During the 13th century, Native Americans on the Pajarito Plateau of New Mexico lived in nice solar heated homes like this one.
They could eat as many bunny rabbits as they could chase down in the snow. Most died by age 30 because their teeth wore out from eating sand.
New Silent Spring in Africa causing increased Rabies and Anthrax due to windfarms. Where is the “Green” movement now????
http://tribune.com.pk/story/483205/when-vultures-die-rabies-and-anthrax-are-born/
http://www.ted.com/talks/munir_virani_why_i_love_vultures.html
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/03/14/vulture-blind-spots-lead-to-collisions-with-wind-turbines/#.UOImsnclp8E
http://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/09/01/lesotho-wind-farm-threat-to-vultures/
I never saw them do that in the Avatar movie. They all seemed happy playing bongo drums around their magic tree and if you got lucky there were a lot of nipple shots to be had. I think you must be mistaken.
The average life expectancy figures of the past included averaging in the deaths of infants and children, thus if you have 10 babies die and 10 adults die at age 60 you have an average life expectancy of 30 which is misleading at best. Look at people like Jefferson, Franklin, Washington or further back to people like Socrates and Plato to understand that these guys weren’t setting age records in times when the life expectancies were half of these individuals’ attained ages.
Raindog – but if you were one of those 10 babies, you certainly didn’t get anywhere near 30, let alone 60. The babies were still humans.
I agree that a “life expectancy of 30” is misleading – many died long before that age and, I would imagine, if one got to 30 then your life expectancy was probably 50 – 60.
Similar rules apply today – if one is still alive at 60. then the chances of getting to 75 is a lot higher than that for a newborn.
Actual average life span is speculative at best. However, given recent anthropological research it now seems probable that many tribal societies had casualty rates among men as high as 50% due to warfare. So yes, if you survived infancy, accidents, spears and disease, you may have lived to age 60 or higher. At least until you were no longer capable of moving with the group.
Male deaths in warfare: Agreed Will, and that gave rise to polygamy. In most primitive societies, the woman has no legal status and cannot inherit. This still obtains in Shariah Law by the way.
To get around that, these primitive societies encourage polygamy. Men are often honor bound to marry the widows of their dead brothers and kin. In the Fourth Surah the Koran prescribes that a man take as many wives as he can support.
King Solomon had hundreds of wives. I speculate that Solomon acted as the “husband of last resort.” At that time the Israelites were a tribe of aggressively warlike peasants and death in combat was common. There weren’t enough men to go around and Solomon didn’t want widowed women and orphaned children being turned out of their homes to starve. As Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and ultimately responsible for all those men’s deaths, Solomon felt obliged to take the widows as wives. I’m sure that if the women were hot he consummated the marriage too but OTOH think of all the mothers-in-law.
Historical life expectancy rates have been calculated from parish registers but with infant mortality being so high, most children would only have been baptized once their survival seemed assured.