The author bills the science presented as Medicine 3.0, but at every turn my intuition screamed that what was being presented was at best Medicine 2.1. Not bad if Medicine 3.0 wasn't actually out there, but I feel that it is. You should still read “Outlive”. You should read all such books, popular health or popular medicine, I guess we call it, popular as much for an ability to speak with accessibility to the general populous as having any actual popularity.

We are in an age of embarrassing riches, no more so than with the feast of high quality, well-researched, well-meaning, thoughtful, and nuanced texts presented by such highly qualified individuals. It is to our detriment that we ignore even the scantest evidence where our greatest resource, our health, is concerned. For Peter Attia, I would say that although you can take the doctor out of the training, it's much more difficult to take the training out of the doctor. You really must read it to decide for yourself as I only have my gut instincts to go on. The science is infinitely complex and there is little agreement among the professionals about what it all means. At a certain point we have to trust the deeper parts of our intelligence to take over, synthesizing mountains of data and the various interpretations of those data. Intuition gets short shrift in our society.

Peter Attia seems in the throws of the paradigms he's struggling against, still very much attuned to a mid- to a late 2oth century mindset, a practice still bounded by old understandings despite an ostensibly cheery prognosis overall.

I'm hesitant to give specifics and argue against professional training, but the areas that pinged my radar the highest were his advice on exercise, his reliance on numbers and extreme testing, and his underestimation of the power of fasting. It all seems a bit out of balance to me.

Compare and contrast (for yourself) this book against books like Richard Johnson's “Nature Wants Us to Be Fat” (2022), Daniel Lieberman's “Exercised: Why Something We Never Evolved to Do Is Healthy and Rewarding” (2021), and Steve Hendricks “The Oldest Cure in the World: Adventures in the Art and Science of Fasting” (2022). There are many areas where these books are in agreement with Attia's advice, but worrying in the ways they disagree, sometime sharply. This list of books of course is in no way exhaustive, with new science coming at us every day. We are foolish if we don't at least try to make sense of it all. The stakes are ridiculously high. The price too precious. ( )

Easy to read and a good introduction to the subject. Better than 3 1/2 stars, but not quite up to 4. That Dr. Attia includes his personal story is important and elevates the book overall. For more detail, one should listen to Dr. Attia's podcast, which I find more beneficial overall. Still, I have no regrets over reading this. The book serves an important service in bringing together scientific ideas about longevity and the idea of what it means to live a good life. ( )

Dr. Peter Attia is an oncology surgeon, a data guy, and an extreme athlete with trauma in his past. That all plays into his approach to longevity: lots and lots of screening, monitoring, and "training" for old age as if you were training for a sporting event.

The chapters on exercise and nutrition were fantastic. My favorite quote: "Cardio or weights? Low-carb or plant-based? Olive oil or beef tallow? I don't know. Must we really take sides?" This is NOT a book telling you the One True Secret to long life; it all depends. Some certainties though: Exercise is the best medicine. If your metabolism is not functioning well, make it a priority to get that under control. Screen for everything, screen early, screen often.

Then come chapters on sleep and emotional health. I had really been looking forward to the chapter on sleep, as it's kind of a bugaboo for me. I had grown to feel I could trust his opinions, and I wanted know what he thought about better sleep through pharmaceuticals. He had stated in an early chapter that he had nothing against using medications in general where appropriate, such as statins; so it felt promising that I wouldn't get some knee-jerk anti-medication attitude.

I started reading the chapter one night shortly before bedtime, and didn't get up to any of the advice; just lots of emphatic "Sleep is crucial! Quality, uninterrupted sleep! It's a must! You risk Alzheimer's if you don't get it!" Nice scary nightmares to put a random chronic insomniac to sleep with.

The next night I delved in further. Alas, he's anti-Ambien. Ambien sleep isn't REAL sleep and yadda yadda yadda. However to give him credit, he had positive things to say about trazodone.

The whole sleep chapter was disappointing and did not feel nearly as data-driven as the previous chapters. It just felt like he got it in his head that sleep was very important to health and decided it warranted a whole chapter on a par with exercise & nutrition, but he didn't want to put any work into it.

For the emotional health chapter, I commend him for telling so much of his personal story. This chapter was driven by his own experience and that was OK.

I guess the real overarching theme of the book, though, was that everyone is different, and you must find what works for YOU. Your exercise ability, your own metabolic reactions - these are going to determine the "right" exercise and diet for you. He could have been a LITTLE more understanding about chronic insomnia, though, and respected that different things work (and don't work) for different people. As I said, a bit of a bugaboo for me… ( )

It’s not a terrible book, nor is it any good. if you don’t know anything at all about life extension, this is a good beginners guide for someone of a relatively low IQ, who won’t be bored by the slow pace of the book. if you already know a lot about life extension, this book is not worth wasting your time on. ( )

Lots of valuable research presented in a clear, relatable manner. I appreciated the whole body and mind approach to longevity and making it a life worth living. I went down many rabbit holes while reading this book. I appreciate that there is a lot of extra media supplemental material on his website if you want it. His differentiation between Medicine 2.0 (reactionary at the manifestation of symptoms) and Medicine 3.0 (early detection and prevention) is a key mind shift for everyone. That is the focus of the first section followed by research about The Four Horseman (cancer, heart disease, metabolic issues like diabetes, and neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's). The final part goes into what you can do for prevention. The book's style gives you the TL;DR version (like exercise is key!) and then dives into details if you want them (the need for stabilization and proper form). I'm glad to have found this book. I imagine it will add many years to many lives. ( )