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The time scale of a human life | Elementary Mathematics(K-6) Explained 18| N J Wildberger

2,777 views · Published 3 January 2013 · 30:00 · Indexed 13 October 2026

Channel: Insights into Mathematics · 2013 · Education

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Numbers are important for both counting and measurement, and today we start discussing measurement in the familiar context of time and the phases of a human life. This is not a bad place for young people to start learning about a scale and different units to measure something. 

We begin by explaining how the fundamental units of a day, month and year come about from the relative motions of the earth, moon and sun. Then we lay out a linear scale representing 100 years, the rough potential life span of a human (although some people do live beyond that). On this time scale we can point out various important times and stages of life.

This is a good way for students to engage with numbers and their relation to their own lives and others around them. It is also a place to mention some interesting facts related to life spans of very long-lived creatures (like the bowhead whale), and also to talk about average life expectancies, such as 18 years for a domestic cat.

Video Content:
00:00 Intro to time scales
5:43 The relative motions of the earth, moon, sun
8:13 The year
10:37 A decade
15:00 The time scale of a human life: Youth
19:48 Middle age
23:29 Life spans (maximum)
25:58 Average life expectancies

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