From: Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
Date: Wed Dec 09 1998 - 04:56:20 MST
Robin Hanson <hanson@econ.berkeley.edu> writes:
> The AP/Albany Times Union reports that the "most dramatic
> improvement was among black males, whose life expectancy
> increased by 1.2 years to 67.3 years." Life expectancy for black
> females increased by half a year to 74.7, and for white females
> by one-tenth of a year to 79.3. White males saw a four-tenths of
> a year improvement to 74.3 years.
Still a bit away from the breakeven point, but interesting enough. A
4/10 increase in life expectancy per year would, assuming steady
progress give an expectation of 0.4x + (0.4^2) x + (0.4^3)x + ... =
1.66 x more years if x are the numbers of "naturally" remaining years
for a given person, since life extending progress would occur during
the extra years given by the initial developments. In order to reach
the breakeven point, we of course need more than one extra year per
year - something the black males got at least this year (time to
change race? :-).
OK, I think Robin and everybody else can pick this (semiserious)
analysis apart at the seams, but nevertheless the CDC data are good
news.
-- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Anders Sandberg Towards Ascension! asa@nada.kth.se http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/ GCS/M/S/O d++ -p+ c++++ !l u+ e++ m++ s+/+ n--- h+/* f+ g+ w++ t+ r+ !y
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