Is there a connection to the probability of death and the number 8?
At the age of 25, our chances of dying are roughly one in 3000. By the time we reach the age of 33 eight years later, chances of dying that year are one in 1500. Double. This pattern continues all the way to the end.
This chart shows that the probability of death doubles every eight years. By the time we get to 100, the odds of making it to 101 are 50%.
Physicist Brian Skinner explains:
Doubling of this sort, when plotted on a chart, looks scary in the later years, but every interval early in the curve is also a doubling. So the same thing keeps happening, only the effects become more pronounced. Anyone reaching the age of 100 seems to have a 1 in 2 chance of getting to 101.
Read the full study at NPR.
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