You have a source on that? News to me.
Human lifespan in Trek
- Thread starter Penta
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You have a source on that? News to me.
well in theory but it should be possible in the future. If want more info you could read this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_extension
My first try at a post but just a few comments and expansions on what others have said. From a past hobby of family history, people hundreds of years ago were often living into 70s, 80s, and 90s. Very high death rates in childbirth to young mothers pulled the averages down. And infections in days before antibiotics was a huge factor in pulling down the averages. If people made it past those gauntlets, they often seemed to live about as long as today without benefit of medical care. Genetic research even now seems to be pushing us already toward longer lifespans so in several hundred years, I would think 150 would be quite reasonable. Like others, I was amazed how ancient the makeup people were making the humans look. If living to 150, people should have been quite vital at 110 or more.
As for McCoy, wasn't part of the storyline in This Side of Paradise that the spores were causing regeneration and healing of his organs as well? Perhaps a long lasting benefit there as well?
Just an observation, initially Spock was in roughly the same age cohort as Kirk and McCoy, quite young for a Vulcan, so why does Spock always look so incredibly old and feeble in recent years given his presumed greater life span, or is this supposed to be his human side dragging him down? I realize he had to age as Nimoy aged, but when not playing Spock, Nimoy always seems pretty youthful and vital for his age, whereas Spock seems to be tottering on his last legs. Have wondered if that's a conscious decision to make him seem wiser and more venerable but I'd prefer to see some physical vitality.
Again, this is my first try at a post so am hoping it didn't turn out too long or repetitive. Be charitable.
As for McCoy, wasn't part of the storyline in This Side of Paradise that the spores were causing regeneration and healing of his organs as well? Perhaps a long lasting benefit there as well?
Just an observation, initially Spock was in roughly the same age cohort as Kirk and McCoy, quite young for a Vulcan, so why does Spock always look so incredibly old and feeble in recent years given his presumed greater life span, or is this supposed to be his human side dragging him down? I realize he had to age as Nimoy aged, but when not playing Spock, Nimoy always seems pretty youthful and vital for his age, whereas Spock seems to be tottering on his last legs. Have wondered if that's a conscious decision to make him seem wiser and more venerable but I'd prefer to see some physical vitality.
Again, this is my first try at a post so am hoping it didn't turn out too long or repetitive. Be charitable.
But Scotty was said to be 147 :P
And anyone can get DNA from earlier in their life and make themselves younger with a transporter, apparently.
Anyway here are some of the latest developments...
http://maxlifefoundation.typepad.co...biotime-reverses-the-age-of-human-cells-.html
And anyone can get DNA from earlier in their life and make themselves younger with a transporter, apparently.
Anyway here are some of the latest developments...
http://maxlifefoundation.typepad.co...biotime-reverses-the-age-of-human-cells-.html
I think reality will past Trek. Here in the 21st century scientists are working on cloning body parts. Can you imagine cloning a young heart to put into a 70 or 80 year old or science finding a way to regenerate or rejuvinate tissue or cells?
Modern science is doing things now that were not even dreamed of 50 or 100 years ago. I think and hope by the 23rd century we could be far beyond the future Gene Roddenbery and Trek dreamed of. Unless of course we destroy ourselves.
Modern science is doing things now that were not even dreamed of 50 or 100 years ago. I think and hope by the 23rd century we could be far beyond the future Gene Roddenbery and Trek dreamed of. Unless of course we destroy ourselves.
I think there should be a discrimination regarding how many invasive procedures one is willing to undergo (within the trek-verse).
Biologically, human average lifespan, granted a solid genetic make-up and a decent health record, is spanned out between 70 and 80. To date, there's not that much to do to increase these figures: one cannot take medicines and undergo procedures that grant you to live, say, 20 years more: a healthy lifestyle and regular check-ups is all we can do, basically.
Now we come to the trek-verse. Let's say, by a purely speculative point of view, that the "environmental" average lifespan is about 90-100 years. With environmental, I mean "not doing anything to actually lengthen this period". The circa 20 more years are caused by zero pollution, healthy living, ultra-efficient health care and the fact that 99,9% of known diseases have been eradicated.
Yet, one can undergo a lot of procedures in order to live more. In Shatner's novel The Return (non-canon), it's said that McCoy has a lot of transplanted organs; canon or not, it's not hard to believe that the doctor has not much left of his own. Transplants are only the apex: there surely are many medicines which improve the circulatory system, regulate blood pressure and whatever else goes on inside our bodies (I'm a political science student, Jim, not a doctor!).
I can imagine, thus, stubborn people refusing to undergo these surgeries and benefitting from external treatments, living somewhat around 110-130 years. Thanks to transplants, this can be improved to we don't how much, arguably well over 150.
Yet, something is to be said: humans can delay their departure, can put off aging as well, but gravity takes its toll and they begin looking old sooner than other species like Vulcans or Klingons. Sarek, at over 200, was a fine upstanding fellow (in the body, his illness is another matter).
