It seems we may not! But what if we use our psychological powers to alter our habits and eat and drink responsibly, surely we would live longer then? Would you believe again the answer may be no? The disappointing news is that it seems the key to all this lies solely in our genes. But need this be taken as proof? I wonder!
If you are endowed with long life genes, then as like as not it seems, you can smoke more than you should, drink and eat more than you should. And, despite that, you will live as long as another with long life genes who has taken care of themselves physically.
Who says so? The Journal of The American Geriatric Society. They report on a study of some 500 people between 95 and 109 which they compared with 3000 others born in the same period. (One 109 year old had even smoked 40 cigarettes a day for 90 years!)
The researchers deduced we were either born to live longer or we weren’t. Worse, they seem to suggest that if you have not got long-life genes, then not only would you live a shorter life, but you could shorten it still further by over indulging in food and drink, and by taking no exercise!
Now if this is true, why are British people being warned that they will all live longer and instead of having 5000 people of over 100 now, by the middle of this century we will have half a million!
So I ask what is happening? Are we doing more than evolve steadily? Are we possibly mutating to achieve such a stunning change? Or are statistics playing tricks with us?
I recall a British MP in the !980’s with a wicked sense of humour and a great disregard for statistics. He asked two parliamentary questions. He asked first how many one legged men there were in the UK and second, how many one legged women!
It seemed that employment risks and the liability to men of serving in the Armed Forces meant there were more one legged men in the UK than one-legged women. He then extrapolated that as a proportion of the total UK population that there were 0.00999 one legged men, but only 0.00997 one legged women.
He then felt entitled to draw the conclusion - and proposed its acceptance by Parliament, that it proved that on average British Women had more legs than British Men!
So I feel I can still stay loyal to my belief that a good attitude to life leads to a longer and happier one! And I prefer that any temptation by the reader to point out any illogicality is resisted!
Gerry Neale is the author of a novel with a cognitive behavioural theme called "Squaring Circles"
More information can be found at www.squaringcircles.co.uk
It can be ordered from any address from www.amazon.co.uk
or from the publishers website where you can scroll down to the 'Squaring Circles book cover and click on 'Add to Cart' www.pearlpress.co.uk
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