I don’t take it. I give it to my cat, who died one day after her twentieth birthday.
:(
A lot of variables in the magic to consider, but if you retain your knowledge, than 35 back to 15. You’ve essentially matured as far as you will at that point, started a family or married if you will do so, found stabilization in your career or at least moved far down that path, you hit the major milestones.
So back to 15 and then you live out the bulk of your high school with knowledge to help you actually enjoy learning, slow pace of high school, form lasting lifelong friendships, properly pursue education beyond high school, then live your 20s with a full appreciation for what they are, start saving money the right way, date the right way and invest in all of the tech companies before they get big so that you’re obscenely wealthy through your late 20s and beyond.
Use the money to line a small island completely with underground dynamite charges. Invite trump, tell him you’re offering him an unlimited budget to make the island into the first trump island and resort, hand him a golden shovel and say, “I’m going to get in this helicopter to get higher up to take a nice cinematic shot of you breaking ground for the press release” when you’re out of the blast radius, press the button. You’ve done one of the greater services to humanity by any living human in history. Enjoy your earned retirement.
Probably 65, as 45 was my vampire age, and I have enjoyed the time since that age. I am not sure I’d like to go back to fertility though. Think about it, say you take it at 40, menarche around 15 and menopause around 55, that’s periods for 60 years instead of 40 years, and twenty extra years you might get pregnant.
I’ve had some time to think on this, I still say probably 65. I waffled for awhile because I would like to have the build I had before the last 2 children, but keep the kids, the ten pound wonder blew out my abs and skin which happily bounced completely back several times did not make a complete recovery with the last. But the 3 additional years I spent nursing them provides additional protection vs. breast cancer, don’t think I’d want to give up their half of that. And I have literally felt better and healthier in the years after 40, so rather have more of those.
No earlier than 45. Otherwise you’re headed back into territory where your body and brain are still developing – fuck with that and you might not feel right in your own body.
I’d probably go back and beg for puberty blockers
I’d take it right now.
I’m not married, not dating, and have no kids.
Getting 20 years back means I can correct a lot of mistakes and I’ll have way more energy and focus to be the me I want to be. My 20s were so stressful I started getting white hair.
I’m 42. Does everyone get a pill? My wife? My kids? My parents?
Jumping back 20 years puts me out of sync with everyone I care about. I’m not sure I’d even want it.
That’s a good point. You kinda lose your kids once you take the pill. On the flip side though, who’s putting who in the nursing home now?
Why do you lose your kids? You could still be there
I think there’s a certain power dynamic that comes with looking and acting older. If you look the same age or younger than your kids, that power dynamic is most likely going to slowly shift. It’d be like if you’re in your 40s working for a guy who looks like he’s in his 20s. While possible, I imagine it’d be a challenging arrangement. Not to mention how your kids would feel about your decision as a parent to take an age reversal pill.
I think there’s an assumption that kids are about 20 years younger than the one taking the pill, this will not always be true. In the US women’s median age for giving birth had hit 30 in 2022, I would expect that age is even higher in men.
So, if you’re 45 and your child is 15, after taking the pill you’ll be 25 which looks like an adult enough for a 15 year old
I’m tempted to say 40, so I can relive the most physically fit part of my life, but maybe I should wait until I’m really old. Not sure
Yeah stick with 40. What are you gonna do, be like “yeah it feels great being only 50 years again! Glad I passed up having a second twenties.” If you heard someone say that you’d think they were insane.
True, but I was a doofus in my twenties. I suppose it depends if we get to keep our collected wisdom/lack of fucks or not
I’ll go for another angle, since the ‘about 40’ has been done to death.
If this is a pill that de-ages but does not de-mature you, go for it at 20. On the way to 20 you are maturing, but also aging. Who knows what mature, but with newborn level ‘age’ health might look like. Imagine the boost from a 40 year old to a 20 year old, but starting from a baseline of a 20 year old.
Sounds like a Black Mirror episode: The mind of a 20 year old in the body of a newborn. Incapable of doing all the things, that a 20 year old would think of. Many years until you are allowed again to do things, that you are actually mature enough to do.