Sure, cosmetic surgery could do away with this but well, as Roddenberry answered to someone who pointed out that by 24th century there surely would be a cure for baldness:
"In the 24th century, they wouldn't care."
Biologically, human average lifespan, granted a solid genetic make-up and a decent health record, is spanned out between 70 and 80. To date, there's not that much to do to increase these figures: one cannot take medicines and undergo procedures that grant you to live, say, 20 years more: a healthy lifestyle and regular check-ups is all we can do, basically.
Now we come to the trek-verse. Let's say, by a purely speculative point of view, that the "environmental" average lifespan is about 90-100 years. With environmental, I mean "not doing anything to actually lengthen this period". The circa 20 more years are caused by zero pollution, healthy living, ultra-efficient health care and the fact that 99,9% of known diseases have been eradicated.
Yet, one can undergo a lot of procedures in order to live more. In Shatner's novel The Return (non-canon), it's said that McCoy has a lot of transplanted organs; canon or not, it's not hard to believe that the doctor has not much left of his own. Transplants are only the apex: there surely are many medicines which improve the circulatory system, regulate blood pressure and whatever else goes on inside our bodies (I'm a political science student, Jim, not a doctor!).
I can imagine, thus, stubborn people refusing to undergo these surgeries and benefitting from external treatments, living somewhat around 110-130 years. Thanks to transplants, this can be improved to we don't how much, arguably well over 150.
Yet, something is to be said: humans can delay their departure, can put off aging as well, but gravity takes its toll and they begin looking old sooner than other species like Vulcans or Klingons. Sarek, at over 200, was a fine upstanding fellow (in the body, his illness is another matter).
Sure, cosmetic surgery could do away with this but well, as Roddenberry answered to someone who pointed out that by 24th century there surely would be a cure for baldness:
"In the 24th century, they wouldn't care."
As for this, I only have my personal opinion, which isn't worth much more than the (virtual) ink with which is written.
1. The organs, I suppose, are either cloned from the possessor or bio-mechanically engineered (as Shatner assumes in The Return). I cannot imagine donors needed in the 24th century. As long as ethical questions are done away with, organs can be succesfully cloned and transplanted.
2. Well ... what to say about hybrid people, if not that they are a marvellous plot device, but a poor instance of scientific rigor? I remember a TOS episode with a monster that feeded itself on sodium chloride, sucked by the victims. Humans were vulnerable, yet Spock was not, since his species was biologically different. This is a subtle example. One can much more simply say that Vulcans have green blood and their hearts are where a human liver would be. Not to mention "The Vulcan brain: a puzzle wrapped in an enigma"; arguably far different from the human brain.
This said, now ... how can we expect that so much different races can have offsprings? Kheleyr sometimes fainted, due to her conflicting human-klingon biology. I think that - by a more scientifical point of view - Klingon sperm cells, when besieging The Doctor's human "fortress ovum", would find themselves quite puzzled as to what to do with such genetic difference. That is to say, it's hard to believe that so much different species can have offsprings.
Now anyway, after this boring (and perhaps unnecessary?) aside about hybrids, I dare say that Vulcan, Klingon and Ktarian traits at least (I wouldn't know about Bethazoids) seem to be strongly dominant. The Doctor says so about B'Elanna and Tom Paris daughter, "Klingon traits tend to be transmitted for generations". The same applies to Spock, who biologically is fully Vulcan (as far as I know): green-blooded, the heart is where it oughts to be (down-right), perfectly capable of mind-melds, with a Vulcan brain and an amiable sense of contempt for human ebullience.
I'd say, then, that as for longevity in a hybrid, the lifespan tends to incline toward the most prominent, dominant, stronger genetic make-up, and after all it adheres to Mendel's laws: longer lifespan = better genes, and therefore, dominant ones.
Well, Spock's also on his second body. It is possible that the katra-less Spock recovered from the Genesis Planet was older than the Spock who died saving the ship from Khan, giving the Spock Katra a home in a body older than the one it came from.
OF course, that doesn't explain why Spock doesn't seem much older 100 years later.
I assume medical assistance of some sort is required. Didn't Dax and Worf discuss with Bashir some treatments that would enable them to have a child?
Doesn't explain Ziyal, though. Her conception was completely natural, as far as I can tell.
Or at least it was implied to be accidental. But one might argue that either her mother or father deliberately used proceptive medication without the knowledge and approval of the other, in order to get leverage against the other. I could see Tora Naprem doing it to force Dukat to acknowledge their liaison - and perhaps Dukat doing it just because it gave him a thrill, took his philandering one step further, gave him an even deeper sense of satisfaction on his laughing off his marital commitments.
The treatments discussed in the K'Ehleyr and Dax cases didn't sound as if they would have involved surgery or anything really extensive like that. Tora or Dukat could easily have slipped a few pills into each other's meals...
Timo Saloniemi
The treatments discussed in the K'Ehleyr and Dax cases didn't sound as if they would have involved surgery or anything really extensive like that. Tora or Dukat could easily have slipped a few pills into each other's meals...
