dv said:

We had a little conversation a few years back about how it seems to be tough to get past the 118 barrier in longevity. Since that time, events have reaffirmed this a bit, with a series of deaths of supercentenarians from ages 116 to 117. Of all the 21 people documented to have reached the 116th birthday, only 2 have reached their 118th (Jeanne Calment and Sarah Knauss).

Last I heard, all the really old people have been dropping like flies at ages 115 to 117.

I’m inclined to have some doubt about Jeanne Calment at 122 years. The motive was there (avoiding a massive amount of inheritance tax), the cover-up was there (Calment destroyed all the old photographs of her that she could get her hands on), the community support was there (her friends and neighbours hated the inheritance tax, too), and the possibility was there (her daughter taking over the name).

Don’t know about Knauss at 119 years. But I’m inclined to some scepticism until someone else reaches 118 1/2.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Well, except for Heinlein’s ‘Lazarus Long’ of course. If there is ever a breakthrough in age, it will occur in exceedingly few individuals.

mollwollfumble said:

dv said:

We had a little conversation a few years back about how it seems to be tough to get past the 118 barrier in longevity. Since that time, events have reaffirmed this a bit, with a series of deaths of supercentenarians from ages 116 to 117. Of all the 21 people documented to have reached the 116th birthday, only 2 have reached their 118th (Jeanne Calment and Sarah Knauss).

Last I heard, all the really old people have been dropping like flies at ages 115 to 117.

I’m inclined to have some doubt about Jeanne Calment at 122 years. The motive was there (avoiding a massive amount of inheritance tax), the cover-up was there (Calment destroyed all the old photographs of her that she could get her hands on), the community support was there (her friends and neighbours hated the inheritance tax, too), and the possibility was there (her daughter taking over the name).

Don’t know about Knauss at 119 years. But I’m inclined to some scepticism until someone else reaches 118 1/2.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Well, except for Heinlein’s ‘Lazarus Long’ of course. If there is ever a breakthrough in age, it will occur in exceedingly few individuals.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Found the spreadsheet. OK, I haven’t extended it to a sufficiently long age but there isn’t any sign of a planned obsolescence cliff for animals on the chart so far.

mollwollfumble said:

dv said:

We had a little conversation a few years back about how it seems to be tough to get past the 118 barrier in longevity. Since that time, events have reaffirmed this a bit, with a series of deaths of supercentenarians from ages 116 to 117. Of all the 21 people documented to have reached the 116th birthday, only 2 have reached their 118th (Jeanne Calment and Sarah Knauss).

Last I heard, all the really old people have been dropping like flies at ages 115 to 117.

I’m inclined to have some doubt about Jeanne Calment at 122 years. The motive was there (avoiding a massive amount of inheritance tax), the cover-up was there (Calment destroyed all the old photographs of her that she could get her hands on), the community support was there (her friends and neighbours hated the inheritance tax, too), and the possibility was there (her daughter taking over the name).

Don’t know about Knauss at 119 years. But I’m inclined to some scepticism until someone else reaches 118 1/2.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Well, except for Heinlein’s ‘Lazarus Long’ of course. If there is ever a breakthrough in age, it will occur in exceedingly few individuals.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Found the spreadsheet. OK, I haven’t extended it to a sufficiently long age but there isn’t any sign of a planned obsolescence cliff for animals on the chart so far.

Data source: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Selected-life-table-parameters-for-groups-of-animals_tbl2_4746626

I see from that table that I can extend the chart beyond 25 years.

“Kane Tanaka, born 2 January 1903) is a validated Japanese supercentenarian who, at age 116 years, 305 days, is the world’s oldest verified living person following the death of 117-year-old Chiyo Miyako on 22 July 2018”.

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

dv said:

We had a little conversation a few years back about how it seems to be tough to get past the 118 barrier in longevity. Since that time, events have reaffirmed this a bit, with a series of deaths of supercentenarians from ages 116 to 117. Of all the 21 people documented to have reached the 116th birthday, only 2 have reached their 118th (Jeanne Calment and Sarah Knauss).

Last I heard, all the really old people have been dropping like flies at ages 115 to 117.

I’m inclined to have some doubt about Jeanne Calment at 122 years. The motive was there (avoiding a massive amount of inheritance tax), the cover-up was there (Calment destroyed all the old photographs of her that she could get her hands on), the community support was there (her friends and neighbours hated the inheritance tax, too), and the possibility was there (her daughter taking over the name).

Don’t know about Knauss at 119 years. But I’m inclined to some scepticism until someone else reaches 118 1/2.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Well, except for Heinlein’s ‘Lazarus Long’ of course. If there is ever a breakthrough in age, it will occur in exceedingly few individuals.

Humans are made with “planned obsolescence” built in. Other animals, even zoo animals with exceptional vet care, don’t live long enough to get to ‘death by planned obsolescence’. I have an Excel spreadsheet somewhere.

