[metesky]

You never know, Eva, but isn't life best left up to the one who actually has to live it?

In my father's case, he started smoking at fifteen and smoked for sixty years until he was seventy-five.

He was a tax accountant also, retired out of IRS and ran his own business until he was eighty-nine.

He's been a little bored the last six years, but he's still here at 95.

I sometimes think that heredity and genes have a lot to do with our chances at longevity.

[Eva]

I am sure that you are right about heredity being a factor in longevity, but I think that it is irresponsible to tell people that smoking won't effect you until you get older, anyway, so go ahead and smoke. That is not necessarily true.

I do have some relatives who continued to smoke right up until their eighties, and although they haven't died of lung cancer, they have suffered other ill effects, such as macro degeneration (that's not the right term, but its a form of progressive blindness which is often attributed to the decrease in circulation due to smoking).

Anyway, I wasn't trying to convince anyone to stop smoking, that's not my business. I was just pointing out the fallacy of a statement that Shelion made to another poster.