It is well known that you can take the man out of the scientist (most often through vasectomy, hormone therapy, or castration), but you can’t take the scientist out of the man. I am constantly tackling the difficult questions of our age, attempting to very slightly elucidate mysteries or reach “good enough” answers. Today, an age old question about old age; What really is the first to go?
So what is the first to go? Traditional thinking usually debates between sight and hearing. Old people generally have a good sense of touch (until they have strokes or Parkinson’s Disease), and there is no solid evidence to show that their taste suffers (it is often perceived as having deteriorated when in fact it is just excruciatingly outdated).
It is my conclusion, though careful observation, that the first to go is the sense of smell. While I will never dispute that these oldies don’t see or hear well, smell is clearly the first to go. Well before they require large print newspapers or hearing aids at the movies, old people smell god-awful. Be the stench mothballs, body odor, or the rank redolence of lavender or White Diamonds, old people are never without it.
The sense of smell must be the first to go, since the diffusion quotient of the stench particles (calculated here by the square root of mass divided by density) is high when compared to the standards (peeled yellow onion, Roquefort cheese, and baby poo). In practicality, this means that the average old person stench could clear a 400 square foot room in what is known as a “manners vacuum.” To carry around an odor of this magnitude would require a sever smell impairment.
Humans all emit pheromones, which are evolutionary signals that ensure we chose mates with complimentary immune systems. We unconsciously pick up these smells and read them as levels of attraction. It is my hypothesis that as we age (and become less physically attractive) and our senses of smell deteriorate, we overcompensate by reeking. Unfortunately, the rest of us younger, functional-nosed citizens must endure the rank odor of the elderly.
Smell is the first to go. But don’t worry. I’m working on a solution, tentatively called “Eternal Youth”.