Abstract
The biological reasons for aging are now understood. Aging is the result of multiple stochastic events in molecules, cells, tissues and organs. These together produce the aged phenotype, senescence and ultimately death. Many of these changes can be directly linked to specific age-associated disease. However, there are also age-related changes that are not pathological. It can be said that aging has multiple causes, or is instead due to a general loss of molecular fidelity, that is, an increase in disorder. The complexity of organism means that they develop as ordered structures by obtaining energy from the environment. These ordered structures must be maintained by a wide variety of mechanisms which also depend on energy resources. Eventually these mechanisms fail, and senescence sets in. It is known that the efficiency of maintenance is correlated directly with the lifespan of different mammalian species. Also, these lifespans are inversely correlated with fecundity or reproductive potential. There is a trade off between investment of resources in maintenance of the body, or soma, and investment in reproduction.
Highlights
It is evident that aging is no longer an unsolved biological problem [1,2,3,4,5,6]
The adult organism is a structure capable of reproduction for a given period, but in a natural environment, most offspring are born to young adults because environmental hazards limit the lifespan of parents
The energy resources available to every animal are used for general metabolism, for reproduction and to maintain the body, or soma
Summary
It is evident that aging is no longer an unsolved biological problem [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Hayflick [8] has argued that aging is an intrinsic process occurring in almost all animals, and that it is not directly related to particular age-associated pathologies. Instead, he states that aging makes an animal susceptible to these pathological events. He states that aging makes an animal susceptible to these pathological events It is argued here and elsewhere [2,5,9] that the process or processes of aging are responsible for most of these pathological changes. Pathology is the science of the causes and effects of diseases. (It is the branch of medicine that deals with the laboratory examination of samples of body tissue for diagnostic or forensic purposes, but this is not relevant to the discussion here)
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