Well, if it ‘de-matures’ then certainly would say older, at least mid 30s.
Lots of wiggle room in the question.
Some assume outright time travel, to repeat your life exactly as it were.
Then there’s the question of maturation versus just the degenerative effects of aging.
Is it just the natural break down or is it also “wear and tear”, and if “wear and tear”, does that extend to damage from disease or injury? Can you reset to before an amputation if one were needed? If that’s the case you’d want to hold on to that pill until you really start feeling things or have an injury. In school a girl was in an accident and got her leg amputated at 7 or so, so I wager for her the answer would have been certainly under 27 if it got her leg back, even if it meant dealing with a preteen body for a while.
So I take this pill, and I become physically younger. I don’t move back in time, I’m still legally a 36 year old, but I look and feel like I’m 16.
It depends on how this works. Is the pill a magic spell where there’s a poof and I’m in my previous body as it was 20 years ago, or is it just “damage and wear and tear are undone?” Because I’ve had a few surgeries I don’t want to redo in the last 20 years; I don’t want my wisdom teeth or appendix back. I’ve had a dental implant since then, does that reverse itself…is a bicuspid going to try to grow out of my skull through the titanium socket bone grafted into my face?
For practicality’s sake I think no earlier than 43, simply because…at that point your younger self is a fully developed adult; if someone cards you and says “You’re telling me you’re 43 years old?” You can say “Yeah I’ve had some work done.”
Much younger than 40 years old and you have to repeat portions of adolescence and/or childhood, which would be inconvenient at best.
Counterpoint: I didn’t discover I was trans until after the wrong puberty made being trans a lot harder. Going back to before that would let me right a pretty grand sense of wrongness.
Can I sell the pill?
Yes.
In that case I sell it some billionaire for a 100 million. It is quality not quantity of life. It isn’t like I am losing twenty years of life I am gaining a 100 million dollars.
I find it funny that no one else (including me) even considered selling it!
Now feel free to answer if you can’t :)
Edit: although I bet you could fetch WAY more than 100 mil for it. The oldest and richest people in the world would probably give up the majority of their fortune, especially if they were close to death. Auction it off!
I find it funny that no one else (including me) even considered selling it!
I was inspired by a yt video I am listening to say too much now.
50s. Getting back to one’s 30s you’re still old enough for people to take you seriously, but the creaking bones and exhaustion hasn’t really started creeping in yet.
the creaking bones and exhaustion hasn’t really started creeping in yet.
Uhhh about that
Well, just saying, what creaking bones I had in my 30s don’t even rate in comparison now
chuckles I’m in danger
Start doing morning stretches, drink more water, and avoid caffeine after 5pm
“Avoid caffeine after 5pm”
Laughs in ADHD
Ugh I turn 30 today, I’ve had a bum knee for like 15 years and now the arthritis is starting in my thumbs 🙄
What on earth did you do at 15? Were you that guy that jumped off the 10 foot roof and landed legs locked in rainboots? :p
I threw a head high kick in a kung fu tournament and landed weird, it’s never been the same. I probably tore something but I didn’t go to the doctor on account of the fact I’m American, but I manage the pain pretty well with medical marijuana and walking barefoot, at least in the warmer months.
Ooof, I’m sorry. :/
42
Always the answer.
👋
Username checks out
I’d take it today. I’m in my 50s, I’m an endurance athlete (I race bikes) and the calculus looks like: if I wait 20 years I get to experience body-age 50-70 twice, but if I take it now I experience 30-50 twice. Living my prime twice is better than enduring my decline twice, thanks
What you said, but I’m just shy of 50 and I run rather than cycle
Take it at 30 so you’re physically 10 but mentally 30.
All your peers would be annoying little kids D:
I’d still consider the 30 year old crowd to be my peers. I am still technically 30, I just look 10. The only downside to this is like that time I saw a dwarf being accosted by an elderly woman when she saw him light up a cigarette from behind and incorrectly assumed it was a child.
Why would you want to look like a child?! Although it could be funny showing bouncers your id (assuming you’re able to update the pic)
