Dr. Aubrey de Grey is working on ways which he and transhumanists believe would allow humans to live for hundreds of years. While Dr. de Gray’s ideas might seem like something more likely to be found in a Tom Robbins or Philip K. Dick novel, his research indicates that the seven biochemical effects of aging can be reversed in humans.
Dr. de Grey was recently interviewed by H+ magazine who questioned the scientist about common criticisms to his ideas. Specifically, the interviewer asked Dr. De Grey about overpopulation, whether or not people would actually want to live for centuries, and the morality of the decision to live for an extended period of time. In addition, he questioned Dr. de Grey about the pros and cons of specific medical advances in the area of longevity.
Dr. de Grey didn’t back down from his stance on Transhumanism or his plan for extended lifespans, Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence” (SENS). In response to the question about population, he responded that overpopulation could be managed in a variety of different ways including less procreation and that future technological advances that might help effectively manage a crowded planet.
On the morality issues of SENS, Dr. de Grey also remained firm in his thinking. He answered that those in developing nations would unlikely be affected by more Westerners living long lives, and that God would offer the option of an extended lifetime if he could.
Dr. de Grey argues that SENS will rejuvenate people from the inside and out, so that they will look younger than they actually are. The battery of treatments that de Grey envisions includes an enzyme therapy and somatic gene therapy, which changes the coding of a person’s DNA so that certain genes are not passed on to the next generation. Some believe that somatic gene therapy could entirely wipe out cancer.
He believes that SENS is in the near future, but because a majority of the therapies won’t be available for twenty-five to fifty years, it may not be soon enough for some people.
Some of the ideas that Dr. de Grey and the H+ interviewer mention for tacking on years of life expectancy are strange. For example, Dr. de Grey mentions long-term caloric restrictions as one possible way to extend a person’s lifetime because it has worked with other animals in experiments.