6 ms·

I find the life expectancy vs. heart rate graph very interesting. The human point is the only one that lies well off the line of correlation, and it's tempting

by markbnj 11y ago

I find the life expectancy vs. heart rate graph very interesting. The human point is the only one that lies well off the line of correlation, and it's tempting to see the distance as a result of our technological achievements. In other words, we're the only animal to have pushed ourselves to the right of that line by being able to fix at least some of what goes wrong.

Namrog84 11y ago
I wonder how much a lower resting heart rate average over a lifespan influences average life expectancy. Is it enough for us to consider lower heart rate as an ideal value to optimize? Obviously being in better shape and see often correlated.
- reasonattlm 11y ago
  Rate of living theories are somewhat discredited. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_of_living_theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_of_living_theory There is some question over correlation of resting metabolic rate and mitochondrial constituents as a correlation of species life span, but that is totally separate from considerations of variations in life span within a species. http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/rej.2008.0676 http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/rej.2008.0676 Nonetheless, resting metabolic rate does seem to predict human longevity: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3100751/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3100751/ Interestingly the Palo Alto Longevity Prize is using heart rate variability as a metric to optimize in mammals: http://paloaltoprize.com/ http://paloaltoprize.com/
guard-of-terra 11y ago
I'm sure there are other exceptions, they're just not shown. Humans are atypical, but so are sloths.
Qantourisc 11y ago
There is another theory about this: older humans are not 100% useless, they provide wisdom and skills to the younger people. As such communities with (not a burden) elder people have an advantage. And this removes some of the selection shadow.
- kaybe 11y ago
  Humans are not the only species for which this is true though.
abecedarius 11y ago
Those graphs show only mammals. IIRC some birds would be about as far off the mammalian line of best fit.

by markbnj 11y ago

Namrog84 11y ago

I wonder how much a lower resting heart rate average over a lifespan influences average life expectancy. Is it enough for us to consider lower heart rate as an ideal value to optimize? Obviously being in better shape and see often correlated.

reasonattlm 11y ago
Rate of living theories are somewhat discredited. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_of_living_theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_of_living_theory There is some question over correlation of resting metabolic rate and mitochondrial constituents as a correlation of species life span, but that is totally separate from considerations of variations in life span within a species. http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/rej.2008.0676 http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/rej.2008.0676 Nonetheless, resting metabolic rate does seem to predict human longevity: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3100751/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3100751/ Interestingly the Palo Alto Longevity Prize is using heart rate variability as a metric to optimize in mammals: http://paloaltoprize.com/ http://paloaltoprize.com/

guard-of-terra 11y ago

I'm sure there are other exceptions, they're just not shown. Humans are atypical, but so are sloths.

Qantourisc 11y ago

There is another theory about this: older humans are not 100% useless, they provide wisdom and skills to the younger people. As such communities with (not a burden) elder people have an advantage. And this removes some of the selection shadow.

kaybe 11y ago
Humans are not the only species for which this is true though.

abecedarius 11y ago

Those graphs show only mammals. IIRC some birds would be about as far off the mammalian line of best fit.