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A comment on 72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI. Parent comment

Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by mindcrime on Thursday December 29, 2022 @01:42AM (#34170177)
To keep the muscle analogy, you won’t compete as an athlete at 72 no matter how fit you remain.

I hate to be "pedantic guy", but FWIW there are absolutely 72 year old competitive athletes. They may not be competitive against folks 20+ years younger than themselves, but many people continue to compete in "masters" divisions of various competitive sports until pretty much the day they keel over. Heck, there are folks who are 70+ competing in ultra-marathons.

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Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by cm2187 on Thursday December 29, 2022 @01:44AM (#34170184)
> They may not be competitive against folks 20+ years younger than themselves

that's kind of my point. Of course they can compete against other 72 year olds.

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Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by pleb_nz on Thursday December 29, 2022 @01:56AM (#34170236)
Why does it have to be a competition. Shouldn't it be about being able to help and contribute. Too much focus on efficiency and not enough on well being of society as a whole.

80 year olds with a desire can still contribute. It doesn't have to be in competition with 20 years.

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Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by wolverine876 on Thursday December 29, 2022 @02:22AM (#34170360)
IME almost all 80 year olds can contribute much more than 20 year olds for any mental task, beyond super-demanding cognitive work like high-level math or some coding.
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Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by cm2187 on Thursday December 29, 2022 @03:03AM (#34170541)
My point isn't the competition, it is the fact that there is a physical decline with age that no amount of training can offset, which you can observe if you compare to a 20yo. I think it is the same with the brain. And like for every large population it is a distribution, there are always outliers. But not many.
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Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by mindcrime on Thursday December 29, 2022 @01:51AM (#34170222)
Sure. And I agree that you "can't defeat nature" in the end, but at the same time, that's no argument against fighting it tooth and nail, right down to the bitter end, staying as fit as possible, both mentally and physically. :-)
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Re:72-year-old Congressman pursues a Master's in AI by echelon on Thursday December 29, 2022 @01:49AM (#34170210)
And average 50 year olds.
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