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Tom Ough tells us about the Big Things that may end humanity - and what we can do and in some cases have done to prevent these. Did you know that if all the risks, the one that is most likely to end you is aging? What are we doing to stop aging? Tom is a journalist and writer who is currently Senior Editor at UnHerd, a London‑based online magazine of culture and opinion. After several years working at The Telegraph, he moved into research on global catastrophic risks and wrote a nonfiction book titled The Anti‑Catastrophe League about individuals and efforts to prevent humanity’s extinction, and he also co‑hosts the Anglofuturism podcast. -- IN THIS EPISODE WE LEARN -- Why aging itself can be understood as a catastrophic risk, and what it would mean to treat it with the same seriousness as other existential threats. What it would actually take to detect, deflect, or survive an asteroid impact. Why space expansion and Mars are a part of long-term civilizational resilience. Why some catastrophic risks may be overestimated, and how to think more clearly about climate change relative to other existential threats. What we know about super-volcanoes, why they’re rare but devastating, and why preparedness matters despite uncertainty. How nuclear war remains a central catastrophic risk, and why deterrence, miscalculation, and escalation still deserve serious attention. How to think about AI risk, what distinguishes it from past technological threats, and why uncertainty makes governance difficult. What p(doom) means, why people disagree so strongly about it, and how probabilities shape policy and public discourse. Who typically gravitates toward anti-catastrophe thinking, and what motivates people to focus on low-probability, high-impact risks. What Anglo-futurism is. 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today we’re diving into one of the strangest and most ambitious ideas in longevity: using crypto trading to fund real-time lifespan experiments. Benji Leibowitz, founder of pump.science, joins us to explain how decentralized science works, why tokens can finance studies in worms, flies and mice, and what happens when a single post on X suddenly turns Metformin into a viral experiment. That intervention, by the way, is being spearheaded by LEVITY friend Linus Petersson, founder of the Swedish Longevity Cluster, who also joins the discussion. In this episode we announce our new collaboration with pump.science. For now, that means they’ll contribute written content to the LEVITY newsletter - and later we may explore a dedicated Youtube format together. More info here: https://reachlevity.com/p/desci-is-exploding-we-re-partnering-with-pump-science-to-help-you-follow-it And check out pump.science's first post here: https://reachlevity.com/p/the-most-radical-idea-in-longevity-right-now Key highlights in this episode: – How pump.science turns attention and trading volume into funding for worm, fly, and mouse experiments. – Why decentralized science emerged, and what problems in traditional science it tries to fix. – What tokens, smart contracts, and DAOs actually mean in practice. – Why Solana, not Ethereum, underpins the system. – How real-time experimental data (like fly racing) could change how we evaluate longevity interventions. ----- 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. CHAPTERS 00:00 Intro – How crypto could fund longevity & Pump Science × LEVITY 05:14 DeSci 101 – fixing broken incentives in science 07:00 Benji’s origin story: lucid dreams, superheroes & cancer genomics 08:45 Discovering crypto & using incentives to fix healthcare 15:52 What’s broken in science funding – and why DeSci might help 30:20 Is crypto just belief? Money, gold and “Ponzi scheme” fears 37:44 Linus Petersson joins + crypto glossary (tokens, smart contracts, NFTs) 59:18 Vitalik’s retweet, 40× price spike & $14k for Linus’s experiments 1:10:24: How to “play”: exchange accounts, Phantom wallet & buying a token 1:17:50: Why does the website look like a retro video game forum? 