The World's Deadliest Distinction

[xchrom]

http://www.slate.com/id/2299256/

Last month, a 114-year-old former schoolteacher from Georgia named Besse Cooper became the world's oldest living person. Her predecessor, Brazil's Maria Gomes Valentim, was 114 when she died. So was the oldest living person before her, and the one before her. In fact, eight of the last nine "world's oldest" titleholders were 114 when they achieved the distinction. Here's the morbid part: All but two were still 114 when they passed it on. Those two? They died at 115.

The celebration surrounding Cooper when she assumed the title, then, might as well have been accompanied by condolences. If historical trends hold, she will likely be dead within a year.

It's no surprise that it's hard to stay the "world's oldest" for very long. These people are, after all, really old. What's surprising is just how consistent the numbers have been. Just seven people whose ages could be fully verified by the Gerontology Research Group have ever made it past 115. Only two of those seven lived to see the 21st century. The longest-living person ever, a French woman named Jeanne Calment, died at age 122 in August 1997; no one since 2000 has come within five years of matching her longevity.

The inventor Ray Kurzweil, famous for bold predictions that occasionally come true, estimated in 2005 that, within 20 years, advances in medical technology would enable humans to extend their lifespans indefinitely. With six years gone and 14 to go, his prophecy doesn't seem that much closer to coming true. What happened to modern medicine giving us longer lives? Why aren't we getting any older?

[lapfog_1]

1. One word: telomeres

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomere

repeated cell division gradually eliminates the telomere after X replications. It's thought that free radicals can accelerate this process.

If we can solve this problem, people wouldn't age (potentially) past early adulthood.

[bemildred]

2. If creatures fail to evolve, they become extinct.

To evolve, there must be selection, to have selection, there must be death. The more rigorous selection is, the faster evolution will be, hence, death is the necessary price we pay for rapid evolution, and hence the price we pay for being what we are.

We may in time be able to overcome that necessity, but only at the price of taking charge of our own development, something that it would be easy for the sort of foolish narcissists that we are to mess up.

[xchrom]

3. it's an interesting dilema. nt

[bemildred]

4. I don't consider it a dilemma, death is nothing to fear.

It's a great deal, really, in my view, to have the chance to be an intelligent being, free on the planet, free to see the universe, for a while. It's true we are not very good at it yet, we muck it up a lot.

[xchrom]

5. no, no -- i don't think death is a fearful thing.

it's whether to choose -- as a collective? -- to become a participant in our evolution.

precisely because we fuck it up.

now 'improving' health standards & dealing w/ diseases that we can now easily prevent has been a sort of experiment.
our improved knowledge of genetics will be the next step?

i don't know. it's interesting.

[bemildred]

6. Oh yes.

:thumbsup:

But I don't think we really have a choice, we may not be around long the way we are going either.

“We are as gods and have to get good at it.” -- Stewart Brand

[xchrom]

7. good quote. nt

[SheilaT]

8. A lot of people misunderstand what is really

meant by average life spans in the past. They seem to think that when the average life span was, say thirty, then people were old at thirty as they are now at seventy or some such age. No. The average reflects how many -- or how few -- humans die in infancy or childhood.

Meanwhile, our bodies are not all that different than they were thousands of years ago. I recall reading some time back that overall, our bodily systems were designed to wear out at around age 80. Obviously, there are a lot of individual differences, but that wearing out is going to happen sooner or later.

[laconicsax]

9. Kurzweil's full of shit. n/t