3) The findings suggesting dietary restriction has positive health
benefits, retards ageing, and extends lifespan in animals have been
supported by nearly a century of research, without falsification.  Most
of that time, research was mostly sporadic and mostly limited to rodents.
However, in recent times, the implications of the dietary restriction
paradigm have spurred major research in a vast number of scientific
areas of investigation.  Most of the recent research is geared towards
human applications, or towards building better animal testing models.
Interestingly, in the former case, the realization that ad libitum
feeding promotes tumor growth has a growing number of researchers worried
about the validity of some experimental tests.  For example, if you are
testing a substance to see if it causes tumors, the carcinogenic
qualities could be masked by the animal eating an ad libitum diet.
Consider the following quote:
 
"It seems not unreasonable to ask whether the ad libitum feeding regimen
is as inappropriate for laboratory rodents as creosoted boxes and
intercurrent disease."  R. L. Sprott 2000  "Is caloric restriction
hormetic or is ad libitum feeding toxic?"  Human and Experimental
Toxicology 19:351-352.
 
The bottom line is that since the phenomenon was first noticed, it has
been confirmed in EVERY species of animals tested, and while the degree
of expression may vary somewhat, it is still universal.  More
importantly, in nearly a century of research, it has never been
falsified.  By itself, this is commanding evidence that the positive
benefits of caloric restriction are applicable to ferrets.
 
Bob C
[Posted in FML issue 3960]