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I would assume also because people also just didn't live as long back then. Life was in general a 20 year term. Average life span in 1800 of 50 years. Today

by bargl 6y ago

I would assume also because people also just didn't live as long back then. Life was in general a 20 year term. Average life span in 1800 of 50 years. Today it's 78.6. https://clickamericana.com/topics/health-medicine/us-life-expectancy-in-the-1800s https://clickamericana.com/topics/health-medicine/us-life-ex... https://www.everydayhealth.com/senior-health/what-life-expectancy-today/ https://www.everydayhealth.com/senior-health/what-life-expec... Those probably aren't the best places for me to get numbers, but I think they're good enough for a rough example of what I mean.

jdgiese 6y ago
The average adult life span may be a better metric if child mortality rates were high.
smnrchrds 6y ago
Life expectancy at birth was low because many people died in childhood, bringing down the average. Those who survived childhood lived much longer lives. I used the historical list of US Supreme Court justices [0] and averaged the lifespan of the first 20 justices. The average was 67 years. Maximum was 91 [1]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_justices_of_the_Supreme_Court_of_the_United_States#All_justices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_justices_of_the_Suprem... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Duvall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Duvall
- bargl 6y ago
  I knew of this happening, but I wasn't sure to what extent it did not know it was that drastic.
malwarebytess 6y ago
>I would assume also because people also just didn't live as long back then. This is false. The statistic doesn't imply this. Longevity has not increased significantly, it's that life expectancy from birth has increased because childhood illness became less of a concern. Once at adult age people generally still lived long, ignoring accidents which really wouldn't be a concern for the type of people who would be justices.
ModernMech 6y ago
I'm sure the founding fathers expected Supreme Court justices to be rich, white, landowning men. What was the average age of that demographic back then?
manquer 6y ago
Average life expectancy is really a bad metric . It is not like people dropped dead at 50. People who survived usually hit their 70s even when the expectancy was in 30s and 40s. The average is low because lot of kids and people died young. The proper metric here would be life expectancy of active lawyers/judges in their 30s and 40s . They have double advantage of both generally surviving all the diseases till then and wealthy and educated enough to afford medical care available. Even if the idea was that people may not survive long, it is a unpredictable and inconsistent way to set policy.

by bargl 6y ago

jdgiese 6y ago

The average adult life span may be a better metric if child mortality rates were high.

smnrchrds 6y ago

Life expectancy at birth was low because many people died in childhood, bringing down the average. Those who survived childhood lived much longer lives. I used the historical list of US Supreme Court justices [0] and averaged the lifespan of the first 20 justices. The average was 67 years. Maximum was 91 [1]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_justices_of_the_Supreme_Court_of_the_United_States#All_justices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_justices_of_the_Suprem... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Duvall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Duvall

bargl 6y ago
I knew of this happening, but I wasn't sure to what extent it did not know it was that drastic.

malwarebytess 6y ago

>I would assume also because people also just didn't live as long back then. This is false. The statistic doesn't imply this. Longevity has not increased significantly, it's that life expectancy from birth has increased because childhood illness became less of a concern. Once at adult age people generally still lived long, ignoring accidents which really wouldn't be a concern for the type of people who would be justices.

ModernMech 6y ago

I'm sure the founding fathers expected Supreme Court justices to be rich, white, landowning men. What was the average age of that demographic back then?

manquer 6y ago

Average life expectancy is really a bad metric . It is not like people dropped dead at 50. People who survived usually hit their 70s even when the expectancy was in 30s and 40s. The average is low because lot of kids and people died young. The proper metric here would be life expectancy of active lawyers/judges in their 30s and 40s . They have double advantage of both generally surviving all the diseases till then and wealthy and educated enough to afford medical care available. Even if the idea was that people may not survive long, it is a unpredictable and inconsistent way to set policy.