Re:Some fish live beyond 100 – and get healthier as they age
by 7thaccount on Monday January 22, 2024 @06:54AM
(#39088504)
I believe what you're saying is correct, but the OP is also correct in pointing out that those who lived prior to antibiotics or other modern inventions probably died a lot more often of things we can prevent now. Not to mention all the routine surgeries that save lives. The massively declining child mortality is the big disruptor here, but there's more going on in the data. More recently, we might be reversing the positive trends with our extremely unhealthy diets that have led to other issues such as heart disease and diabetes.
So for instance in modern history, of the 15 key Founding Fathers, 7 lived to at least 80 years old: John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Samuel Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Franklin, John Jay. John Adams himself lived to 90. The youngest to die were Hamilton who died in a duel, and John Hancock who died of gout of an undocumented cause - it can be caused by excessive alcohol consumption. All the others lived into their 60s and 70s.
It's the same as you go back further into history. Look up basically any Ancient Greek you're familiar with, and you'll see most lived to about the same amount of time we do now a days, sometimes quite a bit longer. For instance Hippocrates, of the Hippocratic Oath, lived to 90 back in the 4th century BC. The common claim there is a survivorship bias, but that's not really true - because most of these individuals made their mark on history decades before they finally died. In other words had e.g. Plato died when he was 50 instead of 80, he still would be known today.
[1] - https://ourworldindata.org/child-mortality (terrible layout but the site has many interesting graphs on this topic)