Ageing is routinely measured by counting the number of years lived since the birth of an individual but at least since at least the 1930s, the validity, precision and sensitivity of chronological age as a measure has been criticised across the biological and behavioural sciences of ageing. This quest that has been reinforced by the contemporary investment in the possibility of technologically manipulating the rate of ageing to delay the onset the age-associated diseases. This paper explores the epistemic, institutional and political conditions that led to the formulation, at the turhn of the 1970s, of Alex Comfort's (1920-2000) seminal proposal to measure human biological ageing rate. Drawing on published and archival sources, I argue that Comfort's suggested measure of ageing can be understood as a form of 'anticipation work', and should be understood as an effort to evidence, and to make present, the technological and social promises that Comfort linked to experimental gerontology.

中文翻译：

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预期措施：Alex Comfort，实验性老年医学和衰老措施。

衰老通常通过计算自一个人出生以来的生存年数来衡量，但至少从至少1930年代开始，按时间顺序的年龄的有效性，准确性和敏感性在年龄的生物学和行为科学中都受到了批评。当代的投资加强了这一追求，即通过技术手段控制衰老的速度以延缓与年龄有关的疾病的发作。本文探讨了导致1970年代突如其来的Alex Comfort（1920-2000）开创性的测量人类生物衰老率的提议的认识论，制度和政治条件。利用公开和档案资源，我认为康福特（Comfort）建议的老化量度可以理解为“预期工作”的一种形式，