# Why can't we double or triple the lives of our pets? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 20, 2015, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398 "2015-05-20T02:18:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2015, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/21 "2015-05-20T17:31:42Z")
Really appreciate all the answers. I guess this one summarizes it for me: [QUOTE=Colibri] It’s more difficult to breed for extended life span because whether or not an animal will have a long birth isn’t evident at birth. You only know it’s long-lived after the fact. And old animals will often be less fertile than young ones. [/QUOTE] I acknowledge that the life expectancy for dogs and cats has been going up, similarly to humans and probably for similar reasons (i.e. access to better health care, better diet, etc). What I was looking for is life span increases. I guess it’s more difficult than I thought it was even for animals…I guess I had this idea in my head that the main stumbling block to doing this for humans was more ethical or squimishness (or religious reasons) with monkeying with Human genes and doing human experimentation, since we’ve been able to extend mice and rat life spans for a while now. But it seems more complicated and difficult than I guess I envisioned. Again, thanks for the replies all…I just wanted to check in to say I appreciated them and hadn’t forgotten about the thread, but I really have very little knowledge on this stuff and just wanted to see what folks here thought. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2015, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/22 "2015-05-20T17:41:25Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > We can. To bread a dog, first you cut it into thin strips, roll them in an egg mixture, then flour. Bake or deep-fry to a golden brown. They’ll keep for a while in plastic bags in the fridge. Wrong. First flour, shake off the excess. Then egg mixture. Then breadcrumbs. This is culinary school 101. ---
**Author:** ![Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blue_blistering_barnacle/32/3386_2.png) [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2015, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/23 "2015-05-20T22:13:09Z")
A lot of the mouse/rat research uses caloric restriction to extend their lives. Whether or not caloric restriction would even work in humans, cats, and dogs, it’s just really HARD to do. Look how much trouble we have controlling obesity, when we know it is harmful to health. I think there are few loving pet owners who could long keep their pets in a continually starved condition. I also think many of these pets would be far less lovable in that condition. Anecdotally, we just raised a puppy for a service organization. She came out a tad overweight, so not starved. Not that you could tell that by how she acted. Every bit of food (and non-food) went right in her mouth. Imagine what she would be like if she was truly constantly starved. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/24 "2016-10-06T14:22:31Z")
Zombie pets and all that. But I saw [this](http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/06/health/rapamycin-dog-live-longer/index.html) article on CNN and thought I’d post it here. > [@](#): > > CNN)See Momo. > See Momo run. > > See Momo run faster, farther and with far more vigor, energy and youthfulness, his owners say, now that he’s taking a drug meant for humans with cancer. > “It’s been remarkable,” Paola Anderson said as she watched Momo, her 13-year-old white Pomsky, run around the backyard, keeping up with dogs a third his age. > The drug is called rapamycin. After nearly a decade of research showing that it makes mice live up to 60% longer, scientists are trying it out as an anti-aging drug in dogs and humans. > Rapamycin was discovered nearly 50 years ago in soil collected from Easter Island in the South Pacific and studied in a Canadian lab, and it’s the most promising drug to fight aging that Arlan Richardson has ever seen. > A professor at the Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, Richardson has been doing this kind of research for 40 years. > “It’s the best bet we have,” he said. > Now, scientists are moving forward and testing the drug in dogs. > Researchers at the University of Washington’s Dog Aging Project gave rapamycin to 16 dogs and imaged their hearts. > “It started to function better. It started to look like a more youthful heart,” said Matt Kaeberlein, co-director of the Dog Aging Project, who has presented this research at conferences but hasn’t yet published it. > Those dogs took rapamycin for only 10 weeks. Here’s what happened to Momo and his “brother,” Sherman, who took it for much longer. > [@](#): > > But there’s a catch > Take a look at the labels for Rapamune, made by Pfizer, and Afinitor (PDF), made by Novartis, two drugs that are essentially the same as rapamycin and are used to treat cancer patients and organ transplant recipients. The list of things that can go wrong is long and horrifying: cancer, diabetes, infections and more. > “You have to be concerned about these side effects,” Kaeberlein said. But that hasn’t stopped him from doing research on the drug. > First, Kaeberlein thinks the side effects seen in cancer patients and transplant recipients might not be because of rapamycin