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The statistics in this article are questionable. For one thing, they don't actually analyse what people are dying from. What we consider "natural causes" now,

The statistics in this article are questionable. For one thing, they don't actually analyse what people are dying from. What we consider "natural causes" now, we may discover all sorts of physiological explanations for in the upcoming decades, as we reach new limits of human age. As diseases, disorders, and illnesses are eliminated, we will have less and less "natural" ways to die. This article would have made more sense if they found an actual limit to human age, as the headline implies.

has2k1 10y ago
The point of the article (and the paper on which it is based) is to infer the existence of a limit. The method of inference is not by pure logic, rather it is partly probabilistic. That is what you have to be comfortable with because all probabilistic/statistical arguments have a similar form. Also worth noting is that what the scientists publish is less than the opinions and convictions they hold. On the age limit question the most popular opinion is that the DNA (specifically the chromosomes) runs out of telomeres, without which the replication process is almost guaranteed to be error prone. With that, it does not matter much what the old people are dying from because anything and everything is going to kill them. Another anecdotal opinion (not sure if there is a paper or not) I have heard is that the blood and marrows of the people in the 110+ age range show that the active stem cells from the systems are nearly depleted. That may or may not be related to the telomores but the consequences are similar, the body will not be able to produce workers for any of the vital/non-vital functions. So anything and everything is going to kill you. When the published papers hint at a limit[1], although may be justified by the content of the paper alone, the authors also do so under the influence extra knowledge and opinions[2]. [1] It can be anything. [2] If you know this sort of thing is happening -- and it is relatively common in scientific papers, you can easily see it. For example, the last sentence of the abstract "... subject to natural constraints." Also last paragraph of the paper hand waves the causes to genetic and cellular systems, but just vague enough so that the paper can stand on its own.

has2k1 10y ago

The point of the article (and the paper on which it is based) is to infer the existence of a limit. The method of inference is not by pure logic, rather it is partly probabilistic. That is what you have to be comfortable with because all probabilistic/statistical arguments have a similar form. Also worth noting is that what the scientists publish is less than the opinions and convictions they hold. On the age limit question the most popular opinion is that the DNA (specifically the chromosomes) runs out of telomeres, without which the replication process is almost guaranteed to be error prone. With that, it does not matter much what the old people are dying from because anything and everything is going to kill them. Another anecdotal opinion (not sure if there is a paper or not) I have heard is that the blood and marrows of the people in the 110+ age range show that the active stem cells from the systems are nearly depleted. That may or may not be related to the telomores but the consequences are similar, the body will not be able to produce workers for any of the vital/non-vital functions. So anything and everything is going to kill you. When the published papers hint at a limit[1], although may be justified by the content of the paper alone, the authors also do so under the influence extra knowledge and opinions[2]. [1] It can be anything. [2] If you know this sort of thing is happening -- and it is relatively common in scientific papers, you can easily see it. For example, the last sentence of the abstract "... subject to natural constraints." Also last paragraph of the paper hand waves the causes to genetic and cellular systems, but just vague enough so that the paper can stand on its own.