Friday, January 28, 2005

Assuming you were born and lived your entire life in the year 1996 (that's where these deathrates are from, USA), here's the likelihood that you'd make it to the end of each of these age groups:

AGE:______DEATHRATE: PERSONS: INTEGER PERSONS:
BORN______?????______100.00______100
00-01_____0.75%_______99.25______99
01-04_____0.04%_______99.09______98
05-14_____0.02%_______98.88______97
15-24_____0.09%_______97.98______96
25-34_____0.13%_______96.73______94
35-44_____0.22%_______94.57______91
45-54_____0.45%_______90.34______86
55-64_____1.10%_______80.40______76
65-74_____2.55%_______59.89______56
75-84_____5.82%_______25.04______23
85+______15.33%_______21.20______19

Obviously I didn't include the likelihood that you were aborted right off, as I give you a 100% chance of being born. I have a feeling that figures I'd find on that matter would be controversial. I'm not trying to be controversial, I'm trying to make you feel better! But I don't think it would take but a percentage point or so off. Your chances don't start to really hurt until you get into the 30's (or the 50's if you're an optimist). Also, you see that if you don't allow for being a partial person (i.e. rounding down), your chances suffer.

I'm not too impressed with myself at seeing this chart, as I have around a 96% chance of having made it so far, and less than a 1% chance of screwing it up in the next 10 years. Easy!