Want to live forever? Okay, not forever, but let’s say… 1000 years?

Think I’m kidding? Well I’m not. For 10 – 15 years I’ve been telling people that I believe the science to significantly extend the human lifespan would be here in my lifetime and that I intend to use it to try to live 500 – 1000 years.

And my guest tonight, Dr Aubrey de Grey, biogerontologist from the Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, UK, is the man leading the field in this incredibly exciting research.

As his website says:

The central goal of my biogerontology work is to expedite the development of a true cure for human aging.

He has developed the term SENS (Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence) and is confident that, given enough funding (a measly $100 million a year for ten years), we can make significant in-roads towards curing human aging. He and his partners have established The Methuselah Mouse Prize, a scientific competition designed to draw attention to the ability of new technologies to slow and even reverse the damage of the aging process. And a couple of days ago, Technology Review magazine issued another challenge – Technology Review is announcing a prize for any molecular biologist working in the field of aging who is willing to take up the challenge: submit an intellectually serious argument that SENS is so wrong that it is unworthy of learned debate, and you will be paid $20,000 if it convinces independent referees.

Out of all of the interviews I’ve done in the last 8 months, I have to say this is personally the most exciting. Getting to assist guys like Dr de Grey to get their message out to the wider population makes this podcasting thing worthwhile.

Now… GO! Listen to the show! And then come back here and spend some SERIOUS QUALITY TIME checking out the links…

    SENS home
    Read Technology Review’s detailed article on Dr de Grey
    Donate money at the MPRize website

YAHOO NEWS RSS feed on “Aubrey de Grey” to you can stay up to date

Further reading:

The Spike (Damien Broderick)
The Age of Spiritual Machines (Ray Kurzweil)
The Prospect of Immortality (Robert Ettinger)