The Abolition of Aging?
Within our collective grasp dwells the remarkable possibility of the abolition of biological aging.
It’s a big “if”, but if we decide as a species to make this project a priority, there’s around a 50% chance that practical rejuvenation therapies resulting in the comprehensive reversal of aging will be widely available as early as 2040.
People everywhere, on the application of these treatments, will, if they wish, stop becoming biologically older. Instead, again if they wish, they’ll start to become biologically younger, in both body and mind, as rejuvenation therapies take hold. In short, everyone will have the option to become ageless.
Two objections
The viewpoint I’ve just described is a position I’ve reached following extensive research, carried out over more than ten years. My research has led me to become a strong supporter of what can be called “the rejuveneering project”: a multi-decade cross-disciplinary endeavour to engineer human rejuvenation and thereby enable the choice to abolish aging.
But when I mention this viewpoint to people that I meet – as part of my activity as a futurist, or when I catch up with my former colleagues from the smartphone industry – I frequently encounter one of two adverse reactions.
First, people tell me that it’s not possible that such treatments are going to exist in any meaningful timescale any time soon. In other words, they insist that human rejuvenation can’t be done. It’s wishful thinking to suppose otherwise, they say. It’s bad science. It’s naively over-optimistic. It’s ignorant of the long history of failures in this field. The technical challenges remain overwhelmingly difficult.
Second, people tell me that any such treatments would be socially destructive and morally indefensible. In other words, they insist that human rejuvenation shouldn’t be done. It’s essentially a selfish idea, they say – an idea with all kinds of undesirable consequences for societal harmony or planetary well-being. It’s an arrogant idea, from immature minds. It’s an idea that deserves to be strangled.
Can’t be done; shouldn’t be done – in this book, I will argue that both these objections are profoundly wrong. I’ll argue instead that rejuvenation is a noble, highly desirable, eminently practical destiny for our species – a “Humanity+” destiny that could be achieved within just one human generation from now. As I see it, the abolition of aging is set to take its place on the upward arc of human social progress, echoing developments such as the abolition of slavery, the abolition of racism, and the abolition of poverty.
It turns out that the can’t/shouldn’t objections are interlinked. They reinforce each other. It’s often because someone thinks an effort is technically impossible that they object to any time or finance being applied to it. It would be much better, they say, to apply these resources to other philanthropic causes where real progress is possible. That, allegedly, would be the moral, mature thing to do. Conversely, when someone’s moral stance predisposes them to accept personal bodily decline and death, they become eager to find technical reasons that back up their decision. After all, it’s human nature to tend to cherry pick evidence that supports what we want to believe.
Two paradigms
A set of mutually reinforcing interlinked beliefs is sometimes called a “paradigm”. Our paradigms guide us, both consciously and unconsciously, in how we see the world, and in the kinds of projects we deem to be worthwhile. Our paradigms filter our perceptions and constrain our imaginations.
Changing paradigms is hard work. Just ask anyone who has tried to alter the opinion of others on contentious matters such as climate change, gun control, regulating the free market, or progressive taxation. Mere reason alone cannot unseat opinions on such topics. What to some observers is clear and compelling evidence for one position is hardly even noticed by someone entrenched in a competing paradigm. The inconvenient evidence is swatted away with little conscious thought.
The paradigm that accepts human bodily decline and aging as somehow desirable has even deeper roots than the vexatious political topics mentioned in the previous paragraph. It’s not going to be easy to dislodge that accepting-aging paradigm. However, in the chapters ahead, I will marshal a wide range of considerations in favour of a different paradigm – the paradigm that heartily anticipates and endorses rejuvenation. I’ll try to encourage readers to see things from that anticipating-rejuvenation paradigm.
Two abolitions
Accepting aging can be compared to accepting slavery.
For millennia, people from all social classes took slavery for granted. Thoughtful participants may have seen drawbacks with the system, but they assumed that there was no alternative to the basic fact of slavery. They could not conceive how society would function properly without slaves. Even the Bible takes slavery as a given. There is no Mosaic commandment which says “Thou shalt not keep slaves”. Nor is there anything in the New Testament that tells slave owners to set their slaves free.
But in recent times, thank goodness, the public mind changed. The accepting-slavery paradigm wilted in the face of a crescendo of opposing arguments. As with slavery, so also with aging: the time will come for its abolition. The public will cease to take aging for granted. They’ll stop believing in spurious justifications for its inevitability. They’ll demand better. They’ll see how rejuvenation is ready to be embraced.
One reason why slavery is so objectionable is the extent of its curtailment of human opportunity – the denial of free choice to the people enslaved. Another reason is that life expectancy of slaves frequently fell far short of the life expectancy of people not enslaved. As such, slavery can be counted as a major killer: it accelerated death.
From the anticipating-rejuvenation perspective, aging should be seen as the biggest killer of all. Compared to “standard” killers of the present day, such as drunken driving, terrorism, lead fumes, or other carcinogens – killers which rouse us to action to constrain them – aging destroys many more people. Globally, aging is the cause of at least two thirds of human deaths. Aging is the awful elephant in the room, which we have collectively learned to ignore, but which we must learn to recognise and challenge anew.
