Do they just kind of stop working or something? It seems like if someone wasn’t doing well their pass away from a heart attack or something whole they were sleeping, but then again that wouldn’t be peaceful. Maybe I’m just getting too caught up on the words.
In: Biology
As stated in other comments, dying from old age occurs because your cells can no longer replicate and renew themselves properly, meaning your body cannot maintain a balance. Either they replicate out of control (cancer), or they stop replicating and the organs begin to fail. Also, people who’s neurocognitive abilities have been severely impaired sometimes die because their brain is simply no longer able to regulate their organs properly and things just stop working. Keep in mind that it only takes 1 organ failure to shut down the whole system.
Passing away peacefully isn’t the actual cause of death, there could be many different ones. Essentially your conscious mind doesn’t realize you’re dying. Think about the last time you slept while you had a bad cold or the flu, you didn’t realize how bad you felt while you were actually sleeping right? Now think of it in terms of your heart failing. If you’re heart was already that weak your body acclimated to that feeling and it wasn’t enough to jolt you to consciousness, so you pass away peacefully unaware.
The DNA that makes you has a definitive termination date set when it will stop replicating. So if you’re lucky, you’ll just “stop working” in your sleep.
Look up telomeres. You’re born with them and they get shorter every time your DNA replicates. When they run out, you stop, unless something else gets you first.
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