Given physical and historical evidence that many people did live long lives in the past, why does the misperception that everyone was dead by the age of 30 or 40 persist? It stems from confusion about the difference between individual life spans and life expectancy.
Life expectancy is the average number of years of life remaining for people of a particular age. For example, life expectancy at birth (age 0) is the average length of life for newborns. Life expectancy at age 25 is how much longer people live on average given they’ve survived to age 25.
In medieval England, life expectancy at birth for boys born to families that owned land was a mere 31.3 years. However, life expectancy at age 25 for landowners in medieval England was 25.7. This means that people in that era who celebrated their 25th birthday could expect to live until they were 50.7, on average - 25.7 more years. While 50 might not seem old by today’s standards, remember that this is an average, so many people would have lived much longer, into their 70s, 80s and even older.
We still see the distorted average death numbers these days. The US reports all deaths, from stillbirths to whatever-end-of-life moment strikes. Many European countries don't report stillbirths and some don't report deaths younger than 6 months or a year.
ReplyDeleteBreak the cycle of death-at-a-young-age and unless something stupid happens like an ox steps on you or war or plague and medievally you could live a long time, into your 50s and 60s, even peasants and serfs.
If you look at actuarial tables, which I did as an insurance salesman in a previous life, you will see thats a moving number. The life expectancy of an american male is 75. I’m 77, most of my male growing up friends have been gone for years, but the tables say the average 77 year old can expect 10-12 more years, go figure.
ReplyDeleteIf one man eats 2 chickens while another looks on average they both had 1 chicken.
ReplyDeleteSome of you don't understand how averages and probabilities work and it shows.