Saturnino de la Fuente Garcia's family were in a state of high anticipation. His seven daughters, 14 grandchildren and 22 great-grandchildren knew his birthday would be big news. He was born in the year that the first aeroplaneLouis Bleriot flew from Calais to Dover in an aeroplane he had designed himself on 25 July 1909. flew across the English Channel. When he was five years old, World War One began. Aged nine, he lived through the Spanish Flu epidemicThe pandemic lasted from 1918 until 1920 and is believed to have killed at least 25 million people.. He had truly seen it all.

Sadly, the celebrations were not to take place. Garcia died on Tuesday in the Spanish city of Leon, three weeks before his 113th birthday. 

He became the world's oldest man last September at the age of 112 years and 211 days.

Garcia's advice for longevity was simple: have "a quiet life" and "do not hurt anyone".

He may have survived due to his height. Garcia was only 5ft. If he had been taller, he would probably have been made to fight in the Spanish Civil WarA bloody conflict between 1936 and 1939 that saw Spain's right-wing Nationalist faction rebel against the left-wing Republican government. The Nationalists won, with support from Europe's fascist regimes.. Over 200,000 soldiers were killed in the conflict. Instead, Garcia ended up making army boots. He went on to build a successful shoemaking business. 

The world's oldest woman, Kane Tanake, turned 119 last month in a JapaneseJapan is famous for its many centenarians, who number more than 85,000. In 1963 there were just 153. nursing home. 

Record-breaking ages could become more common. In his new book Lifespan: Why We Age - And Why We Don't Have To, David Sinclair argues that ageing is a process that can be stopped.

The problem, he says, lies with markers that determine a cell's function. For example, they decide if it is going to be a kidney cell or a lung cell.

With time, these markers become lost. Cells are no longer sure what they should be doing. Slowly, parts of the body stop working properly.

Sinclair's answer is to encourage the production of sirtuin proteins. Their role is to repair the markers. They seem to be controlled by another protein called mTOR.

When the body is having a difficult time, mTOR switches off and the sirtuins start their repair work. 

Sinclair argues that there are several ways to trick a body into producing sirtuins. Experiments with lemurs found that one way is to reduce food. The lemurs that ate little lived 50% longer - though they were not happy. Another way to produce sirtuins is to take a pill with a chemical called nicotinamide riboside. 

Sinclair also suggests genetic engineering could be key. He suggests turning adult cells into stem cells. These would produce brand new, healthy cells. He claims this has increased the lifespan of some mice by 40%. 

But many biologists are worried that trying to stop ageing could do more harm than good. One expert warns that genetic engineering could cause "every kind of cancer at once".

As for starving yourself, no studies have been running long enough to confirm whether it works. And some believe that if sirtuins really were the answer to ageing, our bodies would have found a way of producing more of them naturally.

Yes: Nothing causes humans more misery than old age. If we could defeat it, most of our loved ones would remain with us forever. A younger population would be better able to solve the world's problems.

No: Ageing is a natural process, and tampering with nature is always a recipe for disaster. The most important thing we can do to save the planet is to reduce its population rather than increase it. 

Or... Instead of trying to make old people live longer, we should focus on giving them a better quality of life. There is no point in surviving to 112 if you end up feeling sick and miserable.