On 2014 May 09, Madhusudana Girija Sanal commented:

A SIMPLER DEFINITION OF CANCER

The following two conditions needs to be satisfied to define a cancer:

1) Non physiological rate and duration of cell proliferation. Non physiological rate is defined as a growth rate which is a statistical outlier spatially and temporally for a given type of cell and organism. 2) A change, genetic or epigenetic with reference to the "healthy genome" The genetic or epigenetic 'change' is a statistical outlier, spatially and temporally, for a given cell type and organism. Healthy reference genome and epigenome may be defined as the 'consensus' genome of individuals which satisfy two conditions a) falling within the statistically defined normal range of anatomical and physiological parameters for a population b) demonstrated longevity above 99.9 percentile of the population of a given organism under optimal growth conditions and environment and excluding accidental deaths. Consensus may be reached through statistical or non-statistical approaches (functional,computational or even based on social and economic goals).

According to this definition an apparently "healthy" person having hundreds of cells with known cancer causing mutations do not have cancer because condition #1 is not met. So he will have cancer only when mutated cells start to proliferate at a non-physiological speed.

On 2014 May 09, Madhusudana Girija Sanal commented:

A SIMPLER DEFINITION OF CANCER

The following two conditions needs to be satisfied to define a cancer:

1) Non physiological rate and duration of cell proliferation. Non physiological rate is defined as a growth rate which is a statistical outlier spatially and temporally for a given type of cell and organism. 2) A change, genetic or epigenetic with reference to the "healthy genome" The genetic or epigenetic 'change' is a statistical outlier, spatially and temporally, for a given cell type and organism. Healthy reference genome and epigenome may be defined as the 'consensus' genome of individuals which satisfy two conditions a) falling within the statistically defined normal range of anatomical and physiological parameters for a population b) demonstrated longevity above 99.9 percentile of the population of a given organism under optimal growth conditions and environment and excluding accidental deaths. Consensus may be reached through statistical or non-statistical approaches (functional,computational or even based on social and economic goals).

According to this definition an apparently "healthy" person having hundreds of cells with known cancer causing mutations do not have cancer because condition #1 is not met. So he will have cancer only when mutated cells start to proliferate at a non-physiological speed.