Live Forever or Die Trying

Book excerpt: Initially, I had intended to write this book in the summer of 2006. At that time, my involvement in the Life Extension Movement was growing, my enthusiasm was palpable; trusted friends and colleagues urged me to undertake the project, noting that it would give momentum to a nascent movement that was a mere blip on the political radar screen and bring needed attention to an issue that many thought might never be discussed seriously in a society that considers death an unpleasant but inevitable reality. Even though I agreed with this analysis, I managed to avoid any serious attempt to start a far-reaching debate on the political, social, and economic consequences of radically extending one’s life into the future. After all, I thought, the technology in this field is still at a nascent stage, antiaging research receives few government grants, controversy abounds in the scientific community as to the mere possibility of indefinite life extension; most elected officials are clueless about it and even a majority of the President’s Council on Bioethics is hostile to the idea. But that being said, I never was one to back down from a good fight. I had read much of the scientific work undertaken by a multitude of scientists determined to understand how and why human beings slowly age, and how we can reverse our demise and extend our lives indefinitely. I disagreed with the naysayers who pompously declare that prolonging life will ruin the environment, cause overpopulation, promote wars over scarce resources, as well as those narrow-minded, quasi—pundits who embraced a number of bogus charges and half-truths intended to impede further research into the causes of the terminal disease of aging. I had more than enough evidence to confront the critics, but for some unknown reason, I lost the internal primal spark necessary to fight back. I thought, should I enter a battle that few know about and even fewer care? Instead of hearing a clarion call to act, I became mired in skepticism, doubt and a growing resignation toward terminal apathy. ...