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Do some ornamental fish live 200 years?

Has the first person to live to 200 years old been born yet?

  • With advances in medical science do you think that the first person that will live (consciously, in as good a health as possible and with a good quality of life i.e. not in a 'vegetative' state) to 200 years has been born and already lives on Earth now? If not, what do you think It would take for this to happen and where in the world is this likely to occur first?

  • Answer:

    Well it's not something I know too much about - but a couple of interesting details to mention, that nobody has said yet. First - what is the maximum lifespan for a human currently?  As you get older, mortaility rate plateaus at around 50% a year for very old people. Which would mean - that just by chance - people might live to be arbitrariily old. But unlikely. Chance of surviving say 10 years at that rate is roughly one in a thousand, for 20 years, one in a million, and 30 years, one in a billion very roughly. So, given that there are a ten verified women aged over 113, then there's one chance in a billion of reaching 113 if you are a woman, that would make it one chance in about a thousand billion of reaching 123, one chance in a million billion of reaching 133 just by chance. But chance of reaching 200 is almost impossible. But - other ways of looking at it suggest maximum life span of 125 based on VO2 max. As you get older your ability to take in oxygen goes down, and eventually, apart from the other considerations, will be too low to get enough oxygen to keep the body going. So - that might suggest there is a maximum lifespan for humans after all in our natural state. I found this out from the wikipedia entry here + following up to find more. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximum_life_span#In_humans That however isn't taking account of artificial machinery or cloned organs. Suppose we have new bioengineered lungs for instance, and new hearts. What then? Also - what about slowing down aging or even reversing it? Problem though is, that slowing down aging might have downsides. Increasing the length of telomares can make you more prone to cancer. So - not really answering the question, I don't know the answer, just a couple of interesting points.

Robert Walker at Quora Visit the source

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It's pure guesswork at the moment. The previous two answers have focused on the desirability (or otherwise) of living to 200. Based on our current understanding of humanity and the world in general, I agree with the current consensus that it is not generally desirable for us to live quite so long. Partly, this is because - at very advanced years - there is little we can do at present to prevent the deterioration of the body, and the mind in particular. Some people retain physical and mental health well beyond 100, but it's rare. But back to the core question, I feel it's impossible to answer because although present trends suggest a rising lifespan, we cannot reasonably draw the same graph inexorably into the future. We do not have sufficient information to assume current trends are here to stay. I think - and hope - what is more likely than one of our contemporaries living to 200 is that more of us live to a reasonable age. The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away. (Psalm 90v10, KJV) Three score years and ten… Or in contemporary street slang, seventy years. According to the words of an ancient prayer, those are “the days of our years.” British life expectancy is 79.4, almost four score years. But most of the world’s population will not live to 70. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy. In Swaziland, it’s just 39.6. I'd much rather see the population of countries like Swaziland able to enjoy a more generous life expectancy than see my toddler son live to 200.

David Waddell

I think of our time on earth as a temporary experience for an immortal soul.  I'm not that interested in living to 200.  From a completely secular point of view, I don't think that greatly extended lifetimes would be very good for society.  There is already in place a system that benefits some people over time at the expense of others.  The bulk of the world's wealth is controlled by a smaller and smaller percentage of the world's population.  The longer we live, the worse this will get. I think it's healthy for the human race in general that people don't live much past 100 years.  Recycling of resources is a good thing in nature.

Jim Watkins

I hope not.  Keeping a person alive isn't the same thing as keeping the person in good health.  Let's make quality of life our top medical goal instead of length of life.

Glenn Keenon

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