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Asked by Rebecca to Isabel on 16 Mar 2015.
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Isabel Pires answered on 16 Mar 2015:
In a biological/medical sense, people die when the body stops functioning, and that is normally thought to be when the brain stops working.
However, there are reports of people that, after being brain dead for a few minutes, are able to be resuscitated by doctors. Do for all mdci al purposes, they were dead and brought back to life. This is very rare though, and it is usually associated with the body being very cold, which protects the body and brain tissues.
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Comments
Rebecca commented on :
i understand how we die but why do we have to die? why cant we live forever? people say that the bible says that it is because adam and eve sinned but what is the medical reason behind it?
Isabel commented on :
It is really sad that we cannot love forever. I remember the first time I realised this and it scared me.
Unfortunately it is part of the nature of how our bodies are made, and our cells can only divide a certain number of times. At the end of our chromosomes, there are bits of DNA we call telomeres, and they “tell” the cells how many times they can divide. Cells in different tissues divide more or less.
Personally, I don’t think it has to do with what it says in the bible, as there is no evidence for it (as a scientist I need evidence and don’t take things for granted).