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The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

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Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#31

Post by nynx »

jacquesm wrote: post #23
nynx wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now that’s an interesting take. Aside from the likelihood that aging treatments are likely to be free or subsidized by governments to avoid having increasingly old populations, what do you define as my normal lifespan? Should I avoid cancer treatments if I get it later in life? What about heart disease? Or Alzheimer’s? For better or worse, you cannot make those value judgements on others.

No, feel free to get all those. But the moment that your life-extension becomes the shortening of someone else's is where the problems really begin. Resources are finite, we are already straining our eco-systems to (and beyond) the breaking point. At some point we will need some limits to avoid losing it all. Quite possibly we are already past the point of no return in that sense. I think the first time when humanity…

Still, why are those okay when treatments for the causes of age related diseases are not?

Humans didn’t commonly live to 90 in the past, yet we do now. An 80 year old getting cancer treatment could be using a bed that a 25 year old with COVID could have used.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#32

Post by jacquesm »

prepend wrote: post #3

People want to live forever and there weren’t many people in this space when de Grey started. I don’t think he’s a crank, but it is surprising that people invest in him.

It's the billionaire's dillema: you can't take it with you, so here's this guy who for a - to you - paltry sum of money claims that he can make you live forever. Since it doesn't harm you in any way you might as well make that bet. See also: Pascals' wager.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#33

Post by sebringj »

From a laymen perspective, I see David Sinclair as the clear leader in this field with actual lab results to back it up. https://sinclair.hms.harvard.edu/research I only remember Aubrey de Grey talking and presenting a lot but there wasn't the level of substance that seemed satisfactory to me. Ad hominem alert... Aubrey gives me the sensation of scratching a chalkboard with his strange social life and terrible hygiene but is obviously intelligent. In stark contrast...David has all the admirable hallmarks, socially and academically.

Substance really only matters to me but it is worth mentioning Aubrey's oddness as it seems quite extreme and entertaining. I think Aubrey's weirdness actually had the opposite effect of making me give him more credit of a potential mad genius than now seemingly deserved but maybe that will change.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#34

Post by zozbot234 »

jacquesm wrote: post #23
nynx wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now that’s an interesting take. Aside from the likelihood that aging treatments are likely to be free or subsidized by governments to avoid having increasingly old populations, what do you define as my normal lifespan? Should I avoid cancer treatments if I get it later in life? What about heart disease? Or Alzheimer’s? For better or worse, you cannot make those value judgements on others.

No, feel free to get all those. But the moment that your life-extension becomes the shortening of someone else's is where the problems really begin. Resources are finite, we are already straining our eco-systems to (and beyond) the breaking point. At some point we will need some limits to avoid losing it all. Quite possibly we are already past the point of no return in that sense. I think the first time when humanity…

The SENS programme, as speculative as it might be, is really about rejuvenation as opposed to mere life extension. And younger, healthier people put a lot less strain on resources than if they were older and sicker.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#35

Post by jacquesm »

nynx wrote: post #31
jacquesm wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, feel free to get all those. But the moment that your life-extension becomes the shortening of someone else's is where the problems really begin. Resources are finite, we are already straining our eco-systems to (and beyond) the breaking point. At some point we will need some limits to avoid losing it all. Quite possibly we are already past the point of no return in that sense. I think the first time when humanity…

Still, why are those okay when treatments for the causes of age related diseases are not? Humans didn’t commonly live to 90 in the past, yet we do now. An 80 year old getting cancer treatment could be using a bed that a 25 year old with COVID could have used.

Fair enough. But it's a bit of a difference between tackling disease that also can affect the younger generations versus fixing aging itself. That's on a different level.

It's the difference between a quantitative change and a qualitative one, the one is merely an improvement, the other is revolutionary and will have many unintended side-effects that we are likely not going to be able to accurately predict.

I'm not looking forward to a world ruled by a gerontological elite that we can not get rid of who hold all the cards as well as the levers of power.

At least right now we have death as the limit to how much power an individual can amass, if you take that limit away I suspect that it will not end well and it might get us into a situation that we can no longer back out of.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#36

Post by corndoge »

jacquesm wrote: post #29
corndoge wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you grandstanding opposition to life extension just to make a statement about capitalism? You really would ditch immortality right off the bat rather than try to solve the wealth inequality in some other way?

No, I've been around long enough to be cynical. Immortality with humanity's present state of ethical development, inequality and resource exhaustion would introduce problems, it would not solve anything.

Had you caveated your original post with the second sentence I would have agreed

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#37

Post by javert »

This article is full of blatantly faulty "logic." Maybe de Grey is guilty as charged, but this article is just irresponsible, reprehensible noise.

It's OK up to the cryonics comment, as far as I can tell; after that it just becomes sarcastic. For example, making sarcastic comments about a person's alibi does not mean the alibi is actually false.

Another example - the author states that he will judge de Grey based on some moron commenting on his blog - which is obviously faulty and shows that the author has suspect motivations.

Adding emotionalistic junk to the Internet puts you into the same kind of camp as, well... the normal people that we complain about (QAnon, etc.). I mean, seriously. Practice intellectual hygiene. If you can't do that, you shouldn't be listened to, you are contributing to the overall problem.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#38

Post by zozbot234 »

jacquesm wrote: post #27
zozbot234 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> His success is mostly limited to milking gullible people, as far as I know not a single usable item is the result of this fraudsters activity over the years. Really? SENS research is pretty niche in the broad field of regenerative medicine - that's kind of their schtick after all - but it appears to follow the well-known pattern from medical research where it's amazingly useful for mice, with results on humans bein…

I think you confirmed my point.

Perhaps, but by that standard all basic research in medicine with no short-term application to humans is "just milking gullible people". There's not much in there that's specific to SENS.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#39

Post by jacquesm »

zozbot234 wrote: post #34
jacquesm wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, feel free to get all those. But the moment that your life-extension becomes the shortening of someone else's is where the problems really begin. Resources are finite, we are already straining our eco-systems to (and beyond) the breaking point. At some point we will need some limits to avoid losing it all. Quite possibly we are already past the point of no return in that sense. I think the first time when humanity…

The SENS programme, as speculative as it might be, is really about rejuvenation as opposed to mere life extension. And younger, healthier people put a lot less strain on resources than if they were older and sicker.

Great, bring it on, a world with 150 year olds who look like they're 30, what could possibly go wrong.

Either it will be very few ultra wealthy people (in which case the resources argument wouldn't matter so much anyway) or we are in for a population explosion the likes of which we've never seen.

350K people are born every day, 150K people die every day (lots of those children in the developing world). For a net of 200K, in other words, the world population increase would be roughly double what it is today without death.

Re: The success of Aubrey de Grey baffles me

#40

Post by jacquesm »

zozbot234 wrote: post #38
jacquesm wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you confirmed my point.

Perhaps, but by that standard all basic research in medicine with no short-term application to humans is "just milking gullible people". There's not much in there that's specific to SENS.

Not really, because the bulk of that research is at least based on solid scientific principles whereas what de Grey has been peddling always read as 'made for investors' rather than aiming for specific results. I always figured that Mollers sky car would fly long before de Grey would deliver a result (and I consider Moller to be longest running investor scam in history besides the Catholic church).
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