Category Archives: Transhuman News

(mouseover to enlarge) Devraha Baba Age 250+

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"And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years, and he died," from Genesis 5:5. According to the Bible subsequent progeny lived for hundreds of years, with some in excess of nine hundred years. Are biblical references to a long life span allegorical or statistical facts? Todays human with an average life span under eighty years may have difficulty comprehending how a human could live so long. But, perhaps a life span into the hundreds of years is not that far-fetched. What if sometime in the future medical science was able to eliminate most diseases, what then would cause people to die? Accidents and wars aside, how old could old age be? How long could the life span of a human be? Hundreds of years? Why not?

Much research has been done and is being done on aging and how to prevent it. Some observations and theories have evolved. One observation has been that animals with a slow metabolism tend to live longer than animals with a fast metabolism. Shrews, for example, have a fast metabolism. They live only a year or two. Turtles have a slow metabolism. The giant tortoise lives nearly 200 years. Studies done on meditators have proven that metabolism slows down during meditation; heart rate and breathing slows down. Results of a study measuring the physiological differences between subjects practicing Transcendental Meditation and just simply taking rest were reported in American Psychologist 42: 879881, 1987. The article stated that Transcendental Meditation produced a significant increase in basal skin resistance compared to eyes-closed rest, indicating profound relaxation. Deep rest and relaxation were also indicated by greater decreases in respiration rates and plasma lactate levels compared to ordinary rest. The implication is that practicing meditation may extend one's life span.

Another theory suggests that hormones play a role in the aging process. In 1989, at Veterans Administration hospitals in Milwaukee and Chicago, a study indicated that a growth hormone produced in the pituitary gland plays a critical part in aging. As one ages, production of the growth hormone declines. Injections of a synthetic version of the growth hormone were given to a small group of men aged 60 and over. There was a dramatic reversal of some signs of aging. The injections increased muscle mass, reduced excess fat, and thickened skin. But, when the injections stopped, the men's new strength decreased and signs of aging returned. Also, older people have reduced levels of estrogen, testosterone, melatonin, thymosin, and DHEA; reductions of which also have an effect on aging.

Still another theory of aging is the free-radical theory. According to this theory, free radicals, which occur during the natural course of metabolism, also act randomly and indiscriminately to damage cell components. Free radicals are chemical compounds that possess one or more unshared electrons as part of their structural configurations. To become stable they aggressively seek out another electron with which to pair. In so doing they attack molecules, such as lipids, proteins and DNA which make up the cell's membrane. Cells have an internal defense system of creating antioxidants to fight against the harmful effects of free radicals. However, their defense mechanism is insufficient to prevent the damage caused by the actions of free radicals over a cell's lifetime. This cumulative cellular damage may contribute to the aging process. Pharmacologists demonstrated that by augmenting the cell's antioxidant defenses with certain synthetic enzymes they were able to reduce the action of free radicals, and thereby lessen cellular damage that the free radicals caused. By administering synthetic enzymes to worms the pharmacologists were able to extend the average life span of worms by 44%. Using this same pharmacological intervention on humans may lengthen the human life span as well.

Caloric restriction is another approach scientists have discovered which extends longevity. Researchers studied the effects of reducing food intake by 30% to 70% on a variety of life forms, from yeast to mammals. The researchers found that they were able to increase the life span of various creatures up to 40%. Researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology studied yeast and found that when the energy of a cell drops off (which occurs under conditions of caloric restriction) an enzyme called Sir2 is activated. When activated, Sir2 causes a cell's genes within its chromosomes to be silenced. This reduces the production of extrachromosomal DNA circles, or Ecs. Ecs are toxic to cells and decrease longevity in yeast; they self-replicate, accumulate, and compete with the yeast's genome for vital enzymes and other cellular materials. For this reason reducing Ecs results in extending the life span of yeast. Since Sir2 has been found in humans, the research findings on yeast appear to be applicable to the human aging process as well.

What if a person does not eat at all, but is able to switch his body metabolism into living directly off of sunshine, can he prolong his life? Recent studies made on behalf of NASA, as well as other prior scientific research studies, have proven that humans can live without food. They do not understand why or how, only that it is possible for humans to do so. One such recorded case is of Giri Bala, a woman who had not eaten for 56 years.

Here is a dialogue between of Paramahansa Yogananda and Giri Bala, excerpted from Yogananda's book, Autobiography of a Yogi.

