Talk:Old age/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Health expectancies at birth and at age 65 in the UK

I thought people might want to take a look at some facts pertaining to the above. I wonder how they compare to other EU nations, and other countries across the globe?

Here's the link:

Psychology, physiology of the elderly

I'd like to see more about the psychological changes that take place in old age. Also, it would be nice to see more of why their "regenerative" abilities diminish. Basically I think this article should explain which factors (other than time) make aged people the way they are. AdamBiswanger1 21:58, 10 June 2007 (UTC) 

IOW, when you get over 60, you are automatically assumed to be senile. 
Which can be really be quite helpful when dealing with the long, heavily muscled arm of the law.
Well add it then SimonTrew (talk) 19:12, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Blog and Wiki for Seniors

Since the topic is old age, why shouldn't there be external links to senior blogs and wikis that offer insight into this topic? seniorcitizen.com and seniorcitizens.com deal with nothing but old age and its problems. Sacredhands

Mostly because Wikipedia tries to avoid external links in general. WP:EL says that "[external links] should be kept to a minimum of those that are meritable, accessible and appropriate to the article." I, personally, am against this link because WP:EL "Links to be avoided" guidelines 3, 5 and 12, plus a little concern about a conflict of interest. --Mdwyer 03:39, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

What is Let Life In doing there then? this is clearly a commercial blog. Confused...Sacredhands

WP:SPAM says "Inclusion of one spam link is not a reason to include another". Still, I can see your point. Being a commercial blog isn't enough to disqualify it. I think guidelines 6 and 10 might apply, though. Actually, when I look at the links there, most of them seem kind of spammy. So, I removed all except the top three to the list below. If anyone thinks these links should be there, as per WP:EL, let us know! --Mdwyer 02:54, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

The term 'Elderly' as a euphenism

I'm not sure whether the term 'elderly' is considered as a euphenism outside the United Kingdom, but here in the UK it most definitely is not. As this article has been flagged as American-centric maybe this 'euphenism' needs attention. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 90.193.186.234 (talk) 21:42, August 20, 2007 (UTC)

Needs Work

This page -really- needs cleaned up, its a major topic with a childish and very limited entry. RickO5 20:21, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

BLACK WHITE its all the same —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.83.67.38 (talk) 20:00, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Ummmm, excuse me, but where's YOUR article? I thought so. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.93.8.50 (talk) 18:31, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Confusion about the introduction of the term 'ageism'

The page currently reads the following:

As occurs with almost any definable group of humanity, some people will hold a prejudice against others; in this case, against older people. This is one form of ageism.

This assumes that term "the elderly" is a reference to a type of ageism. which is certainly not the case. as was previously stated, this isn't the only part of this page that needs work.--75.83.15.201 (talk) 00:00, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Gallery

Why is there a gallery section? It seems a bit unnecessary. NS Zakeruga (talk) 21:37, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. I'm taking it out. I'm old, but I don't want to look at pictures of other old people. Most everybody knows what an old person looks like. Cmichael (talk) 05:54, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
Agreed, it is unnecessary. Next, I don't think it's appropriate to illustrate the body of the article by using family photographs, we should stick to fine art as in the past. --CliffC (talk) 14:28, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

When you find fine art with old people as the subject, go ahead and call me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.93.8.50 (talk) 18:34, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Madonna of Chancellor Rolin has a carefully depicted 60-year-old, but I am sure there are some much more detailed studies amongst fine art, mostly self-portraits I think. @Ceoil: can you think of any good ones?
Regarding our rather elderly topic, the Gallery seems to be gone and there is an artistic presentation near the top of the article. Two of the other three images seem to have good reasons for being there, and the other one might have. MPS1992 (talk) 01:05, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
MP, your example is very good, and a favourite for me would be Self-Portrait (Titian, Madrid) but also see late Bacon and Goya. Also Portrait Diptych of Dürer's Parents, and especially Portrait of the Artist's Mother at the Age of 63. Ceoil (talk) 19:53, 26 June 2016 (UTC)

Dated pictures

Old people are not hard to find. Please try to replace the current pictures with photos that give exact ages of each subject. Preferably, find subjects for which several pictures are available at different ages against the same background. Just a suggestion, Wnt (talk) 00:11, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Col Sanders

I must admit I don't think Col Sanders deserves a mention in the notable figures section. 62 is not really that old. SimonTrew (talk) 14:14, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I removed it (some time ago) on the grounds that the article itself defines old age as being 65 or more. SimonTrew (talk) 21:17, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

the hair color gray

Should this be either color gray or colour grey?

