On Thu, 20 Apr 2000 10:48:38 +0100, "P.G.Hamer"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
< snip, interesting stuff about, proper age-adjusted life-tables,
with proper adjustment of base-line Ns, would not show an increase in
competing causes of death >
> BTW an even greater problem in animal testing seems to be due using
> feed-on-demand systems. The little critters are usually bored out of
> their minds and overeat, causing a variety of health problems. So any
> drug that makes them mildly unwell can easily spoil their appetite --
> and make them look healthier.
I never knew that!
But that might be similar, or that might underlie another thing that I
once was told about laboratory rats.
I had been impressed by the newspaper reports that rats lived longer
if they were underfed, i.e., on very-low-calorie diets. Then my
lab-tech friends told me that the lab rats tended to live to a certain
*size* rather than age. The starved ones took 30% longer to reach
that same size. So my friends were not at all impressed by those news
reports. [ There may be newer data that are more impressive.]
I later realized that humans and dogs are in the minority among
mammals, in that we achieve "adult" size and then stop growing. For
elephants and moose and bears, etc., the stereotype from childhood
nature stories is not all invention. If the clever "old man of the
woods/jungle/forest" is the wisest and the oldest, he is likely to be
the biggest, because most critters never stop growing. That seemed to
tie in to the rat-life-spans, too.
--
Rich Ulrich, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.pitt.edu/~wpilib/index.html
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