10 Mindblowing Things That Happen As You Age

Right, so scientists continue to bicker about exactly what is causing us to age, but why should we do it in the first place? We've been evolving for millions of years, surely those that succumb to something like old age will have been eliminated from the gene pool by now?

Unfortunately, evolution isn't as foresighted as that. 

To begin with, Darwin theorised that evolution opposed the idea of ageing, meaning that the ageing process was just due to fundamentally insurmountable limitations of chemistry and physics, but the reality is a bit more complicated than that.

The ageing process was then thought to be, at best, neutral in the realms of evolutionary pressure. This is due to the fact that it is the young, fit and healthy that do all the breeding, so as long as a person lives into reproductive maturity, what happens after that is irrelevant in an evolutionary context.

In recent years, scientists have begun to theorise that the body ages on purpose in order to reduce pressure on the rest of the population. This means that our success as a species could be largely based on the fact that we whither and die after we've served our purpose of procreation.

Sorry, as far as nature is concerned, you're just a baby making machine and anything beyond that is your problem.

Perhaps the best thing to do is just embrace it. Put down the wrinkly cream, get some comfy shoes and enjoy growing old as (dis)gracefully as you like.