41–50 of 113 posts
The Ming clam the article refers to as comparison was not 508 years but 405 to 410 according to the linked reference. So I'd say that shark is definitely a strong contender for the overall title.
clams are invertebrates
> The team looked at 28 sharks, most of which had died after being caught in fishing nets as by-catch. Nice job- the shark had done just fine for ~400 years.
It has some staggering numbers regarding the amount of by-catch caught every day
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Heartrate has been found to play a big part. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9316546/ Animals with slower heart rates tend to be longer lived. An interesting sidenote are bats, which have heart rates about the same as similarly sized small mammals like mice, but due to their nightly torpor state where their heart rate is significantly lowered, they tend to live 20-25 years opposed to the 3-4 mice usually live.
Assuming this is true, I recommend everyone start running! If I am regularly running, my resting heart rate at night drops into the upper 30s. During the day sitting down, 45-50. If I haven't been running (for a week or longer) it picks back up in to the mid 40s at night, and around 60 for normal sitting.
Don't ask me how I know :-)
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How do people develop their repertoire/knowledge of these “effects” and laws?
Not OP, but I pretty much only know two effects: Baader–Meinhof effect and Streisand effect. So I guess the answer for knowing this particular one is just that it is famous.
> The team looked at 28 sharks, most of which had died after being caught in fishing nets as by-catch. Nice job- the shark had done just fine for ~400 years.
"The sharks' livers were once used for machine oil, and they were killed in great numbers before a synthetic alternative was found and the demand fell" Fascinating that the fate of these sharks depended on a completely unrelated technological advance.
Whales were killed huge numbers for whale oil during the industrial revolution. The oil was oil lamps and to make soap. (over 10-20 million gallons per year during the peak)
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Whales were killed huge numbers for whale oil during the industrial revolution. The oil was oil lamps and to make soap. (over 10-20 million gallons per year during the peak)
Isn't Ambergris still used in luxury fragrances? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambergris
Confirmation bias is a creepy thing sometimes. I was literally asking my Google Home last night what the longest living vertebrate was and it told me the Greenland shark. Had a whole conversation about it over dinner, arguing about how accurate we think these age-establishing methods are. Though the more interesting part of our conversation (I would say) was wondering how ages work out in practice. For example why do…
> For example why do the vast majority of animals not live beyond 20 years, even when we try to keep them alive as long as possible (dogs)? If the environment was different would longevity be different for all species, e.g more oxygen in the atmosphere or a longer day-night cycle? Etc. A lot of animals just don't need to live longer than 1, 2, or 20 years to reproduce. There is no evolutionary pressure to do so. From…
Species need to live until reproduce, maybe several times, and see the next generation into being able to live on their own. That is about 35-50 for humans (granted the 15-20/generation - relatively prolonged maturation period given our size - is primarily because of the brain/skills development you mentioned). Additionally, because of the complexity of societal organization, skills and other knowledge, we've got boost from having the grand generation around to help and transfer knowledge and experience. That brought us to 60-70.
> The team looked at 28 sharks, most of which had died after being caught in fishing nets as by-catch. Nice job- the shark had done just fine for ~400 years.
Related: there’s a new documentary on Netflix called Seaspiracy It has some staggering numbers regarding the amount of by-catch caught every day