Why would a person age more slowly in space?

Answer 1

Time dilation.
Any object has a total amount of kinetic energy. The total is the sum of motion through space and motion through time. This total always equals c (or the speed of light [in a vacuum]). So, if two objects are in the same frame of reference and one of them is moving faster through space than the other, it is moving more slowly through time than the other. So, yes, you're are aging more slowly as you drive along in your car than someone who's standing on the side of the road. However, at our snail's pace of everyday life, the effects are unnoticeable. Now, if you're an astronaut going along in the shuttle at about 17,000mph the effects are still only in the trillionths of seconds. You would need to be moving at a substantial % of c to notice relevant differences.
Also, the farther away from the center of a gravity well an object is, the slower it moves through time. So, again, if you're an astronaut orbiting earth in the shuttle, you're farther away than someone on the ground is from the center of the earth--i.e. the center of the earth's gravity well. These effects of time dialtion have been proven and verified by numerous experiments.

Answer 2

It's not outer space (the place) that would cause a person to age slowly (from the perspective of people on earth)...
It's the speed at which the space explorers are traveling...
The faster you travel, the longer it will seem to people traveling less fast, that you live...
But time will still pass normally from your own perspective, and you will still age at the same rate you did before...it's just that from the people of Earth (who aren't traveling so fast) it would "seem" as if you are aging slower and living longer...
E=MC squared (C = speed of light)...
Now break down Einstein's simple equation into it's complicated, individual component equations, and you'll see why your question (which should've been asked this way..."Why would it "seem" like a person traveling at super speeds through space age much slower...?) is actually a "truth" about the connection between a person's speed of travel and locally perceived time, and how it could enable people to leave Earth in 2010, and return in 2090, but only age 20 years (and in the spaceship's interior, only 20 years of ship time would have passed)
The advantage being you get to see a future you would've missed out on...
The disadvantage is that everyone you knew before you blasted off into space would be dead when you got back...and you missed the last season of "Lost" many decades ago...

Answer 3

We have personell on the Space station. They are under observation to determine if the mode of living affects their aging. I would assume living conditions have some correlation to whether aging is slower or not.
Basically Earth is the most adapt to favorably support life on while its suspended in space and moving thru it.
Perhaps in prehistoric flood time man did live up to a thousand years.Then life spans degraded with time. Pehaps Radiation Changes occured; there may have be greater magnetic intensity surrounding the Earth shielding cosmic radiation and solar wind radiation in space.. After the flood,sea current motion may have changed causing magnetic field changes surrounding the Earth. Changes in Radiation flux bombarding the Earth may have been a factor in shorterning life on earth.Other scenarios, which we have not discovered or understood yet, may also have caused changes in human life span.
We are living in a section of space in the Universe which we call local space.
If we Saw from the Horizon a high velocity spacecraft with Humans in it,the vehilce would appear to us to moves very slowly from our frame of reference but from their point of view they vehicle is moving very fast.
Does that mean they are aging slowly because us the observers see them barely moving from a distance? No because we are all in the same local space.The people in motion are not aging any faster than the Observers which are at rest.

Answer 4

Time dialation... The faster you travel the slower time goes, you dont have to be in space ^_^

they did an experiment with this... they took two synchronised atomic time recorder, one was on the ground and one was on a plane. The flew around the world and landed in the same position they left off on and checked the times. The one that went round the world was running a fraction of a second slower (to put this in persective if you left these time recorders side by side for 100,000 years you wouldnt have seen this time discrepancy!)

This question opens up a whole new can of worms about how we decribe time (and even if time actually exists!) but i'll go for the simple answer of;
more speed = slower time.

Answer 5

Well not only gravity causes wrinkles... In space there would be less pollutants, dirt and germs then that are here on Earth, these also contribute to ageing also wind and dry heart during summer dries the skin making the ageing process speed up faster again!

Answer 6

By and large, Earth is the ideal environment for humans.
While living in space for extended periods tends to slowly degrade the general health of the occupant, there are circumstances where it would be very beneficial.

People with very weak hearts would benefit from living in space. Thanks to the microgravity, the heart needs to do very little work. People with weak bones could also benefit.

There are a good few sci-fi stories dealing with this very issue. I recommend those by Heinlein and Arthur C Clarke.

Answer 7

People age the same in space. The effects of aging might be reduced from a lack of gravity but you age no matter where you're at.

Answer 8

They wouldn't.

Physiologically they will tend to age faster - the human body does not cope well with zero g.

Ignoring that they will age at exactly the same rate.

However, the passage of time for them WITH RESPECT TO EARTH will be different. This is NOTHING to do with motion - they could be in a geostationary orbit. It is to do with lower gravity (not the same as zero g - which is zero effective acceleration) with altitude. The effect is very tiny, and it has no impact on the passage of time and ageing they experience themselves.

Answer 9

Wow. that's a super question. My wager is the sunlight has extra to do with ageing than gravity. without the retaining layers of the earth, the floor is extra without delay uncovered to the detrimental UV rays from the sunlight. If the floor is by no ability uncovered, then confident, it may age extra slowly. despite the fact that, if the floor is ever outdoors, it may in all probability age quicker. in basic terms my reasoning. i'm no scientist.

Answer 10

A person will age faster in space, the person is outside the envelope that he evolved in.