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Aging
Point Two: If we're really careful
we get old while we're still healthy.
Point Three: Physical senescence precedes
Death By Old Age; this is not senility.
Notes:
But whether we actually get disease, in Western countries in particular, is not chance, for so-called lifestyle choices, combined with family history, permit educated guessing. For example, a smoking pilot whose parents both died of heart attacks in their fifties is hardly likely to outlive them, and most likely will die of tobacco-related disease, most likely a heart attack.
Even if we stay healthy, we will die. I have been professionally observing people get older for 25 years. Early on I was stuck by the fact that healthy old people at some point begin to fail physically. For some, this is in their seventies; for others, in their nineties. But regardless of the age at which it begins, it is quire dramatic, and incapacitation or death usually occur, in my experience, within about three years after this begins.
But physical senescence is a late phenomenon Most incapacitation blamed on old age is due to disuse, disease or injury, not to aging, in my judgment.
Aging effects do occur, and are relatively subtle, which means that the pilot can miss the clues of diminished ability or capacity. This is best done by continuing to fly.