Interesting FAQs about Death and Longevity
1. Who holds the longest longevity record in the world, having lived the maximum number of years?
Ans. The oldest confirmed recorded age for any human is 122 years, achieved by Jeanne Calment of France. She lived from 1875 to 1997.
2. Can human beings become Immortal?
Ans. There is concept called biological immortality in some of the species. For example a jellyfish species, called Turritopsis dohrnii are considered biologically immortal. They can revert back to their juvenile young forms after reaching maturity, potentially allowing them to bypass death from old age. For humans to become immortal will require many scientific advancements and the longevity industry is rapidly progressing in this direction.
3. What are Blue Zones?
Ans. Blue Zones are regions in the world, where people have exceptionally long lifespans. These include Okinawa (Japan), Sardinia (Italy), Nicoya (Costa Rica), Icaria (Greece), and among the Seventh-day Adventists in Loma Linda, California.
4. Why are some companies offering to preserve human beings?
Ans. The idea is to revive them in future when medical science has advanced enough to cure their ailment. This practice requires deep freezing techniques called Cryogenics. This field of cryonics is evolving fast and would also help with future space travel.
5. Is there a correlation between our number of heart beat and Lifespan?
Ans. Yes there seems to be a fascinating correlation between the total number of heartbeats in a lifetime and lifespan across different species. For example humans and mice both have roughly the same total number of heartbeats in their lives, but humans have a slower heart rate and longer lifespan.
6. What is the influence of genetics on Lifespan?
Ans: Genetics plays a very significant role in our lifespan. For instance, identical twins, who have nearly identical DNA, tend to live as long as each other and more so than fraternal twins or siblings.
7. What is the co-relation between length of Telomeres and our lifespan?
Ans. Telomeres have been the focus of anti-aging research. Telomeres are the protective caps at the end of our chromosomes and they shorten as we age. It has been seen that longer telomeres are associated with longer lifespans.
8. Has any death happened in Space?
Ans. No there have been no recorded human deaths in space. The few astronaut fatalities have occurred during spacecraft launches or landings.
9. What is the Death Clock?
Ans. The Death Clock is a fictional concept often used in literature or online calculators. It is not a scientific tool, and claims about predicting one's death should be taken with skepticism.
10. How many suicides occur each year?
Ans. As per WHO reports, more than 700,000 people die due to suicide every year. For every suicide, there are many more people who attempt suicide.
11. What is the Doomsday Clock, and what happens when it hits midnight?
Ans. The Doomsday Clock is a symbolic representation of global existential threats. When it reaches midnight, it signifies a hypothetical global catastrophe. It's maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
12. When will the world end?
Ans. Predicting the end of the world is not possible. Scientifically, the Earth's future is uncertain, and any claims about specific dates are speculative and not based on credible evidence.
13. How many days until midnight or the end of the world?
Ans. The concept of counting down to the end of the world is not scientifically valid. Time is continuous, and predicting specific end times is not supported by credible sources.
Our Earth
It has limited resources and a fragile environment. The explosion of the human population in the last 200 years has been rapidly depleting the world of its resources and causing global warming. We were 1 billion in 1820, 2 billion in 1930, 3 billion in 1960, 4 billion in 1974, 5 billion in 1988, and 6 billion in 2000.
Currently 75-80 million people are added every year and only 56 million people die. At the current rate we will double the world population every 35 years.