My guess is original author is canadian where either spelling of gray/grey is acceptable, or that it's just a slip. It's no biggie.

S. —Preceding unsigned comment added by SimonTrew (talk • contribs) 17:23, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

AE vs. BE

The usual procedure, as for example in the Encyclopedia Britannica, is to retain the orthography of the original contributor. In the Wiki, therefore, either AE or BE can be used, but the style should preferably be consistent throughout. Anyone attempting a major copyedit, could bear this in mind. --Kudpung (talk) 04:53, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Good point. This is explained in detail at WP:ENGVAR. --CliffC (talk) 14:12, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

merger proposal

Since life expectancy already has its own article and some of the claims made here are a quite "weasel-ish," I don't really see how this can remain a separate article. Verifiable sources will have to be based mostly on statistics, and in that case, the life expectancy article is good enough. As a separate entry, I would expect more information taken from philosophy, sociology, or anthropology. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.172.184.105 (talk) 17:13, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Classifications

It appears that "young old," "middle old" and "old old" are used as subclassifications for the elderly. Wakablogger2 (talk) 01:15, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Depression

Is there any evidence that old people get depressed? It says so in the sub-section physical changes Pass a Method talk 13:02, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Further reading

Greetings,

Here are some recent scientific publications on related topic, which may be useful for people, willing to improve of this article further:

  • Gavrilova N.S., Gavrilov L.A. Genetic Influences in Later Life. In: D. Carr (Editor), Encyclopedia of the Life Course and Human Development, Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2009, vol.3, pp.165-170.
  • Gavrilov L.A., Gavrilova N.S. Mortality Measurement at Advanced Ages: A Study of the Social Security Administration Death Master File. Living to 100 and Beyond: Survival at Advanced Ages [online monograph]. The Society of Actuaries, 2008, 32 pages
  • Gavrilova N.S., Gavrilov L.A. Search for Predictors of Exceptional Human Longevity: Using Computerized Genealogies and Internet Resources for Human Longevity Studies. North American Actuarial Journal, 2007, 11(1): 49-67.

Full texts are available for those who are interested.

Best wishes, Gavrilov (talk) 18:02, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

MOVE-RENAME

Strong suggestion to rename this page! "Old age" is often considered perjorative. Suggest: Elder age. Meclee (talk) 03:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Most countries not cited

The article says that most countries have adopted 65 as the definition of elderly, but there is no citation. Have more than 50% of the countries in the world really established such a definition? --BenjaminBarrett12 (talk) 01:13, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Also the statistic: "Hearing loss. Of individuals 75 and older, 48% of men and 37% of women encounter difficulties in hearing. Of the 26.7 million people over age 50 with a hearing impairment, only one in seven uses a hearing aid"- Which country exactly is this?--152.78.24.229 (talk) 19:30, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Map Information

The data map on this page purports to show the population over 65 years of each nation, as a percentage of the nation with the largest. As a result, it tracks so closely to overall population as to be indistinguishable. For example; China obviously has the largest portion of people over 65, having the largest population on Earth. It says nothing about the demographics of China versus, for example, Japan, which has a much larger population of elderly as a percentage of total. Therefore the map adds no new information about distribution of the elderly. I am deleting it. --Bridgecross (talk) 15:14, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

Regarding my edits

I am an 89 year old novice Wikipedian who has delved into the literature about old age. See my draft edits of Old age for further edits I have in mind. As I see them, my revisions (1) respect text written by former editors, (2) add inline citations as the tag calls for, (3) sharpen the focus on “old age” and not the process of Ageing, (4) increase coherence, (5) add new information, and (5) remove excessive hyperlinks. If you can offer advice or assistance, please let me know. Vejlefjord (talk) 18:16, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

as a Cause of Death

Shouldn't that be in here, somewhere? It's why I looked at it... 144.32.60.216 (talk) 10:26, 10 July 2014 (UTC)

