> long lifespan
...isn't it just better healthcare and nutrition?
...isn't it just better healthcare and nutrition?
We have done quite a lot in terms of infant mortality, but relatively little to extend the maximum age people reach. Take 1,000 random people born 100 BC vs 1,000 people born in 1900 and the oldest person from 1900 will very likely have lived longer but probably less than 10 years longer.
Mean lifespan has been dragged down mainly because of high rates of infant mortality and, as you allude to, various untreatable diseases. But as we make progress on those, the mean has been shifting up.
Being able to consult the elders when the group faces perplexing problems (who may have lived through something similar, or at least heard stories from the recently deceased generations who have) might mean the difference between between 20% of the population starving and no one starving.