Do You Want to Live Forever?

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I was recently introduced to Aubrey de Grey, who’s on a mission to show us how we can live forever and raise the funding needed to start the research process to do so. Sound crazy? Well, if given the chance to live forever, would you? Scientists already know this is possible someday, albeit way in the future.

49-year-old Aubrey de Grey, who is facing his own mortality, is out to make this happen. He’s a theoretician in the field of gerontology, and the Chief Science Officer of the SENS Foundation, a non-profit organization he co-founded for scientific rejuvenation research. He’s intent on educating people to get us comfortable with the consideration of living forever. Simply put (as he explains) humans are like machines and can be repaired though nontechnology to prevent us from aging, and ultimately from dying. So yes, we can live forever.

This raises all kinds of unbelievable questions. Like, will only the rich have access to never dying? A second thought is, what about those who want to bring more children onto this planet? I’m just lightly grazing the surface of the multitude of questions here. It all sounds complex and sticky, but for me the truth is, I will not be around by the time surgeons (or what will they be called?) have the ability to perform repairs on us. Well – unless I opt for cryonics, which I will not explain but instead refer you to a former post of mine here.

“So many people die of aging in the world, well that’s 30 World Trade Center’s a day” Aubrey de Grey

Whether you’re fascinated by how we can live forever, or you think this is some crazy crock of – you know what, here’s a TEDMED video where Aubrey De Grey explains in excellent laymen words just how this works.

As we push hard here at SevenPonds to open the conversation on “the inevitable,” Aubrey de Grey is jetting around the world lecturing to educate and connect with those who can help him make this a reality and eliminate the word “inevitable.” How much research, time and dollars it will take to achieve this remains to be seen. But living forever is indeed in the cards of the human race. Fact breeds fiction and Blade Runner is more of a glimpse (of sorts) into our future than we may expect.

Meanwhile, we continue to deal with the current task at hand – changing the last taboo of death. For a more comprehensive understanding of Aubrey de Grey, watch this fascinating video.

• To learn more about Aubrey de Grey, check out his Wikipedia page here.
• Visit his SENS Foundation website here.

And how to do feel about this? Do you want to live forever? Is this interesting to you or just plain crazy?? We look forward to your comments.