How many breaths in a lifetime?

Question

1. Roughly how many breaths does a person take in an 80-year lifetime? 2. Roughly what total volume of air passes through their lungs? (A resting breath is about half a litre.) Give both answers as round numbers, state the assumptions, and find a second route to the first answer as a cross-check.

Accepted Answer

About 500 million breaths, moving about 250 million litres of air, which is 250,000 cubic metres, roughly the volume of a large office building. Breaths. At rest a person breathes about 12 to 15 times a minute; take 14. That is 14 × 60 × 24, about 20,000 breaths a day, times 365, about 7.4 million a year, times 80 years, about 600 million. Sleep slows breathing and exercise speeds it up, so "half a billion" is a fair round figure. Volume. At about 0.5 litres per breath, 500 million breaths move 250 million litres = 250,000 cubic metres of air. A large office building has roughly that internal…

How many breaths in a lifetime?

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