Peak Life Expectancy

I am often skeptical of these claims that we will see the next generation have a shorter life expectancy as these claims require models. These models may be incorrect for a variety of reasons: misspecification, noise, shifting patterns of disease, unexpected technological improvements, and so forth.

But what was fascinating was the map in the article. The places in the United States where life expectancy is dropping are focused mainly in the Southeast. Now that distribution is, itself, interesting as the southeast has long had health issues: think of the classic stroke belt. Furthermore, it is an area of high inequality that has a climate that is very compatible with a sedentary lifestyle.

Contrast this with the California coast (and especially Los Angeles) where life expectancies are actually rising, or even New York city. Could it be that an urban lifestyle is actually life enhancing (both in terms of quantity and quality)?

So perhaps, instead, what we have is an ecological experiment to really try and understand these phenomena.

Econned

It is the start of the school year and time to read something non-epidemiological or statistical. So, being me, I decided to read Yves Smith's new book Econned. I'll let you know what I think but reading the introduction this morning suggests that the book is off to a strong start. The best quote so far:

Theories that fly in the face of reality often need to excise inconvenient phenomena, and mainstream economics is no exception.

This quote reminds me of Karl Popper's thinking; one often learn more based on what does not fit your theory then from what does (i.e. falsification). This principle is hard to follow in very complex fields (like economics and epidemiology) where you are guaranteed to have at least some mismatches and disconfirming evidence for everything. But it is good to cultivate a sense of humility about our models!