Just out of curiosity, do YOU believe this? Do you believe that anyone in the history of the planet lived to be 903 years old?
I don’t want this to turn into Great Debates, but to answer your question, Yes, with reservations.
I consider myself to be a Christian, and generally believe the Bible to be true, but I am willing to consider one or more of the following possibilities.
[ul]
[li]In those days “years” may have been calculated in a different manner than we use today.[/li][li]Moses, or some subsequent scribe got the numbers wrong, or they were somehow messed up in translation.[/li][li]In the years before the flood humans had longer lifespans because many/most of the diseases we have today were not yet around, coupled with healthy lifestyle and diet. After the flood, it seems that reported lifespans decreased dramatically, for whatever reason.[/li][/ul]
Okay, I would just like to step in and say that “evidence” from scripture is not acceptable for my purposes and ask that any religious discussions take place in a more suitable forum. Thanks.
Chronos writes:
> Into which category would you put modern America? We routinely have both
> people living into their 90s, and mothers in their early teens.
Compared with the U.S. as of, say, 200 years ago, we have a much higher percentage of people living into their 90’s and a much lower percentage of mothers in their early teens.
You know, if you count age in lunar months rather than years, those start to make a bit more sense, at least to me.
Does anyone know what the record for the most generations living in a family is? I am in 4th position of 6 (generation) in my family… I have 2 daughters that have both had children. My oldest daughter had a little girl so that made my family 6 generations of all female then my second daughter had a little boy 3 months later and made my family 5 female 1 male. My great grandmother will be 101 this Feb. 2011 and seems to be in great shape. I promise if you had to guess her age you prob. wouldn’t guess anymore than 75-80! I cant find alot of info on 6 living generations… are we a rare find? Where do I research this or who should I contact? Can anyone help me?
It appears that the record is seven generations alive at the same time:
With the doubling that occurs as you go back into the grandparents it becomes increasingly likely that someone is alive that you dont know about.
Seven generations back there are 128 people responsible for your existence.
Before my paternal grandmother died, she was a great great grandmother. If my mother in law can live another 15 years (and she is a healthy old Chinese woman) she could also be a double great also.
On the show “Raising Hope”, the character of Cloris Leachman (who is 84 years old) is a great great grandmother to the baby on the show named Hope. The grandmother on the show is the beautiful Martha Plimpton who is 40 years old, who had the son who is the father of the baby when she was 15.
I wonder in socieities where getting married very young is the norm, or back in ancient times when people had children very young with those children having children and so on.
We attended a wedding of a coworker wedding yesterday. A second marriage for both. Both in their 70s. Both Mormons. During the ceremony the Elder said the two shared 54 grandchildren and about 30 great-grandchildren.
First time we were ever inside a LDS church, let alone a LDS wedding. It was amazing by the number of their friends with multi-multi-generations at the ceremony.
Wendell, thanks for the most helpful contemporary reply to my three-year-old question. I suspect that historically there may be examples of seven or eight generations, but this is the best we’ve found so far.
[I wasn’t expecting to count zombie generations!]
Quoth groman, some time back:
The ages start to look reasonable, but then you end up with folks begetting at too young an age. Maybe there’s been an eight-year-old father at some point in history, but it can’t be very common.
I guess any sort of reasonable non-year unit would have to be non-linear. Something like the decibel-year, 20*log(biblical age) = solar age. 
I’m past the editing threshold, but something occurred to me – it’s fairly easy to imagine a culture that only starts counting (or resets) age after some sort of initiation or coming-of-age ritual. Combine with ages in months instead of years, and it becomes a somewhat palatable explanation. Although easily falsifiable if we have evidence to the contrary or it would be somehow inconsistent with other data.
this is crazy! I was just serching for the average gererations still alive in one family. My Grandmother has not been well and I am worried about her.And I have grandchildren, I thought at one time my grandmother would be still alive to see my grandaughter have her first baby, that could happen in approx 15 years my grandaughter will l be 17 hopefully not till she 30, but if it was to happen it would be nice for my grandmother to see it, she would be 97 hey it seemed possible. But latley she is not well, we are five generations living all women.
Great Great Grandmother 83
Great Grandmother 63
Grandmother45
Daughter 24
Grandaughter 2 yr old Lilliah and one one the way !!!
i come from a family of 6 generations my great grandmother is still alive at the age of 107 she lives in flint mi and i and my grand children live in greeneville tn and both of them make up our six generations thank you
Yes this is absurd but technically possible. The world’s youngest mother was a child from Peru named Lina Medina. She had a condition called precocious puberty and gave birth to a child at the age of 5 years and 8 months. If she had given birth to a daughter (she actually had a son) and her daughter continued the family tradition of giving birth to a daughter at the same age, by the grand old age of 118 years and 8 months, Lina Medina would the grand matriarch of 20 generations!
The longest family tree in the world today is that of the Chinese philosopher Confucius (551 BC-479 BC) He was a descendant of King Tang (1675 BC-1646 BC). The tree spans more than 80 generations, and includes more than 2 million members.
No, it is not.
Please don’t argue with me and just accept that you’re wrong.This is GQ and not GD afterall.
Tasty aged braaiins!