Every single week the rejuveneering project is delayed, hundreds of thousands more people suffer and die worldwide due to aging-related diseases. Advocates of rejuveneering see this ongoing situation as a needless slaughter. It’s an intolerable offence against human potential. We ought, therefore, to be powerfully motivated to raise the probability of 50% which I offered at the start of this foreword. A 50% chance of success with the rejuveneering project means, equally, a 50% chance of that project failing. That’s a 50% chance of the human slaughter continuing.
Motivation
In the same way as we have become fervently motivated in recent decades to deal with the other killers mentioned above – vigorously campaigning against, for example, drunk drivers and emitters of noxious chemical pollutants – we ought to be even more motivated to deal with aging. The anger that society has directed against tobacco companies, for long obscuring the links between smoking and lung cancer, ought to find a resonance in a new social passion to uncover and address links between biological aging and numerous diseases. If it’s right to seek to change behaviours and metabolism to cut down bad cholesterol (a precursor of heart disease) and concentrated glucose (a precursor of diabetes), it should be equally right to change behaviours and metabolism to cut down something that’s a precursor of even more diseases, namely, biological aging.
This is a discussion with enormous consequences. Changes in the public mood regarding the desirability of rejuveneering could trigger large reallocations of both public and private research expenditure. In turn, these reallocations are likely to have major implications in many areas of public well-being. Clearly, these decisions need to be taken wisely – with decisions being guided by a better understanding of the rich landscape of rejuveneering possibilities.
An ongoing surge of motivation, wisely coordinated, is one of the factors which can assist the rejuveneering project to overcome the weighty challenges it faces – challenges in science, technology, engineering, and human collaboration. Stubborn “unknown unknowns” surely lie ahead too. Due to these complexities and unknowns, no one can be sure of the outcome of this project. Despite what some rejuvenation enthusiasts may suggest, there’s nothing inevitable about the pace of future medical progress. That’s why I give the probability of success as only around 50%.
Although the end outcome remains unclear, the sense of discovery is increasing. The underlying scientific context is changing rapidly. Every day brings its own fresh firehose of news of potential breakthrough medical approaches. In the midst of so much innovation, it behoves us to seek clarity on the bigger picture.
To the extent that my book can provide that bigger picture, it will have met at least some of its goals. Armed with that bigger picture, readers of this book will, hopefully, be better placed to find the aspect of the overall rejuveneering project where they can make their best contributions. Together, we can tilt that 50% success probability upwards. The sooner, the better.
(This content is a copy of the Foreword from my recently published book “The Abolition of Aging”.)
Do you see our ability to produce food keeping pace with the enormous surge in human population that this breakthrough would cause?
Also, this breakthrough would be another cause to develop the ability to colonize our solar system and beyond.
I don't see these positions as arguments against rejuvenation, simply things to consider. I really can't see a moral argument against rejuvenation.
I think this will just be a question of energy. As soon as there is energy abundance, enough nutrients can be produced to feed the world's population.
Lots of bugs around to eat, or just give immortality too the Non-Breeders that are productive and educated. A Cricket Chocolate Bar isn't suppose too be that bad anyway.
For years I was convinced by the singularity that some day I would upload my consciousness and live forever. Now that I've been more convinced by the simulation hypotheses, I figure it's more likely that I have already uploaded my consciousness to the digital world, and that I'm already living forever.
The question for me has actually changed to... do I want to stick around in this simulation forever? Or see what's next? Or maybe at some point these realities will merge together regardless.
Thank you for your serious and vigorous research and development into the biggest "Omg...of course!" subjects in existence. I have always felt uneasy with aging, I know that it sounds trite, but hear me out. I believe that we inherently feel strange about things that aren't quite right.
Whether the feelings are physiological in nature like a knee that isn't moving the same and gets worse with time or hanging out with the wrong people who you know are not helping you enrich your life and experiences. Or a relationship that deep down inside you know is keeping you from true love but is just comfortable.
Aging is this nagging uneasiness that I feel is remnants of a much longer lifespan that our bodies know is a possibility. We wouldn't yearn so deeply for it if it couldn't happen. We are amazing perfect machines and we have a frontal lobe for a reason. Problem solving our way back to the original lifetime warranty blueprint.
A utopia in which births would be a very special occasion and done with purpose instead of mistakes and without education. Imagine the possibilities of having mastered many disciplines and the awe in watching the ebb and flow of humanity and history. There is this fear of death that lives inside of us that could vanish and this invisible monster chasing us would be gone. No one knows what that feels like but I can imagine that it would be akin to realizing that you get to be alone with the person you are enamored with for a whole night or that you don't have to work for 3 weeks with pay....just relief exponentially extended.
P.S. Sorry for the long windedness
Reminds me of Nick Bostrom's fable of the dragon-tyrant.