1:20:53 Network state for not dying – community, human trials & products 1:27:45 Why scientists are skeptical & how to recruit labs and students 1:32:15 Kings of the pill & the coming longevity leaderboard 1:39:59 Skepticism vs optimism, call to action & book recommendations 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Valuable time is being lost because there is not enough funding for science with real life-extending potential. No major political party is promising to address aging, even though aging harms and kills more people than anything else. Most people—and most leaders—still do not understand that aging is both a problem and something that can be solved through science. We need a political movement that demands action and insists that something be done to save our lives. And this is where this episode's guest comes in. Felix Werth is the founder and chairman of the German Party for Rejuvenation Research — a political movement dedicated to accelerating scientific progress in regenerative medicine and longevity. Originally trained in biochemistry, Werth founded the party in 2015 (then called the Party for Health Research) to push for greater public investment in research aimed at combating aging-related diseases. Through his activism, Werth has helped bring the topic of longevity and healthy life extension into the political conversation in Germany and across Europe. In this episode you'll learn more about: The longevity scene in GermanyHow to start a longevity partyHow to get the message outA dating site for the longevity communityUsing AI to solve within SENS CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction 01:08 Berlin and the global longevity community 05:20 Who is Felix werth and why did he start the longevity party? 15:00 How he started the party 21:49 The public's reaction 27:16 Why change the message from health to longevity? 32:50 Message strategy: posters and videos 34:34 Funding issues 39:20 Campaign video 41:50 Dating site for longevity people 44:45 Does Felix recommend forming a political party? 54:20 What is the optimal outcome for the party? 59:00 Is there any support for longevity among the German elite and government? 01:04:20 Using AI to solve aging within the SENS approach 01:10:16 Winning aging hacking contest with the West-Coast Vectors 01:16:00 Using de-sci for funding, Pump-Science 01:23:00 How do you keep in shape? 01:24:29 Do you do any extreme risk-avoidance? 01:25:22 Three good books 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sara Hägg, PhD is an associate professor at Karolinska Institutet, where she leads the Molecular Epidemiology of Aging Group. Her work focuses on human biomarkers of aging - especially biological age “clocks” built from epigenetic, proteomic, and metabolomic data - and on turning Nordic registry resources into clinically useful aging measures. In this episode: * What biological/epigenetic age clocks actually measure (and what they don’t) * Accuracy, error bars, and why clocks aren’t clinic-ready yet * Epigenetic vs. proteomic vs. metabolomic clocks - strengths and trade-offs * Organ-specific clocks (liver, ovary, kidney) and what they reveal * Why uncertainty spikes at life transitions; menopause as a natural “stress test” * PC (principal-component) clocks and noise reduction * Nordic registry & Swedish Twin Registry advantages; UK Biobank use * Direct-to-consumer tests: interpreting results and common pitfalls * AI’s role in building/validating clocks and handling uncertainty * What would move the field fastest (data, standards, trials) and where Sweden stands Show notes for this episode will be available after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction 03:27 Why Sweden lags behind in longevity science 08:04 Nordic registry & Swedish twin registry advantages; UK Biobank use 10:05 What is biological age? 16:33 The rise of epigenetic clocks 24:22 The importance of aging clocks 32:04 Beyond methylation: proteomic and metabolomic clocks 35:12 Organ clocks 39:37 Do aging clocks generalize? 54:37 The cost of aging clocks 01:03:18 Uncertainty and AI 01:17:10 Solving aging - where do we stand? 