An interesting memoir of a scientist who has spent his career researching how to postpone aging.

He started with the premise that evolution was the ultimate controller of aging, and natural selection did nothing to ensure the survival of those who were post-reproductive, so he decided to move reproduction to an older age.

By delaying reproduction over 50 generations (!), he produced fruit flies that consistently lived longer (10%). He dubbed them Methuselah flies. By delaying reproduction, he also achieved an interesting side-effect. The flies were healthier overall than the offspring of regular flies allowed to reproduce at an early age. That was due in part to the fact that most genetic diseases, most of which don’t allow individuals to live until ripe old age, have already killed unhealthy individuals before they were able to reproduce. The offspring of those older parents, reproducing and reproducing again for generations consistently produced longer living offspring.

Methuselah flies showed more interesting characteristics. They survived longer without food. They resisted acute stress better than the regular flies, so it turned out that to respond better to stress also means to live longer.

Following the research on reduced caloric intake as prolonging life, the Methuselah flies were subjected to a calorie restricted diet, and lived still longer.

Overall, interestingly enough, it seems that indulging in sex and eating were not good for them at all. In fruit flies:
1. Early fecundity killed earlier
2. Male fruit flies could actually copulate themselves to death
3. Eunuchs lived longer than sexually active males
4. Mated females lived shorter lives than lifelong virgins, who lived shorter lives than sterilized females, who lived shorter lives than ovarieless females
5. Those who survive on 60-50% of regular daily intake of food lived still longer.

The question that I want to ask right now is: Is there any sense in living longer then?
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Sort of a diary of this biologist's research, which involved a lot of fruit flies.