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Randy M's avatar

Interesting thesis. On the other hand, there is, hate to say it, a sort of visceral repugnance for the signs of physical aging. Kennedy beat Nixon because the debates were televised, and the younger candidate usually has more charisma.

Have you checked for a correlation between life expectancy and average age of an elected official?

R.W. Richey's avatar

I should have mentioned the recent open mike where Putin and Xi were discussing organ replacement and lifespan extension.

But the key thing I wanted to get across is the lack of "evolutionary protection" as in this is obviously a problem but it's something that only became a problem once we could keep people alive for a lot longer. Previously, it didn't come up very often because people were a lot more likely to die.

I have not checked that correlation, I should.

Gamereg's avatar

In comparing health states, I'm less concerned about a president with bruises on his hand than a president with cognitive decline. I'll bet if Biden could trade he'd rather have had the bruises than the brain fog during his fateful debate.