No, because old age by itself does not cause death. Diseases occurring in old age do. 2602:306:3653:8920:8162:8C8C:E611:63B7 (talk) 00:10, 26 June 2016 (UTC)

Merge

This merge tag needs tweaking; if any merging happens in this case, it's the Senior citizen article that should be merged into this one. We are not going to have the old age concept covered by only a euphemism; see, for example, WP:Euphemism. Flyer22
Also, that is not a merge discussion you pointed to. You are supposed to start a new merge discussion. Otherwise, this merge tagged you placed on this article can be validly removed any time, by anyone.) Flyer22

Senior citizen ought to be merged here. Because the current title was offensive to some, I thought the merge could be done in the reverse direction. As euphemism is not allowed for article titles, how about elder age? Fgnievinski (talk) 21:38, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

In 1965, "elderly" surpassed "old age" as the most common denomination, as per google ngram viewer: [1]. Therefore, I forward the proposition that the present article, old age, be renamed over its redirect, elderly. And senior citizen to become a section. Fgnievinski (talk) 21:47, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

Hello, Fgnievinski (talk · contribs). Make sure that you don't quote me again like you did above without making it clear that the comments are quotes, and where the quotes came from. Your quoting me above makes it seem like I posted that material to this talk page. And, no, it's best that you don't change it now that I've commented on it; this is because changing it would take my comments in this post out of context, and I'd rather not have my comments taken out of context; see Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Own comments. For clarity to others, this and this WP:Dummy edit are where my above comments came from. I commented on that matter after Fgnievinski placed a merge tag on the article. And, Fgnievinski, I moved this section down to the bottom to signify that it is a new discussion; this is per Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Layout.
As for your move proposal, the policies and/or guidelines to keep in mind are WP:Common name, WP:Not censored, and WP:Offensive material. I see that you asked about offensive titles at Wikipedia talk:Article titles. But as for starting an official move discussion, see Wikipedia:Requested moves. You're going to have to make a good case for why the Old age article should be moved to a different name; stating that the term old age is offensive, for example, requires WP:Reliable sources for proof. Furthermore, some people find being called a youth offensive, but that does not mean that we should move the Youth article. Flyer22 (talk) 22:06, 24 November 2014 (UTC)
@Flyer22: First: WP:BENICE -- I copied & pasted your words verbatim so that a discussion could ensue. Second, you didn't say anything about merging senior citizen here; if I don't hear anything, I'll proceed with it. Third, about the rename, I've demonstrated statistically that "elderly" is the most frequent name. Fourth, there's this from WP:COMMONNAME: "When there are multiple names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others." Fifth, maybe you're aware of Wikipedia's problem with editor retention; there's a project meta:Grants:IEG/Senior Citizens Write Wikipedia trying to make Wikipedia more friendly for the elderly, and calling people the way they prefer to be called would have a positive impact. Thanks for your understanding. Fgnievinski (talk) 01:15, 25 November 2014 (UTC)
There is no need to ping me to this talk page, since it's on my WP:Watchlist. As for "WP:BENICE," which redirects to the WP:Civility policy, I don't see how my above post is not civil. I even began by stating, "Hello, Fgnievinski." And, yes, you should not have posted my comments the way that you did. I'm sure that a lot of other Wikipedians would agree with me on that. Like I stated, "Your quoting me above makes it seem like I posted that material to this talk page." That you faithfully reproduced my comments is beside the point. What if I had not responded? My comments would have then been left there, looking as though I posted them to this talk page, and without any indication of where they actually came from. You should have indicated that they were quotes, instead of making them look like I posted them to this talk page and that I signed my username in a sloppy way. And, in one of those comments, I did indeed state something about merging the Senior citizen article into the Old age article; I stated, "This merge tag needs tweaking; if any merging happens in this case, it's the Senior citizen article that should be merged into this one. We are not going to have the old age concept covered by only a euphemism; see, for example, WP:Euphemism." So there is no need for me to repeat myself on that. And as for the rename, you are supposed to propose this matter through an official move request. WP:Requested moves is clear that any potential contested article moves should go through that process; this is why I pointed you to the page that explains how to proceed with that process. As for what the elderly prefer to be called, many people don't like to be called "elderly" either. Unless you have WP:Reliable sources to support the matter, it is not as though the vast majority of people who are elderly hate being called old. Do the vast majority of relatively young people, such as 40-year-olds, hate being called old? Yes, I would think so. But regarding people in their 80s, for example, that is a very different matter. I fail to see how the term elderly is any better than the term old. And I'm thinking some others won't see your logic on that either. But, whatever the case, I'm not very interested in debating this topic with you. Flyer22 (talk) 01:43, 25 November 2014 (UTC)
I've finished the merge; as for the rename, I'll wait for the opinion of interested parties. Fgnievinski (talk) 02:48, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