per se but because those patients were very sick to begin with, because they were taking a whole host of other drugs as well, or both. > Secondly, he uses a much lower dose of the drug on his healthy dogs compared with the dose used on sick people. > Richardson, the aging expert at the University of Oklahoma, agrees with Kaeberlein. He’s so convinced that he gave a low dose of rapamycin to his own dog, coincidentally named MoMo. > MoMo had a heart problem, and Richardson said it stabilized after he started taking rapamycin. He said the Tibetan terrier looks and acts younger than his 14 years, which would be around 80 or 90 in human years. > Plus, he said, there have been no side effects. > “We’ve been doing blood chemistries on her the whole time, and there’s nothing bad,” Richardson said. > The researcher was quick to note that one dog’s experience did not constitute proven scientific data – but he added that he’s given rapamycin to tiny monkeys called marmosets and hasn’t see any negative side effects for them, either. Yeah, this is totally experimental, and a couple of examples where it seems to help don’t constitute something that really works. However, it sounds like it MIGHT be something. It would be great if our pets could live longer and healthier lives. I think at 13 it might be worth the risk to try this out if you could get your pet in the program. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/25 "2016-10-06T16:46:03Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > if that’s the case, then biologically humans don’t really need to live much past age 30. Humans are already a fluke in life spans. There’s the billion heartbeat principle. The basic rule if that mammals have a lifespan equal to the amount of time it takes for their heart to beat a billion times. It doesn’t matter if it’s a mouse or a dog or a bear or an elephant or a whale - they all have a lifespan equal to around a billion heartbeats. Some mammals have quick heart rates and short life spans and other mammals have slower heart rates and longer life spans. But they all follow the billion heartbeat rule. With one exceptions: primates. Chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans all live significantly longer than a billion heartbeats. And humans live even longer than other primates. The average human life span is over two billion heartbeats long. If we followed the normal rule, we would die sometime around the age of thirty. ---
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/26 "2016-10-06T17:08:00Z")
There’s another exception: some birds. For example, hummingbirds’ hearts beat at an incredibly fast rate (up to 1,260 beats per minute), yet they can live as long as 10 - 12 years. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/27 "2016-10-06T17:32:22Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > How long do you think dogs or cats live in the wild, on average? > > Hint: It’s a LOT less than our pets typically live. > > We HAVE extended their lives by providing adequate food and nutrition, safe shelter, protection from larger predators, and medical care. Yes. Wanna double or triple the life of you cat? \*\*Keep it indoors. \*\* ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/28 "2016-10-06T18:06:30Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Animals like lobsters, turtles and some others can live to 200+ and still be healthy, lobsters could possibly live forever if protected from trauma and predators. Those animals, and this thread, exhibit a characteristic called [neglible senescence.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negligible_senescence) ---
**Author:** ![mmmiiikkkeee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/edb3f5/32.png) [@mmmiiikkkeee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mmmiiikkkeee)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/29 "2016-10-06T18:46:14Z")
> [@MLS](#): > > There’s another exception: some birds. For example, hummingbirds’ hearts beat at an incredibly fast rate (up to 1,260 beats per minute), yet they can live as long as 10 - 12 years. Add bats to that list too. Some species at least (eg: little brown bat) are about the size of small rodents and might average several hundred BPM, but often live for decades. A mouse or hamster the same size will only last 2-3 years. ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/30 "2016-10-06T18:54:54Z")
The problem of extending the lifespan of a cat is that they’ll eventually figure out how to kill their owners while they sleep … that’s a bad thing. ---
**Author:** ![GusNSpot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gusnspot/32/436_2.png) [@GusNSpot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GusNSpot)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/31 "2016-10-06T19:57:26Z")
So, why is it wrong for a person over 60 years old to want to quit living? Religion? Off chance they might make a big contribution to society? Humans are special snowflakes? ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/32 "2016-10-06T20:12:32Z")
We do, just by protecting them from the hazards of the wild. The longevity of the fox is listed as 5 years, coyotes and wolves “up to” ten or twelve in the wild, with the average orf median well below that outlier. So if wild canines have a natural life expectancy of 5-7 years, and dogs 10 to 15, domestic canines do live at least twice as long as their wild cousins. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/33 "2016-10-06T23:15:53Z")
