Let’s face it, being president takes a toll.
“You look at the picture when they’re inaugurated, and four years later, they’re visibly older,” Connie Mariano, a former White House physician whose stethoscope checked presidential hearts from 1992 to 2001 told The Washington Post in 2013. “It’s like they went in a time machine and fast-forwarded eight years in the span of four years.”
Last week, Microsoft showed off a new Web site that uses the company’s face detection software to guess the age and gender of people in photographs. How-Old.net allows users to upload their own photos and although the results have been mixed so far, the site has garnered many reactions on Twitter.
So what does the Web site say about our president, or, for that matter, the previous three presidents
Time magazine took a go at it earlier this week and found, according to How-Old.net, that President Obama’s looks have aged 13 years during his time in office. This estimate was based on two photos. To get a more thorough result, The Washington Post’s Morning Mix used multiple sets of photos, containing one picture at the beginning of a president’s tenure, one in the middle, and one toward the end. The results were a bit mixed; here’s a look:
President Obama
How-Old.net guessed that Obama is a few years older than he actually is. However, for the most part, it did not show that he aged very much while in office.
George W. Bush
Overall, the Web site was very close to guessing the age of President George W. Bush, but the online tool did show that at the end of his second term Bush looked a few years older than he actually was.
Bill Clinton
The Web site was very close to accurately guessing President Bill Clinton’s age when he entered office, but there were some anomalies. For example, in the first photo comparison, the site’s results show he aged 29 years.
George H.W. Bush
The Web site guessed that President George H.W. Bush was at least 10 years older than his actual age while in office. Results were mixed as to how much Bush aged over his term.
By Nick Kirkpatrick