01:28:10 Book recommendations 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We are always excited about the next technological solution. But what if it does not come? Or what if it comes only for the few, or with terrible side-effects? And while we are waiting for the easy tech fix, are we neglecting what we can do now to better our lives? Many of our previous guests have been excited about the prospect of radically extending our lives, and some have been optimistic about the prospect of achieving this in our life time, perhaps even within a few decades. We are Levity, the real longevity podcast after all. Todays guest thinks that we should be less excited about radical longevity, and radical enhancements in general. And he does not think radical life extension is on the horizon. Nicholas Agar is a New Zealand philosopher specializing in ethics. He holds a BA from the University of Auckland, an MA from Victoria University of Wellington, and a PhD from the Australian National University. As of 2022, he is a Professor of Ethics at the University of Waikato. He is a prolific writer and the author of How to think about Progress, and Truly Human Progress, to mention two recent books. CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction 03:38 The hype and the reality 06:02 Too much enthusiasm for radical life extension -- or too little? 17:15 Distribution worries -- more life only for the rich? 23:06 Pessimism about distribution and feasability 29:00 Structural reasons for bad science and big promises 33:30 Is it wise to spend money on radical life extension? 37:13 Should we die if we have had good life? 48:48 Deat as tool for solving housing crisis 58:27 Liberal eugenics 01:06:45 How to attract funding -- hype + conservative grant proposals 01:09:40 What is enhancement? 01:25:30 A mechanical Roger Federer with robot arms 01:38:12 Is it bad to cease to exist? 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

One idea I’ve had lately is to put together a list of people to trust in geroscience and the longevity field more broadly. (And I might do it - keep an eye on reachlevity.com - and subscribe while you’re at it!) Matt Kaeberlein would not only make that list - he’d likely be right at the top. He’s rigorous, precise in his wording, and always puts integrity ahead of hype. But, and this is important, I wouldn’t characterize him as a skeptic. He’s a realist who insists on evidence, yet at the same time he’s visionary and deeply optimistic about what aging science can deliver. Matt is probably best known for his pioneering work on rapamycin and for co-founding the Dog Aging Project. In this episode, though, we also talk about Optispan - his proactive healthcare company - and Ora Biomedical, where the WormBot platform is screening thousands of interventions for effects on lifespan. We get into therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE), how artificial intelligence might accelerate discovery, and even his favorite science fiction books. And true to form, Matt doesn’t hold back. He calls out irresponsible use of biological age tests - going so far as to label it “medical malpractice” - and criticizes hype-driven actors, sloppy science communication, and the inertia of institutions like the NIH. At the same time, he shows how rigorous, honest work could move the entire field forward. ----- 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com ----- CHAPTERS 00:00 Teaser 01:38 Introduction to Dr. Matt Kaeberlein 11:50 mTOR and rapamycin 21:37 The Dog Aging Project 51:08 Personal experiences with rapamycin 01:05:33 The inertia of the NIH 01:08:54 The right to try law and access to experimental therapies 01:13:21 Ora Biomedical and The WormBot Platform 01:21:41 The role of AI in longevity research 01:28:29 Optispan: A new approach to proactive healthcare 01:33:56 Biological age tests 01:39:39 Therapeutic plasma exchange: A personal experience 01:46:39 Book recommendations 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When you give a child a pet, you also expose them to death—since most pets pass away long before their owners. But what if we could cryopreserve Buddy or Tiger, and bring them back from suspended animation once we have a cure for what ended their lives? Kai Micah Mills is a pioneering figure in radical life extension and biostasis. As the founder of Cryopets, he is leading efforts to make cryopreservation accessible for pets, with aspirations to extend these technologies to humans. He left high school early to pursue entrepreneurship, becoming a tech entrepreneur in his teens. A Thiel Fellow and co-founder of CryoDAO and HydraDAO, Kai is deeply involved in decentralized science initiatives aimed at advancing longevity research. 00:00 Introduction 04:44 Timeship in Texas 05:36 Vitalism 11:54 Bryan Johnson, Mormonism and Vitalism 18:25 Dropping out of highschool to play video games 24:25 Becoming a Thiel Fellow 40:37 Why Cryonics? 