Re: Life Expectancy

Spike Jones (spike66@ibm.net)
Sun, 13 Jun 1999 08:46:42 -0700

> > At 11:42 AM 12/06/99 -0700, spike spikulated:
> >>One's l.q. is the average of your parents' l.q
> >>assuming natural causes, otherwise one's...
> > ...
> > stochastic impact of disease, all that.
> Timothy Bates wrote: Jokingly - how do you factor in stochastic
> phenomena?

I dont know. Have you suggestions? If a parent died in an accident use their parents l.q.? If the now-curable disease death occured when the parent is older than the average age at which their ancestors perished I suppose you could estimate how long they would have lived. Obviously this is not an exact science. One can only... spikulate. {8^D

The original question is: suppose I wish to raise a litter of pups. The best gift I can give them is a set of genes that will predispose them to long life. If I take a sperm donation from a 117 year old man, there is much time for that DNA to have accumulated errors. Ova would not be available from a woman much older than about 50. So, how do we identify good genetic material? Assume I care nothing about race, height, intelligence, etc. The goal is to maximize the only thing we *know* for sure is good: long life.

How now, Dr. Bates? spike