Aubrey profiled in Open Democracy

Open Democracy has published a long and positive piece on anti-aging researcher and IEET fellow Aubrey de Grey. Paul Miller is an associate and James Wilsdon is head of science and innovation at the think-tank Demos. They are the editors of Better humans: the politics of human enhancement and life extension, a new collection of essays published by Demos, in association with the Wellcome Trust, on 8 February 2006.

“The man who wants to live forever” Paul Miller & James Wilsdon, Open Democracy, Feb 2, 2006

Aubrey de Grey believes that a 60-year-old alive today may become the first 1,000-year-old human. And he is serious. Paul Miller & James Wilsdon profile a scorned but calmly defiant pioneer of the science of biogerontology….

de Grey is convinced that politicians and policy-makers should think about life extension now rather than later. “Most policymakers get interested in therapies when they’re at the human trial stage. That’s wrong. They need to think about these things when we’re at the mice stage, if not before. Life extension could go from zero to infinity faster than the web. It will have a massive impact on the way that people live and plan their lives. Just think about how tricky it’s going to be to retain people in vital but risky jobs – like the fire service or the army. Everybody’s going to be doing their best to live long enough to live forever.”

Link to article