49:53 We want Immortality 53:19 Cosmism 01:01:36 AI 01:05:47 Building Cryopets 01:27:42 Cryonics science 01:37:24 Cryo rat 01:46:01 CryoDAO HydraDAO and replacement 01:59:30 Talent shortage in cryogenics 02:05:08 Book recommendations 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As you may have heard, AI-designed medicines have crossed a historic line. In this episode, Alex Zhavoronkov - CEO of Insilico Medicine and founder of ARDD walks us through how Insilico’s rentosertib became the first AI-generated small molecule with peer-reviewed clinical efficacy, while arguing against AI hype and reminding us that biology still moves at “the speed of traffic.” That duality runs through the whole conversation. On one side: a pragmatic operator obsessed with credible science, biomarkers, and clinical benchmarks; on the other: an AI visionary investing in cryonics, sketching “pharmaceutical superintelligence,” and thinking in decades, not quarters. We start in Basel, home to Roche and Novartis, where ARDD was born, then trace how the conference morphed into a ”high-signal filter for longevity” - packed with startups (who also fund it), hard data, and mainstream pharma. Alex looks back at his 2014 Nvidia talk (”Can Nvidia solve aging?”) and explains why Insilico trains its AI to learn age first - so it actually grasps biology. Years of problem-solving with pharma turned into their Pharma.AI toolkit (Biology42, Chemistry42, Medicine42, Science42). Insilico now runs 40+ programs and in an early Phase 2 study for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), their drug rentosertib showed a dose-dependent boost in lung capacity. Compared with the old path - often $150–200M and ~5 years just to pick a lead molecule - Insilico says it can often reach that point for under $3M or even less. Still, Alex is cautious: no matter how smart the AI gets, real-world testing and regulation won’t speed up overnight. Also in this episode: What made Alex cry. Why he wouldn’t give his own drug to patients - yet. How a mirror on a conference poster led to a proposal. How ARDD became the “WEF of longevity”. Why internal “kill teams” try to stop their own drug candidates. Why labeling aging a disease helps - but won’t shortcut approvals. Why he writes to “feed AI”. How Nvidia threads through the story - from free GPUs to Jensen’s video. 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. CHAPTERS 00:00 – Teaser 03:08 – Introduction to Alex Zhavoronkov 06:11 – Alex talks ARDD 15:15 – Big-pharma starting to embrace ARDD 17:31 – The proposal story 24:52 – Why Alex decided to fight aging 27:44 – Neuralink, humanoids and the brain-aging bottleneck 30:52 – Keeping ARDD pharma-credible 32:02 – The path to Insilico 48:03 – The Zhavoronkov crystal ball 57:29 – The Insilico platform 1:07:16 – The rentosertib story 1:16:42 – What made Alex cry 1:17:44 – Aging-as-disease: rhetoric vs. regulation (GLP-1 analogy) 1:26:53 – Culture check: Middle East momentum, China’s stance 1:34:28 – Costs & timelines: what AI compresses - and what it can’t 1:41:30 – Insilico’s fully automated lab 1:47:21 – “I respect Demis, but…” 1:51:10 – Why even superintelligence won’t skip clinical validation 1:52:15 – Cryonics as plan B: organ preservation, TimeShift, use-cases 2:00:56 – Writing Forever AI & the roadmap to “pharma superintelligence” 2:06:42 – Book recommendations 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Anyone who is interesed in emerging science and futurism will come across the name Natasha Vita-More; a suggestive name for a charismatic and important philosopher and artist envisioning human possibilities. She wrote the Transhuman Manifesto in 1983. But did you know that she has also made a scientific discovery with big implications for cryopreservation? Natasha Vita-More is a trailblazing futurist, acclaimed author, and pioneering designer whose work stands at the thrilling intersection of science, technology, and art. Renowned for her visionary contributions to transhumanism and human enhancement, she has spent decades exploring how we can transcend biological limitations and reimagine what it means to be human. From her iconic “Primo Posthuman” prototype to her influential writings on life extension and ethical AI, Vita-More has inspired global audiences to think boldly about the future. 