"If I felt a craving for food, I would have to eat."

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Longevity Human Life Span, 250 yrs. Longevity. Longevity Life ...

13 hours ago White sharks are considered vulnerable worldwide. Since individuals are slow growing and mature late, white shark populations could be even more sensitive to fishing, environmental and other pressures. Credit: Greg Skomal, MA Marine Fisheries

Great white sharkstop predators throughout the world's oceangrow much slower and live significantly longer than previously thought, according to a new study led by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI).

In the first successful radiocarbon age validation study for adult white sharks, researchers analyzed vertebrae from four females and four males from the northwestern Atlantic Ocean. Age estimates were up to 73 years old for the largest male and 40 years old for the largest female.

"Our results dramatically extend the maximum age and longevity of white sharks compared to earlier studies," said Li Ling Hamady, MIT/WHOI Joint Program student and lead author of the study published in PLOS ONE. "Understanding longevity of the species, growth rate, age at sexual maturity, and differences in growth between males and females are especially important for sustainable management and conservation efforts."

Age determination in fish relies primarily on analyzing growth increments in mineralized tissue, such as otoliths (ear bones), vertebrae, and fin rays. These grow throughout a fish's life, adding annual rings, similar to growth rings in trees.

Estimating age in white sharks can be challenging. While vertebrae are constructed of layers of tissue, laid down sequentially over an individual's lifetime, the alternating light/dark banding patterns can be narrow and less distinct than in other species, and the bands don't necessarily signify annual growth.

"Traditionally, ageing sharks has relied on the assumption that band pairs are annual. In many cases this has been proven correct for part or all of a species life, however in more and more cases this is being disproven," said coauthor Lisa Natanson, a fisheries biologist at NOAA's Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC) lab in Narragansett, R.I.

In previous studies, which assumed annual deposition of growth bands, the oldest white shark individuals identified were from the southwestern Pacific Ocean at 22 years old and the western Indian Ocean at 23 years old.

For this study, researchers took advantage of radiocarbon produced by thermonuclear device testing done during the 1950s and 1960s. Radiocarbon mixed from the atmosphere into the ocean, and was incorporated into the tissues of marine organisms living during that time period. The rise in radiocarbonmeasured as 14Cgave researchers a specific spot in time pinpointed in the vertebra layers, which can be used as a "time stamp" to help determine the age of an animal.

The National Ocean Sciences Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Facility at WHOI conducted radiocarbon analysis on collagen in the white shark vertebrae. All of the vertebrae samples came from white sharks caught in the northwestern Atlantic Ocean from 1967 to 2010 that were archived at the NEFSC lab in Narragansett, which has the largest collection of this kind. The samples were also digitally photographed with a camera attached to a stereomicroscope using reflected light for counting growth bands.

Continued here:
New study finds extreme longevity in white sharks

Eating raw food benefits health and human longevity in so many different ways. I find that most raw food diet reviews and articles I have read are a bit repetitive. This is alright, but in this article I touch on many of the facts that are usually skipped over by other authors. After this you'll be convinced of the power that live raw food plays in your diet for longevity. The following nutrients are some things not available in cooked food, but you can get them by eating raw foods:

~Hormones: Various live superfoods and herbal adaptogens contain natural hormones and hormone precursors that are very beneficial (such as maca, mucuna pruriens, cacao beans, various sprouts, bee pollen and royal jelly). The addition of plant based hormones and natural steroidal compounds in a living food diet for longevity becomes more crucial as you gain years.. These raw food benefits help maintain the proper levels of hormonal health commonly associated only with young people.

~Oxygen: We get oxygen from our food and water as well as through breathing pure clean air. Cancer and many other diseases simply cannot exist in an adequately oxygenated body (which is why hyperbaric oxygen chambers are such powerful life saving tools in Hospitals). This is why it is crucial to get the raw food benefits of extra oxygen, the worlds most deficient nutrient and basic fuel! Most people are starved of oxygen through: 1. not doing proper diaphragmatic breathing, 2. eating cooked food which uses up more oxygen to metabolize, 3. eating animal products which uses up more oxygen to metabolize, 4. not engaging in the benefits of physical exercise on a regular basis, 5. living in houses which are full of stagnant oxygen depleted air, 6. living in cities which are full of stagnant oxygen depleted air.