You should reassure people you're the real David W. Wood by posting a link to this on your Twitter.
Welcome to Steem!
Yes, Nick Bostrom's fable is something that has a big impact. I refer to it in the final chapter of my book, as an admirable example of the positive power of online advocacy.
And thanks for the suggestion to link to this from my Twitter feed. Now done!
(Though I'm still finding my feet here...)
I'm still trying to "find my feet here," too, and would appreciate your thoughts on a recent blog:
https://steemit.com/energy/@freeradical/you-want-100-solar-energy-it-s-coming-and-we-re-going
Bostrom is one of my favorites. I remember years ago when I was introduced to his "Simulation Theory" and "Paperclip Theory". My mind is still blown from that!
After having read the whole thing:
A) I think the moral reason against this tech is bs. Everyone above 25 wants to be younger again. There is no exception so there will also be a market. We are also going to have to kill some people, but that is a secondary problem.
B) I can't judge if this is possible or not, I would love to learn and will follow you.
Overall I found your article a bit fluffy and sales- like. I don't need to be sold, obviously I want tech that keeps me young. I am almost 40 and my body and brain sucks compared to 20 years ago. I wish I could have the 19 year old body of mine back. I could learn much faster, see better, react faster, play computer games, lose weight, recover better and fuck 7h in a row and cum on the spot. All these things don't quite work this way any more.
As you can see no selling required. I look forward to learn from you in future articles.
glad you're not in charge. killing people is wrong. the only caveat being self-defense.
I agree and I even do not like it as self defense.
Hi knircky - Thanks for the feedback. I don't see where the argument comes from that "We are also going to have to kill some people". Are you thinking of a possible population explosion? Population growth is something I consider but answer, at some length, in Chapter 2 of my book - free audio version available at https://theabolitionofaging.com/chapter-2/.
I guess the population explosion could also be solved by leaving earth.
However there is also the issue of getting new dna and evolving as a species.
Again I think this is something that is irrelevant at this time, since the problem does not exist yet. It will be interesting to not age, since all life depends on death to evolve.
Instead, I would say that evolution depends on variation followed by selection. Historically, that selection has taken place by differential avoidance (for a while) of death. But the better alternative is selection by intelligent design :-)
(by which I mean that both the variation of DNA and the selection of it can be carried out by intelligent humans, rather than relying on nature red-in-tooth-and-claw).
even the universe is not eternal, but we have to live happily ever after
![](https://steemitimages.com/640x0/http://i.imgsafe.org/0e936a491f.png)
wellcome my art
https://steemit.com/photography/@romanskv/winter-travel-in-the-bitter-cold-on-the-ice-of-the-rybinsk-reservoir
Well , his is something to think about . If the ancient could we could do it also . Imagine what one man in lifetime of maybe 300 years can do and achieve in fields that improve life like medicine , science etc...
i have been thinking about this subject for quite some time. most of the literature that i find is still focused on the anti and the breakdown as we age. i find endless studies on senescence and decay. with stem cells i thought that there would be a change in understanding that would lead us to the necessary shift to begin looking at what makes things grow, rather than what makes things die. i haven't seen much yet. mainly i see dithering about ethics of a small subset of the science. i see almost no discussion of the ethics of allowing all of our best and brightest, and friends and loved ones to continue to drop dead all around us. some of what you've discussed here i find refreshing, and i would like to thank you. we need more like you if we are ever to climb from this pit. we do still have many distractions. such as the death worshiping religionists who believe we are supposed to die. we also have the scarcity mongers who have trouble with the idea that if we can cure aging, surely we can come up with a way to make extra food and energy. i think buckminster fuller was instrumental in making those concerns irrelevant, provided we apply ourselves to the solutions. with extra life and a bolstered capacity for wisdom freed from decrepitude, we should find that many of our seemingly insurmountable problems quickly become a thing of the past. again i thank you, please continue your welcome inquirys into this, what i believe to be our most pressing challenge as sapient beings. one final thing, i have found very interesting the information of dave asprey and his bulletproofexec.com and many of the people connected with him. specifically the information he has gathered on cholesterol. i find his podcasts very illuminating. make of it what you will. thank you.
Who is David W. Wood:)? Very nice post sir! Do a proper introduction so I/we can get a better idea of your background please. The comment section praises your work!
Very interesting! I'm assuming you mean age related decline and not aging in general. Am I right?
Hi Sarah - Yes, people will still become chronologically older. But what can be slowed and then reversed is the deterioration in our bodies that normally accompanies chronological aging. This includes damage at the molecular, cellular, and organ level - damage which rejuveneering will deal with, in various ways. All this damage ordinarily increases our likelihood of getting chronic diseases such as cancer, heart disease, lung disease, dementia, and so on.
I thought that was what you meant. Thank you for clarifying. I completely agree with you. Many of our pre-conceived notions of how "old" people act, think and behave will in fact influence our own aging process. I highly recommend you watch "Iris" the documentary about Iris Apfel on Netflix if you haven't already seen it. She is the epitome of vibrant!