Progress with ending aging, with Aubrey de Grey

Our topic in this episode is progress with ending aging. Our guest is the person who literally wrote the book on that subject, namely the book, “Ending Aging: The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime”. He is Aubrey de Grey, who describes himself in his Twitter biography as “spearheading the global crusade to defeat aging”.
In pursuit of that objective, Aubrey co-founded the Methuselah Foundation in 2003, the SENS Research Foundation in 2009, and the LEV Foundation, that is the Longevity Escape Velocity Foundation, in 2022, where he serves as President and Chief Science Officer.
Full disclosure: David also has a role on the executive management team of LEV Foundation, but for this recording he was wearing his hat as co-host of the London Futurists Podcast.
The conversation opens with this question: "When people are asked about ending aging, they often say the idea sounds nice, but they see no evidence for any actual progress toward ending aging in humans. They say that they’ve heard talk about that subject for years, or even decades, but wonder when all that talk is going to result in people actually living significantly longer. How do you respond?"
Selected follow-ups:
• Aubrey de Grey on X (Twitter) ( / aubreydegrey )
• The book Ending Aging: The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime (us.macmillan.com/books/978031...)
• The Longevity Escape Velocity (LEV) Foundation (www.levf.org/)
• The SENS paradigm for ending aging , contrasted with the "Hallmarks of Aging" - a 2023 article in Rejuvenation Research (www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.108...)
• Progress reports from the current RMR project (www.levf.org/projects/robust-...)
• The plan for RMR 2 (www.levf.org/projects/robust-...)
• The RAID (Rodent Aging Interventions Database) analysis that guided the design of RMR 1 and 2 (www.levf.org/projects/raid)
• Longevity Summit Dublin (LSD): 13-16 June 2024 (longevitysummitdublin.com/)
• Unblocking the Brain’s Drains to Fight Alzheimer’s - Doug Ethell of Leucadia Therapeutics at LSD 2023 (explains the possible role of the cribriform plate) ( • Unblocking the Brain’s... )
• Targeting Telomeres to Clear Cancer - Vlad Vitoc of MAIA Biotechnology at LSD 2023 ( • Targeting Telomeres to... )
• How to Run a Lifespan Study of 1,000 Mice - Danique Wortel of Ichor Life Sciences at LSD 2023 ( • How to Run a Lifespan ... )
• XPrize Healthspan (www.xprize.org/prizes/healthspan)
• The Dublin Longevity Declaration ("DLD") (dublinlongevitydeclaration.org/)
Music: Spike Protein, by Koi Discovery, available under CC0 1.0 Public Domain Declaration

[@SilverFan21k]

Ty for covering longevity and having Aubrey

[@user-hx1ku8sp8c]

superb.

[@brianbrain9132]

39:30 FHI RIP

[@joemagicdeveloper]

This interview seems to defeat the purpose of showing any progress with ending aging for humans: It sounds terribly like the same Aubrey saying the same things for ~25 years, sadly. Keyword here is "saying". Missed opportunity to show any practical results. AKA, ~we'll show progress in 20+ years? It started sounding like religion: It will be great after we're all dead!? Well done Calum for the key questions.

[@HvdHaghen]

Good news about the mice, and I heard new things about the X-price though.

[@squamish4244]

I don't really go by Aubrey's predictions. He helped the field get started, but now it has a life of its own. His model of damage repair seems to have withstood the test of time, as it has been adopted by the NIH for its own explanation of aging. A great deal will depend on how AI will change medicine. The $101 million X-Prize is an interesting test. If it works, well, great!

[@EkilRevolution]

its a problem of funding . aubrey is trying to accelerate progress . being optimistic that the prospects of this research are not too far off is a strategy to increase support , even if its potential that many (or all) of us may die before we actually escape velocity . only time will tell , its hard to make a prediction in a time like this when there are many complexities and change is occurring at an extreme rate .

[@warioland523]

@@EkilRevolution I suggest looking up the rejuvenation roadmap. It's happening sooner then you think.

[@squamish4244]

@@EkilRevolution That's my problem with him. He makes predictions like "17 years" when so much has changed so fast that he has no way of knowing that. Nobody knows what's going to happen anymore. His reputation as a drunk and the wizard beard don't make him credible to new audiences. He did a huge amount to get the field going but he's been stuck on repeat for 20 years.