I was encouraging Dead Pool entries last night and noticed that if you’re my age (the foothills of middle-age) then you will enter names like these:

Olivia de Havilland, Kirk Douglas, Vera Lynn

(collective age 296)

However, the younger Dr Paul Pub Quiz clientele simply haven’t heard of these oldies. It’s fair enough. The last time Kirk Douglas was nominated for an acting Oscar was 1956.Olivis de Havilland was already a star before Hitler invaded Poland.

So the younger quizzers knowledge of very old once-famous people is greatly limited. The people listed above stopped doing anything meaningful to the general public at least 30 years ago. They are famous in the same way that you can hear an echo of the creation of the universe if you have the correct kind of radio telescope.

Consequently, what constitutes old celebrities in younger peoples’ head is a list more like this:

Donald Trump, Simon Cowell, Sylvester Stallone

(collective age 194)

Conclusion: Young people are less likely to choose someone who will actually die but if their choice does go down then they are more likely to be actually famous.

The first list above is a total of 102 years older than the lower list. But the people on the upper list stopped being famous 30 years ago.

Balance, perspective and certain death. But when will they die? That’s the game.