My recent edit

Turns out I was right about the addition of that "Plato quote" being in bad faith. I just checked the revision history and it originates in this piece of vandalism. At some point, someone added it back and replaced Pythagoras with Plato. --70.106.139.21 (talk) 00:20, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

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Reverting to the IP's disruptive edits

Soundofmusicals, regarding this and this, why are you reverting me and treating me like some newbie who is test editing? I clearly told you the following: That IP range is known to change ages based on the IP's personal opinion. See the history of the Young adult (psychology) article. Yet you still reverted me with some insulting edit summary about test editing? Look at the sources! This Britannica.com source, for example, clearly states, "anywhere from the mid-40s to the 70s." So why are you changing the text to the IPs wording of "anywhere from 35 to 64" when the source does not state that? Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 21:18, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

@User talk:Flyer22 - Sorry about that! I think my watchlist is getting too big - my original revert was based on a quick look at the top half of the "diff" - NOT good practice at any time! On reading the full section I take your point of course - although 45-65 (the age bracket my own children have all been in for a while now) always used to be called "middle aged", or perhaps "aging", rather than "old", or "elderly" - so you can see where my initial impression came from. Or is the rather less than pleasant realisation I will soon be not just an old codger myself, but the father/father-in-law of "old" people getting to me? In fairness to myself - it would have been helpful if you'd "gone to talk" straight off - the longer edit summaries they allow nowadays still don't beat a good talk page post. Hang in there, and best season's wishes. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 23:59, 26 December 2018 (UTC)
Soundofmusicals, thanks for explaining. I figured you were reverting because you didn't trust what I was reverting to, although the IP's beginning age of "35" is clearly younger than mid-40s; so I would think one would be more skeptical of that. Mid-40s obviously isn't generally seen as old age. Just in some societies. As for taking the matter to the talk page, I did not see the need. Neither edit summary was that long. Anyway, Happy Holidays. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 01:14, 27 December 2018 (UTC) Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 01:16, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
Yeah - I obviously didn't even look at the bottom part of the "diff", or read the whole section "before and after" - as I said, NOT good practice! One might almost remark "old enough to know better" - although in my case that could be contrued as a little impolite. What I meant about the "new" (longer) edit summaries wasn't that either of us had used the feature, but that the good old talk page remains important in cases like this. Never mind, all's well that end's well. Not sure how this one even got on my watchlist, to be honest - I think I'll take it off! --Soundofmusicals (talk) 02:58, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

Thought on intro

WP doesn't normally use an example in the intro, so the paragraph about osteoporosis seems a little odd to me. I'd lean toward removing it. - Sdkb (talk) 16:22, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Also, the intro seems a little unduly negative. Positive aspects of old age like retirement and the respect afforded the elderly for their wisdom are important aspects of old age in many cultures and deserve inclusion, imo. - Sdkb (talk) 16:25, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

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Eurocentrism

The Societal and Historical section seems Eurocentric. --Oakime (talk) 17:35, 6 April 2022 (UTC)oakime

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