‘Hormesis in aging is characterized by the beneficial effects resulting from the cellular responses to mild repeated stress’ (Rattan, 2004: 287). He reports laboratory research that shows how mild stress of various kinds (including starvation) in in vitro cell cultures improves functional integrity without upsetting the normal cellular processes. He also reports an Indian finding in humans that undernutrition can be beneficial to DNA repair capacity. This last observation contrasts in a culturally revealing way with the reports by Lane et al. (2002: 36) that ‘caloric restriction’ was an effective anti-ageing strategy but that people would probably have to ‘reduce their caloric intake by roughly 30 percent, equivalent to dropping from 2,500 calories a day to 1,750’. They reached the conclusion that ‘few mortals could stick to that harsh a regimen’. Their response was the, as yet unsuccessful, attempt to produce a pill that would imitate in people the effect of nutrition levels common in the poorest nations of the world (World Resources Institute, 2003) without their having to give up food.
John A.Vincent. Ageing Contested: Anti-ageing Science and the Сultural Construction of Old Age // Sociology, 2006, Volume 40(4): 681–698.