🔍 In this conversation ✅ Experiment show that memory can survive cryopreservation ✅ The origin of transhumanism ✅ What is stoic extropianism? ✅ Pragmatic optimism and the concept of progress ✅ How to feel and look great past 70 ✅ AI and the way to superlongevity ✅ The bottlenecks for nanotechnology as a tool for health and longevity ✅ Books that we need to read CHAPTERS 00.00 Introduction 04:27 Scottsdale Arizona 05:21 Making a scientific discovery: memory survives cryonics 16:13 The making of Natasha Vita-More 33:00 Humanity+ and its critics 41:04 Writing the Transhumanist Manifesto & origin of futurist movements 50:58 Transhumanism today 57:13 The soul of transhumanism - troubles with the concept of progressive 01:04:05 Stoicism and extropy 01:06:12 Knowing what you can change 01:17:04 Solving aging with AI? 01:24:29 Pragmatic optimism 01:27:38 Hope and science 01:34:50 Staying healthy and alive 01:45:15 Bottlenecks for nanotechnology 01:50:50 3 books we have to read 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Even though it’s undeniably...aesthetic-challenged, the naked mole-rat is the envy of the longevity world. Its risk of death barely changes with time; it shrugs off cancer, stays fertile for decades and seems to skip every hallmark of aging that hobbles the rest of us. But why? What evolutionary forces gave a mouse-sized, subterranean rodent near-immunity to aging - and what can its biology teach us about extending healthy human life? Comparative biologist Prof. Rochelle Buffenstein (University of Illinois Chicago) - who has maintained the world’s largest captive colonies and authored 200+ papers - joins LEVITY to dissect the evidence. In this episode ✅ Rochelle’s journey: from Zimbabwe farm kid to the pre-eminent naked mole-rat researcher. ✅ Eusocial society: queens, worker castes and lethal succession battles. ✅ No Gompertz slope: hard numbers that show mortality risk stays essentially flat for 40 years. ✅ Cancer resistance → high-molecular-weight hyaluronan, unusual immune cell profiles. ✅ Telomere maintenance and DNA-methylation reversal. ✅ Proteostasis on easy-mode: slow translation, durable proteins, super-charged autophagy. ✅ What actually kills a mole-rat? ✅ Translational angles: small-molecule screens, CRISPR edits, and why funding is still an uphill battle. ✅ Other long-lived species worth studying - and how young scientists can break into comparative gerontology. 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. 00:00 Teaser 02:37 Meet Prof. Rochelle Buffenstein 07:04 Naked mole-rats crash course 10:23 Eusocial life: Queens, workers, death matches 11:46 Extreme underground lifestyle (Low O₂, High CO₂) 18:12 Problems with inbreeding? 26:07 Don’t call them cold-blooded! 29:15 Keeping the world’s largest colony of naked mole-rats 31:45 Eating naked mole-rats 36:01 Lifespan of the naked mole-rat 38:20 Two remarkable papers 50:53 How long can they live? 52:45 Resistance to cancer 57:03 The Hallmarks of aging are no match for this rodent 59:48 Surprising immune defense 01:04:18 What’s the evolutionary rationale? 01:10:08 Translating the research 01:18:51 Other longevity champions 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

🎁 Our giveaway is live! 10 winners will receive FMD kits from Prolon. It’s free to enter – just follow the link below 👇 https://gleam.io/NaVa0/prolon-fasting-mimicking-diet-giveaway 🔬 Can food rejuvenate you from within? In this special episode of LEVITY, Peter talks with Andrea Ghirardi, CEO of L-Nutra Europe — the company behind Prolon, the fasting-mimicking diet (FMD) developed from Dr. Valter Longo’s research. 🧠 We cover: – How Prolon mimics fasting without starvation. – Real-world results: 2.5 years bio-age reversal. – Why FMD may beat GLP-1 drugs for long-term health. – What’s inside the new NextGen kit. – Prolon’s potential as a medical treatment. 📘 Dive deeper with our companion article: https://reachlevity.com/p/the-fasting-mimicking-diet-explained-5ce17b65d00c14c1 💌 Our newsletter: Weekly biotech + aging breakthroughs: https://reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Note: Nothing in this post or episode is medical advice. We're not doctors. Before trying this, you should consult your physician. Prolon is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any diseases. CHAPTERS 00:00 Teaser 00:41 A message from Peter 02:35 Introduction to L-Nutra and Andrea Ghirardi, CEO 05:02 What is the fasting-mimicking diet? 07:23 The clinically validated formulation 08:32 The formation of L-Nutra 13:22 How does FMD compare to other fasting methods? 