and Lynn Margulis), argue that genes are programmed to promote their own long-term survival as well as to die for group survival and population stability. The existence of cellular death programs could be seen as supporting the group selection theory of evolution, in addition to the far more accepted kin selection theory. Yet this notion is far from proven. The authors’ contention that caloric restriction can lead to prolonged life is widely accepted, but the same is not true of their assertion that predators control their own numbers so they won’t overwhelm their prey. Furthermore, too many unsupported statements erode the reader’s confidence in the authors’ thesis. The book states that “people who are most prominent in telomere research tend to believe that [the enzyme] telomerase will prove to be the philosopher’s stone, the fountain of youth, the elixir of Gilgamesh about which humanity has dreamed for thousands of years.” However, the authors identify neither those prominent people nor the research leading them to that ostensible belief. This is unquestionably a fun, provocative read, but it is marred by too much hyperbole and too little support. Agent: Gillian MacKenzie, Gillian MacKenzie Agency. (June)
Reviewed on: 10/10/2016
Release date: 06/01/2016
Ebook - 978-1-250-06172-0
Compact Disc - 978-1-4272-7284-3
Paperback - 336 pages - 978-1-250-06171-3