Found the spreadsheet. OK, I haven’t extended it to a sufficiently long age but there isn’t any sign of a planned obsolescence cliff for animals on the chart so far.

Data source: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Selected-life-table-parameters-for-groups-of-animals_tbl2_4746626

I see from that table that I can extend the chart beyond 25 years.

“Kane Tanaka, born 2 January 1903) is a validated Japanese supercentenarian who, at age 116 years, 305 days, is the world’s oldest verified living person following the death of 117-year-old Chiyo Miyako on 22 July 2018”.

Extending that out as far as I can, I get the following chart. The vertical scale on the last 3 points for apes is only relative and may differ from that on the axis

The only evidence for an obsolescence cliff I’ve seen in researching that for non-humans is for gorillas and chimps. Both tend to die off quickly between ages 60 and 66. But that’s only real evidence for planned obsolescence if the survival of the chimpanzee Little Mama to an age of 76 years or longer has been faked.

For the survival of the oldest known raptor at 45 years I could have the wrong species, so that data point is not reliable.
The vertical line at age 20 for carnivores is an artefact of the statistical difference between “mean and “median”.

So if I take the age of Little Mama as correct, then that suggests that humans may be the only species known to die of old age.

https://youtu.be/_Jtpf8N5IDE

given cell turnover, what DNA is exposed to, that an organic replicator can maintain the level of fidelity it does is impressive really (with help from immune system etc), if you compare it with the most complex things humans build that are exposed to harsh (variable) environments

thanks

For comparison, here are humans. See the difference. Also see how the apes graph is just starting to approach the human graph.

mollwollfumble said:

For comparison, here are humans. See the difference. Also see how the apes graph is just starting to approach the human graph.

I’m guessing that’s humans in Australia (or similar), rather than global average.

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

For comparison, here are humans. See the difference. Also see how the apes graph is just starting to approach the human graph.

I’m guessing that’s humans in Australia (or similar), rather than global average.

Evolution would favour a system where the old infirm members would die & thus not be a burden to the tribe.

Tamb said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

For comparison, here are humans. See the difference. Also see how the apes graph is just starting to approach the human graph.

I’m guessing that’s humans in Australia (or similar), rather than global average.

Evolution would favour a system where the old infirm members would die & thus not be a burden to the tribe.

In the case of members being sufficiently active to help look after the kiddies, and to pass on their life-time learning, they can provide some evolutionary advantage.

And presumably did.

The Rev Dodgson said:

Tamb said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

I’m guessing that’s humans in Australia (or similar), rather than global average.

Evolution would favour a system where the old infirm members would die & thus not be a burden to the tribe.

In the case of members being sufficiently active to help look after the kiddies, and to pass on their life-time learning, they can provide some evolutionary advantage.

And presumably did.

They did but until recently they died at an early age.
When I was in Indonesia in the 50s, reaching 40 was considered to be quite an achievement.

Tamb said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

Tamb said:

Evolution would favour a system where the old infirm members would die & thus not be a burden to the tribe.

In the case of members being sufficiently active to help look after the kiddies, and to pass on their life-time learning, they can provide some evolutionary advantage.

And presumably did.

They did but until recently they died at an early age.
When I was in Indonesia in the 50s, reaching 40 was considered to be quite an achievement.

> Evolution would favour a system where the old infirm members would die & thus not be a burden to the tribe.

I used to think that, but other animals trend not to live long enough for total internal collapse to occur. And not seen for humans until recently.

> They did but until recently they died at an early age. When I was in Indonesia in the 50s, reaching 40 was considered to be quite an achievement.

Thank you. You’ve prompted me to post my other graph. :-) Human longevity now vs human longevity in Jamaica in 1901-1903. Keep in mind that 1903 was not all that long ago. The median survival age back then was 4 years old, and there was a uniform death rate all the way from age 10 to age 80.

So also “in Indonesia in the 1950s”, very interesting.

The Jamaica 1901-1903 chart, like the charts for animals, shows almost no sign of the planned obsolescence cliff, apart from the sharp cut-off at age 95. Although there were cholera epidemics every 20 years or so, these were not years with epidemics.

>…/cut/…..Evolution would favour a system…./cut/…..”

attenborough I reckon uses the term evolution this way (maybe), not sure if it’s an appeal to pop culture or what

given it relies on accidents, happened upon features, and mechanisms, often (of latter) that are proximate, I question whether it’s a thing, system as indicated, as the term may lend to, notions of

I guess the term evolution is loosely meant to mean selection, or what’s selected for

dunno

looks like typical cells divide 50-70 X, so the end is often to do with telomeres, they get shorter, fray or whatever, and cancer has a way of making them look more normal, evading the immune system

transition said:

looks like typical cells divide 50-70 X, so the end is often to do with telomeres, they get shorter, fray or whatever, and cancer has a way of making them look more normal, evading the immune system

of human cells..