18:07 Are weight-loss drugs a tough competitor to Prolon? 20:05 What's inside the 5-day Prolon kit? 22:54 The next-gen formula 25:41 Peter's and Andrea's experience of trying the FMD 28:23 FMD studies 35:15 The future of FMD and L-Nutra 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When is someone really dead? What does it mean to survive? Is mind-uploading really a possible future way of surviving? These are some of the questions we are discussing with Dr Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston. Dr Ariel Zeleznikow‑Johnston is a neuroscientist and Research Fellow at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, whose work delves into the neural basis of consciousness - from understanding how genetics and environment shape cognition to exploring the subtle qualities of perceptual experience such as color qualia. A 2019 PhD graduate from The University of Melbourne, he has published extensively on how cognitive function changes across the lifespan. He is the author of The Future Loves You: How and Why We Should Abolish Death, which advocates for brain preservation technology as a means to suspend death and revive individuals in the future. Check out Peter's review of the book here: https://reachlevity.com/p/a-clear-case-for-cryonics-a-review-of-the-future-loves-you His multidisciplinary approach combines rigorous neuroscience with philosophy and ethics, positioning him at the forefront of contemporary debates about identity, mortality, and the future of human life. 🔍 In this conversation: ✅ When do we consider someone to be dead? ✅ What is vitrifixation? ✅ Cryonics. ✅ Palliative philosophy. ✅ Personal identity and the connectome. ✅ Are neurons the same over time? ✅ Teleportation as a test of the information view of personhood. ✅ How do we make the future love us? ✅ Survival and medical priorities. 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership 🚀 Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com 🚀 LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. CHAPTER 00:00 Intro 03:45 Jonathan is 190-years-old 07:00 Learned helplessness 10:00 Incoherent medical strategies 11:30 Aging is unhealthy 14:22 Palliative philosophy 20:44 The book in brief - how to cheat death 23:30 Different ways of biostasis - vitrifixation 35:01 Digital snap-shot emulation of our essense 37:59 What is a person? Connectome preservation 43:30 Do neurons stay the same over a life? 47:00 Is mind-uploading preserving personal identity? 01:03:52 We are not our brain - is the connectome model a dualist view? 01:07:50 Teleportation and survival I 01:14:19 Duplicate myself to increase utility 01:15:31 Teleportation and survival II 01:24:30 "Dead people" may not be dead 01:33:30 Saving lives by biostasis brainpreservation 01:36:04 Priority of medicine 01:38:05 Saving everyone that can be saved 01:40:07 Justice and survival - an unusual angle 01:43:36 What kind of world will we wake up to? 01:44:48 How to make the future love us 01:44:59 What are the odds of today's cryonics working? 01:49:10 What year is resurrection? 01:56:33 Ariel's book recommendations 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Just about the hottest thing in longevity science right now is partial reprogramming - using Yamanaka factors to rewind the biological clock in our cells. Billion-dollar giants like Altos, Retro and New Limit are betting on it. But in this episode a far smaller player, Shift Bioscience, argues that the field may be looking in the wrong place. CEO Daniel Ives explains how his team used AI-powered virtual cells to uncover a single gene that seems to match OSK-level rejuvenation without the tumor risk that haunts classical reprogramming - and why their just-released data could change the game for aging research. 🔍 In this conversation ✅ Daniel’s journey from mitochondrial PhD work to founding Shift Bioscience. ✅ Why Yamanaka-factor–based partial reprogramming excites the field and why it’s inherently risky. ✅ Epigenetic clocks 101 — Horvath, single-cell versions, and what they really measure. ✅ Building AI “virtual cells” (transformers / GNNs) to run millions of in-silico experiments. ✅ Discovery of new rejuvenation factor sets - including SB000, a lone gene that rejuvenates without inducing pluripotency. ✅ Early wet-lab validation across fibroblasts & keratinocytes; next-step mouse studies already under way. ✅ How inhibition targets (not just over-expression) could slash timelines from 15 years to ~5 years. ✅ Mapping a “risk landscape” of age-linked diseases and why fibrosis may be the fastest clinical entry point. ✅ Funding Shift: from personal redundancy money to a $16 M seed and the next raise. ✅ Timelines, escape-velocity hopes, and where cryonics still fits. ✅ What Daniel would ask Jeff Bezos, and why the pharma ecosystem needs to “plug in” now. 