~Phytochemicals: Perhaps the greatest recent discovery in nutrition has been the role that phytochemicals play in health and longevity in humans. It is more clear than ever that eating raw food benefits your endocrine (hormonal) system because of these powerful chemicals which include all natural antioxidants, polysaccharides, nucleic acids, alkaloids, etc.

~Enzymes: The pioneering research of Dr. Edward Howell demonstrated how critical the role of enzymes play in digestion as well as every other bodily function. He discovered that humans are born with enough enzyme stores to theoretically live about 200 years! The downside to this is that cooked food (which always has all of the enzymes within it destroyed when heated above 115F) uses up your body's metabolic enzymes (the type that are required for basic biological functions of life) to convert into digestive enzymes. Eating enzyme rich raw food benefits these limited stores since on average, a live raw food contains half of the enzymes needed to break itself down during digestion.

~Paramagnetism: Live raw food benefits your body's electrical field simply because it still has it's own paramagnetic field. Kirlian photography is one way that this has been demonstrated (thanks to Christian Joubert for the kirlian photograph of cabbage from his site http://www.esseniaecovillage.com). Live foods add a paramagnetic charge to your body, thus increasing the radiance of your vital life force. Nobel Prize winner Dr. Fritz Popp discovered that humans retain, absorb and emit photons (light energy). 97% of human DNA has also been shown to give off photons. You absorb the photons from food to fuel your bio-electric field. Cooked food literally requires your body to fill the dead matter with photons so that it can be assimilated, thus weakening your body.

~Water: Cooking begins to dehydrate food. Some forms, such as grilling, baking and frying do it more than boiling or steaming, but in the end, all cooked food has less water in it then it started out with. A living food diet retains the natural moisture of food that is requires for digestion. The body shouldn't have to contribute excessive amounts of water to the digestive process. Add on top of this the severe chronic dehydration that most people suffer from and you have accelerated aging. If you want to look juicy and fresh for as long as possible, you have to eat juicy and fresh as much as possible!

You can find raw foods rich in the above mentioned qualities by clicking on this link or any of those in the sidebar to the right.

The founder, Dr. Ann Wigmore often talked about how one of her most thrilling experiences was the day she first observed cancer cells taken from a human body and placed under a microscope begin to thrive on cooked food, yet dying off when in the presence of only live raw food. It is now a well established scientific fact that cooking destroys all of the raw food benefits listed above. Some people will exclaim that they mostly only steam or boil their food and that this is a "happy medium". When someone does this, the resulting loss of the above nutrients aren't perhaps as great as someone eating mainly barbecued, fried and/or baked foods every day, but it's still degrading these basic necessary benefits of raw food.

The Linus Pauling Institute has found that boiling cruciferous vegetables for a mere 9 minutes results in a 59% loss of the phytochemical indol-3-carbinol, which in other studies done abroad, as well as at this same institute, is the key nutrient that is being promoted as one of the most powerful anti-carcinogenic compounds in the human diet. Absolutely nothing of value has been added by only slightly cooking this food! The following list further outlines this bio-chemically destructive insanity that is known as cooking. There are live raw food benefits listed above that are lost through cooking, but below is a list of the toxic compounds created through cooking:

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Secrets of Longevity in Humans

ENID, Okla. NORCE employees have received a second buyout offer, just one month after the first 27 voluntarily left their jobs on mutually agreeable terms at the state facility.

Administrators met with workers Wednesday at Northern Oklahoma Resource Center of Enid to give them a chance to leave state employment before their jobs are eliminated. NORCE is expected to close by August 2015.

This time around, the offer is the same. Up to 30 employees will be given a chance to resign and receive several benefits. Like the first buyout, the first 30 who volunteer for it can leave and receive the following:

Payment equal to their current health insurance premium for 18 months. This applies to the employee only.

A longevity payment that would have been paid on their next anniversary.

One week of pay for each year employed with a minimum of $5,000 and, at most, $26,000.

A payout of accumulated sick leave equal to one-half of the employees hourly wage.

Shut-down slowdown

Since a state oversight panel voted to shut down NORCE more than a year ago, the number of residents there has rapidly diminished. Parents and guardians now are forced to make plans for community-based care, which often has several developmentally disabled people living together or living with family. This model relies on private health care providers to take over daily nursing and care in place of state-paid workers.

The number of residents at the state-run facility has fallen by half in six months. According to data provided by the Oklahoma Department of Human Services, there were 92 residents at NORCE in July.

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Second buyout offer: NORCE facility sheds clients