Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2022 May 22

= May 22 =

People in their 50s dying of old age
Can people die of old age at age 50-59? 86.143.101.107 (talk) 19:15, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * "Dying of old age" is not really a thing. You die of some degenerative condition that gets more likely with increasing age.  Some of those can start in the fifties or even before, sure. --Trovatore (talk) 19:18, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * See Progeria for a rare disease with a name meaning "before old age". It says "Patients born with progeria typically live to an age of mid-teens to early twenties." They are often said to die of old age but as Trovatore said, it's not really a thing. . PrimeHunter (talk) 19:39, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
 * In the case of natural death, authorities generally want death certificates to list a specific medical condition as the cause of death. The fact is, though, that there may not be an already known and plausibly responsible underlying ailment and no recent obvious symptoms of one, so without autopsy it is not possible to be really specific – and even an autopsy may not be conclusive. A way out is to say ""undetermined natural causes" or "multiple organ failure". The latter actually applies to anyone dying from any cause, although the multiple organ failure may not have been the initial cause that led to the process of dying. Given the strong similarity in the way in which many old people without specific identifiable illness die, characterized by a slow but progressive system-wide diminishing of the body's functions, I think there is some reason to question the relatively new wisdom that the cause is always a specific, often age-related ailment. --Lambiam 21:04, 22 May 2022 (UTC)


 * OP should know that "dying of old age" is a colloquial term, and is not a medical cause of death. There are some concepts related to aging; the science of studying the health effects of aging is Biogerontology (as a field of academic study) and Geriatrics (as a field of medicine) and degradation due to aging is called Senescence.  That may help the OP research the topic more.  -- Jayron 32 17:21, 24 May 2022 (UTC)

William Hartnell was about 55 years old when he played the original incarnation of the Doctor in Doctor Who and maybe 58 in his final story. While Richard Hurndall was about 72 or 73 when he played him in the 20th anniversary story The Five Doctors and David Bradley was 75 in the 12th Doctor's (Peter Capaldi) two final episodes The Doctor Falls and Twice Upon a Time. Here are images of 55 year old actors, 58, 72-73 and 75. And the cause of the First Doctor's regeneration was old age. 86.130.4.167 (talk) 19:04, 24 May 2022 (UTC)
 * What does the age of actors in science fiction TV shows have to do with the matter at hand? -- Jayron 32 18:43, 25 May 2022 (UTC)

Can people die if they've become old, weak and worn out in their 50s? And did the original Doctor look about mid-50s, 60s or 70s? 86.130.4.167 (talk) 19:21, 26 May 2022 (UTC)
 * IP contributor, please quit pinging participants about this on their personal talk pages.
 * As to the matter at hand, are you trying to evaluate the realism of a Dr Who plot point? That suggests you may not have fully understood the nature of the show. --Trovatore (talk) 21:14, 26 May 2022 (UTC)