Engineering An End to Aging

Reason writes "Biogerontologist Aubrey de Grey has put forward a biological engineering plan to end human aging and co-founded the Methuselah Mouse Prize in recent years. Now he is finally getting some of the public recognition he deserves in an excellent David Stipp article at Fortune Magazine. If you ever wondered exactly how to go about engineering away the 50 million deaths due to aging that occur each and every year - and how to bring about a sea change in the scientific establishment - then this is the place to start. As an added bonus, I don't think you'll find a more succinct (and utterly British) answer to overpopulation objections to life extension than the one at the end of this article!"

Comments

don't you just love how...

[dijjnn]

every week (sometimes more often) someone posts on slashdot a link to an article that says, summarized, "nanotechnology is the only thing that will save us! but, oh, it's so great, it will definitely save us!"

it's like a bunch of little machine supermen. but years from now, when it becomes practical, slashdotters (if they still exist) will resurrect all the arguments we've got against technologies like rfid and refuse to submit.

it's funny, that way.

Tapping the ego isn't an argument

[Cranx]

Tapping the ego and calling upon people to "go ahead and die" if they feel extending human lifespan is a bad idea is a childish statement, and the sort you would expect from a fanatic, not a scientist. There's no way earth can sustain our current growth rate indefinitely, let alone what would happen is people increased their lifespans. Indefinitely extending human lifespan is a death sentence for earth itself.