Tag Archives: Life Extension

ApoE4 – The Ancestral Allele

Posted on August 5, 2011 by Aschwin de Wolf

Reportedly, when James Watson and Steven Pinker had their genome sequenced, they declined to know their risk for Alzheimer’s disease. Clearly this is not an option for life extensionists and cryonicists, who are better off knowing whether they have a copy … Continue reading →

Posted in Health, Neuroscience, Personal Genomics | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off

Philosophy of science and life extension

Posted on January 27, 2011 by Aschwin de Wolf

Paul Edwards concludes his chapter ‘The Semantic Challenge’ in his book God and the Philosophers with the following observation about logical positivism: It is not uncommon nowadays to hear logical positivism dismissed as a set of crude errors and confusions. … Continue reading →

Posted in Science | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off

The presumption of death

Posted on July 12, 2010 by Aschwin de Wolf

Bertrand Russell once said that “most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so.” One does not need to look any further than the many responses to Kerry Howley’s recent article about cryonics and hostile partners in … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Society | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off

Cryonics Oregon June Meeting with Aubrey de Grey and Ben Best

Posted on May 27, 2010 by Aschwin de Wolf

On June 6th the next Cryonics Oregon meeting will coincide with a downtown Portland aging conference. As a result we have been successful in persuading Cryonics Institute President Ben Best and Alcor member and biogerontologist Aubrey de Grey to attend … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Science | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off

The healthy skeptic

Posted on December 15, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

Consumers are constantly bombarded with advice about health. Lower your cholesterol, avoid carbs, take dietary supplements, avoid Teflon, get a full body scan, etc. Such advice does not fall on deaf ears. Who does not want to remain healthy, look … Continue reading →

Posted in Health, Science | Tagged , , , , , | Comments Off

Greg Jordan on Buddhism, Epicureanism, and Immortalism

Posted on December 10, 2008 by Chana de Wolf

“Buddhism and Epicureanism combat the fear of death by accommodating the emotions to the reasonable certainty of death. Contemporary immortalism (which includes projects such as life extension, cryonic suspension, and universal immortalism) argues that scientific and technological solutions to the … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments Off

Liberty and oblivion

Posted on October 6, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

In 1991 the Libertarian Alliance published an article called “Immortality: Liberty’s Final frontier” (PDF) by David Nicholas. In this article the author argues that “the continuing fact of death renders all talk of liberty ultimately futile.” The author further argues … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , | Comments Off

Thomas Donaldson on cryonics and anti-aging

Posted on August 13, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

Just a superficial look at the history of the life extension movement will suffice  to show the rise and fall of numerous fads and trends in ideas about the mechanisms and “treatment” of aging.  Psychological meliorism and simplistic visions of … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off

Robert Prehoda in Cryonics Reports

Posted on August 10, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

Now online is an old interview with Robert W. Prehoda. Prehoda was a prolific science writer who published on topics such as aging, life extension, and technological forecasting. In 1969 Prehoda published the book “Suspended Animation: The Research Possibility That … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off

Interview with Cryonics Institute president Ben Best

Posted on August 6, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

This is the first in a series of interviews with individuals in the life extension and cryonics movement. We start off with an interview with Ben Best, president of the Cryonics Institute. What is your philosophy toward life? I think … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , | Comments Off

The history of scientific immortalism

Posted on August 4, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

Now online is Mike Perry’s article “Historical Steps Toward the Scientific Conquest of Death.” This article was previously published in 2003 in Physical Immortality, a short-lived publication by the Society for Venturism. The article is adapted from Chapter 2 of … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , | Comments Off

Gary Taubes and bias in nutrition science

Posted on July 26, 2008 by Chana de Wolf

In a recent blog post, Overcoming Bias reports that Gary Taubes, who has written much to further the idea that refined carbohydrates are a stronger contributing factor to overweight and “diseases of civilization” than dietary fat and cholesterol, has compiled … Continue reading →

Posted in Health, Science | Tagged , , , | Comments Off

Curing aging does not make cryonics redundant

Posted on July 15, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

Most life extensionists and transhumanists do not buy into many of the myths about cryonics. But one perspective that is sometimes voiced by futurists is that cryonics is a rational backup plan until aging is cured. This position has some … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , | Comments Off

Why is cryonics so unpopular?

Posted on May 29, 2008 by Aschwin de Wolf

In his 1998 essay “The Failure of the Cryonics Movement” (part 1, part 2), Saul Kent stresses that cryonics has remained so unpopular because nobody thinks it will work. One observable implication of this view is that we would expect … Continue reading →

Posted in Cryonics, Death | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off