In order to breed for longevity, you would need to know how old something will live to. In order to know how old something will live to, you have to wait for it to die. Dead things don’t breed. That said, we now have a few tests that give a good prediction (for humans) on how long they are likely to live (telomeres length, methylation frequency, etc.) These techniques should work on most animals. So we would be able to tell how long-lived each member of a breeding pool is likely to live and cull (or prevent from breeding) the lower 50%. Over time, this should produce longer-lived animals. Though it’s possible that this alone would be insufficient. If the biomarkers are testing for certain chemicals, then maybe increasing those chemicals in the body will be beneficial at a certain level but increasing it even more past that could start harming the animal and shortening its life, rather than extending it. So you might see one or two generations of improvement and then a decrease after that. Ultimately, we would need to understand aging better. At the moment, we’re still not sure how it works. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/34 "2016-10-07T00:12:36Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#): > > Those animals, and this thread, exhibit a characteristic called [neglible senescence.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negligible_senescence) Conversely, there are animals with unusually rapid senescence for their size and metabolic rate, too. Notably opossums. From the wiki article: > [@](#): > > Opossums, like most marsupials, have unusually short lifespans for their size and metabolic rate. The Virginia opossum has a maximal lifespan in the wild of only about two years.[18] Even in captivity, opossums live only about four years.[19] The rapid senescence of opossums is thought to reflect the fact that they have few defenses against predators; given that they would have little prospect of living very long regardless, they are not under selective pressure to develop biochemical mechanisms to enable a long lifespan.[20] In support of this hypothesis, one population on Sapelo Island, 5 miles (8 km) off the coast of Georgia, which has been isolated for thousands of years without natural predators, was found by Dr. Steven Austad to have evolved lifespans up to 50% longer than those of mainland populations.[20][21] Although, opossums also exhibit an unusually high level of resistance to many diseases - they just LOOK diseased, even when they’re perfectly healthy. ---
**Author:** ![Arrendajo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arrendajo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrendajo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/35 "2016-10-07T01:28:07Z")
Also, it looks like humans are reaching their maximum life span. [Here’s](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/06/science/maximum-life-span-study.html) an interesting article I read just this morning. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/36 "2016-10-07T03:07:57Z")
> [@MLS](#): > > There’s another exception: some birds. For example, hummingbirds’ hearts beat at an incredibly fast rate (up to 1,260 beats per minute), yet they can live as long as 10 - 12 years. Birds are not mammals. Although the thing with bats is interesting. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/37 "2016-10-07T04:06:29Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > In order to breed for longevity, you would need to know how old something will live to. In order to know how old something will live to, you have to wait for it to die. Dead things don’t breed. No longer true, due to artificial insemination and frozen semen. I have a friend who still offers breedings to her champion stallion, who actually died several years ago. But she has straws of frozen semen from him available for sale, and every year or so he has new offspring born. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/38 "2016-10-07T05:43:25Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > No longer true, due to artificial insemination and frozen semen. Or you could do what Heinlein suggests in the Lazurus Long books. Pick out dogs and cats whose grand parents lived the longest and breed those together for 30 generations or so. ---
**Author:** ![Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/channing_idaho_banks/32/250_2.png) [@Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Channing_Idaho_Banks)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/39 "2016-10-07T08:30:54Z")
Pets have been bred for desirable qualities for millennia. And, that isn’t good enough for you? Are you sure you want to be married to your pet for 40 years? They have pets like that. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398/40 "2016-10-07T11:46:05Z")
I have parrots. Of the current patch, 2 can have life expectancies in the mid-20’s and one into the mid-30’s, even 40. So some of us do that already. Parrots are some of those birds with high metabolisms and long lives. Some parrots have life expectancies in the 50-75 year range, comparable with human beings. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-we-double-or-triple-the-lives-of-our-pets/720398.md?page=3)