Timo Saloniemi
I don't recall really well DS9 season six, but as far as I remember, Dax was impregnated without any medical assistance (I also remember a figure like 1 chance in 16 of a Trill being impregnated by a Klingon).
Setting aside how a spotted Klingon possibly capable of symbiosis would look (and how his/her temperament would deal with the symbiont he/she hosts), I find this a bit hard to believe, that a Klingon and a Trill can have children.
However, as seen in TNG 6X20 episode "The Chase", the race named the ancient humanoids, unable to find other sentient species seeded planets with their DNA. Humans, Klingons, Vulcans (and Romulans too consequently) amongst others seem to share common genetic origins, so they would be genetically compatible and can have children without any medical help.
This sounds to me like the only plausible explanation.
Doesn't explain Dukat's baby with Mika the cultist in season 7. Neither of them seemed to have expected it, and neither of them had any reason to want it to happen.
I suspect something of the kind was going on--and personally, I suspect Dukat was the guilty party, because this would ALSO give him one Bajoran that would love him unconditionally, even more so than Tora (though in a different way--well, at least, I HOPE Dukat wasn't planning on...um...oooookay...moving on...
). It would also not surprise me if he then subjected Tora to whatever genetic treatments would be required to ensure Ziyal would survive. (And considering this is a mammalian-therapsid pairing, I think something WOULD be necessary.)Mika's baby is a tougher one, but I still think Dukat was probably slipping something to Mika--he might have still been banking on the child being her husband's, though.
If I were writing that story, though, I would have made the child have some sort of underlying medical condition we didn't see in her right away as a newborn--because complications would not be unexpected if the right genetic treatments weren't done.
Unfortunately, I would expect to see some sort of metabolic disorder take such a child after not too long.
^ I find that very far-fetched. I can see why Naprem might have wanted to secure her position with a baby, but for Dukat, a half-Bajoran child was a huge liability, and he must have known that his political opponents and rivals might use her against him. Does everyone forget that Dukat was an ambitious man and his career and position meant a great deal to him? I don't think he ever choose a personal relationship over it before he made the decision not to kill Ziyal and to take her to Cardassia. He sure didn't when he sent Naprem and Ziyal away on Ravinok. I am also not buying the idea of Dukat always having been more or less deranged, he seemed pretty rational until season 6, and I think the whole thing about him being obsessed with getting Bajoran approval and love has been exaggerated beyond belief - yes, he was upset that they didn't appreciate/love him, but he was also deeply upset in The Maquis that the Central Command did not appreciate him, he was furious that some gul was courting his ex-wife in Return to Grace... he wants admiration and adoration from everyone, not just Bajorans.
(I also don't think that a child is any more guaranteed to love you unconditionally than a lover is, but maybe that's just me.)
With Mika, it makes even less sense, his position as a cult leader was even more endangered by the existence of the baby (as his subsequent actions confirmed).
(I also don't think that a child is any more guaranteed to love you unconditionally than a lover is, but maybe that's just me.)
With Mika, it makes even less sense, his position as a cult leader was even more endangered by the existence of the baby (as his subsequent actions confirmed).
I think Dukat hadn't banked on the end of the Occupation, when he got Tora pregnant. If there's one thing Dukat's not good at, it's seeing the writing on the wall. (His behavior on DS9 was very similar--not acknowledging the end coming until it was almost too late.)
I definitely haven't forgotten Dukat's ambition, but the thing is that he was so blind to what was going on around him that he thought he could get away with it forever. I think the same thing happened with Mika--he assumed he could get away with it, only to find out that was not the case. He thinks he can have it ALL--his command, his mistress, his child, his wife, and his legitimate children--and he doesn't exactly have much of a grip on reality. He never did, even before he finally broke with reality completely.
It's kind of the same attitude that drives people like John Edwards, IMHO.
(Not sure if you've heard of him, but here's an article. Check out what this schmuck did while running for Vice President of the United States! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Edwards_extramarital_affair )
I definitely haven't forgotten Dukat's ambition, but the thing is that he was so blind to what was going on around him that he thought he could get away with it forever. I think the same thing happened with Mika--he assumed he could get away with it, only to find out that was not the case. He thinks he can have it ALL--his command, his mistress, his child, his wife, and his legitimate children--and he doesn't exactly have much of a grip on reality. He never did, even before he finally broke with reality completely.
It's kind of the same attitude that drives people like John Edwards, IMHO.
(Not sure if you've heard of him, but here's an article. Check out what this schmuck did while running for Vice President of the United States! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Edwards_extramarital_affair )
Bajorans and Cardassians were defined as uncomfortably genetically close.
Uncomfortable both from the "how could the monsters who did this to us be so like us" angle and from the "we both think we evolved on our homeworld, but it sure looks like we share a common ancestor" angle.
Defined as genetically close where? Was that ever stated in anything on the show?
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