wondering if my brothers issues with ageing is connected to autism

One of the advantages of this being an anonymous forum is I can say things here I never would say in public. I know how he feels. At least I think I do. When I first started developing facial hair in my late teens I started plucking it out meticulously. I hated the idea of getting older. I still do. I didn't like my voice deepening either. I experimented with shaving my body hair but it was too much nuisance. I think it is maybe partly because we form a strong sense of who we are and what we stand for in our teens. I didn't want the face I associated with that person to change. I think it's also partly because as a young person I developed a strong sense of us and them. As far as I was concerned adult society suffered from a form of collective insanity ... my views on this haven't changed much.


But from a physiological point of view after 15/16 parts of your body start to age. For most people up-to that point every aspect of your bodily function has been constantly improving. Reflexes, strength, hearing, flexibility, range of motion. The notion that from that point onwards there would be aspects of my body that were constantly in decline was upsetting. It's not really mortality that is distressing so much as the awareness of slow decline.


On top of that my aspirations as a teen were all frustrated. The exciting active social life I hoped for never materialised and the more 'adult' the 'society' around me became the less I wanted any part of it. The world of mortgages and school catchment areas just didn't suit me. If I could have kept that 15/16 year old face I would have. If I could have kept hanging around with university freshers I would have.


This is why I pivoted my research career towards ageing research. I have not trying to find the secret of eternal life. Nor am I only concerned with alleviating ageing related diseases. But if gene therapy or cell therapy or any other intervention could wind that clock back? That's what motivates my work.


I remember when Emile Ratelband applied to have his age legally changed by the dutch court. I must have been one of the only people in the world who didn’t think it was a huge joke. Of course his legal argument was that he looked 20 years younger than he was. I don’t know about him but I certainly couldn’t say that about myself. But suppose there were a therapy that could take +10 years off your biological clock. I would certainly try to get some sort of legal age change. I’m sure the courts would deny me just as they did him. But no one would be able to say I tinkered with my own genes for a joke. And in truth in a case like that you’d apply for a court order to stop the papers reporting on it anyway.

Peter said:

I would certainly try to get some sort of legal age change.

While there is a lot of scope for Prince Andrews of this world to abuse this in order to mix with young people in inappropriate environments, I don't think the law will change.

Good luck with your research.

Yes that's most peoples imediate thought. People changing legal age -> sex. But when you think about it from a legal point of view there is no difrence in the eyes of the law between sexual activity and behaviour at 18 and 80. Regardless of how sociaty might feel about geriatrics who conduct their sex lives like 18 year olds.

The real issues legally are mostly rather neich. Some public services are age limited. Child and Adolescent Mental Health service, Some provisions under ECHPs extend to 25. There are special exeptions carved out of the equality act for car insurence and 18-30 holidays. Some limitation on driving heavy vehicals under 21. Mostly things that a person changing their age could live without or that would be no big deal to make exceptions for.

The 2 big ones are pensions (presumably a person would have to wait longer to get it) and the fact that dates of birth are used for identification. I'd argue DOB shoudn't be used for identification. There are a few people who share both a full name and DOB. Public services should really be using national insurance numbers or visa / asylum / residancy numbers for that sort of thing.

A lot of the issues with idenityfying people who have changed details have already been worked out for gender change where the goverment runs a special office that can link new records to old for things like DBS checks.

What an interesting idea. Winding back ones biological clock...

Would be a bit rough on the young 'uns though wouldn't it?

We'd be able to out-compete them on a level physical playing field simply by having the extra decades of lived experience, not only in sexual competition but totally across the board, except in activities that we know carries an unacceptable chance of personal injury or death... 

That exquisite balance (or not depending on teh situation!) between being young strong and inexperienced versus being old, weak, but experinced and knowledeable seems to have an innate fairness about it. 

OTOH Aubrey De Gray (Phd) says that theoreticallyif our T-Alleles were "turned off" with careful living we could possibly go for as long as seven hundred years.  

630+ years more of this!! 

What an interesting idea. Winding back ones biological clock...

Would be a bit rough on the young 'uns though wouldn't it?

We'd be able to out-compete them on a level physical playing field simply by having the extra decades of lived experience, not only in sexual competition but totally across the board, except in activities that we know carries an unacceptable chance of personal injury or death... 

That exquisite balance (or not depending on teh situation!) between being young strong and inexperienced versus being old, weak, but experinced and knowledeable seems to have an innate fairness about it. 

OTOH Aubrey De Gray (Phd) says that theoreticallyif our T-Alleles were "turned off" with careful living we could possibly go for as long as seven hundred years.  

630+ years more of this!!