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership 🚀 Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com 🚀 LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction to Daniel Ives 05:34 The Evolution of Shift's Focus 13:25 Understanding Aging Clocks 19:28 Commercial Clocks is ”Mostly Entertainment” 21:03 A Pivotal Meeting with Steve Horvath 24:35 A Brief Crash Course in Yamanaka Factors 28:16 Finding Something Better Than Yamanaka Factors 33:20 The Origin Story For This Approach 36:50 What Does Shift’s New Results Show? 37:33 Defining the Virtual Cell in This Context 44:22 The Gene is Called SB000 46:45 “This Could be Hugely Important” 01:01:44 Speeding up Drug Development with AI 01:11:12 What do Investors Say? 01:17:15 What Daniel Hope Will Happen Next 01:19:34 What Would Daniel Ask of Jeff Bezos? 01:27:00 Why is the company called Shift? 01:32:55 The Pride Day for Closeted Aging Biologists 01:42:28 How Should We Think About Cryonics? 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We think that death is bad, but why exactly is it bad? We cannot suffer when we do not exist, so why would it be bad? In this episode we have a long, deep conversation with Professor Travis Timmerman, whose philosophical work delves deeply into the nature and ethics of death. An Associate Professor at Seton Hall University, Professor Timmerman has become a prominent voice in contemporary discussions about whether death is bad for us, how we should understand the harm of dying, and what moral obligations we might have surrounding death and dying. His work engages both timeless questions and urgent contemporary debates—offering fresh insight into topics like the timing of death’s harms, the ethics of procreation, and our attitudes toward mortality. What you'll learn in this episode: ✅ Why death is bad ✅ How it can bad to not have been born earlier ✅ What the ancient Mirror Argument gets wrong ✅ How it can be bad for a 95-year-old to die ✅ Whether we should wait to have children ✅ How an analytical philosopher thinks about death 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership 🚀 Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com --CHAPTERS-- 00:00 introduction 00:50 Why is death bad? The Deprivation account 15:30 Lucretius 18:10 A reason to live is a reason to see death as bad 20:20 James Stacey Taylor vs Travis Timmerman 26:20 Deprivation account and mercy killing 29:20 Counter intuitive implications of the Deprivation Account - overdetermination of death 37:20 What would have happened if I had not died? Possible worlds and the badness of death 40:40 The badness of a 95-year-old to die 47:00 Thomas Nagel - death and normalcy 51:49 Reasons and the good and the bad 53:40 The Timmerman style of analytic philosophy 01:00:49 Philosophers and prolongevity in history 01:08:28 Philosophy as therapy 01:09:40 Time and intrinsic good - what matters most? 01:14:36 Is health overrated? 01:16:27 The eternal philosophical dialogue 01:17:56 If longevity were impossible, how would that change philosophy of death? 01:21:35 The Mirror Argument 01:26:55 Could I have been born earlier? 01:39:22 When should we have children? 01:42:47 Better never to have been? 01:48:09 A world without consciousness 01:52:27 Can we wish for the impossible? 02:02:07 Meta-philosophy and ironing out the wrinkles of the Deprivation account 02:03:00 What Travis is working on 02:08:02 What what we should read 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There were two reasons why Dr. Valter Longo was featured so prominently in my longevity book Evigt Ung (2022). First, if you had to name a single scientific thread running through the history of longevity research, calorie restriction is hard to beat. And few have done more to modernize and translate that insight into real-world practice than Longo. Second, I hold Valter Longo in the highest regard. I've tried his Fasting-Mimicking Diet (FMD), I’ve followed his work on The Longevity Diet, and I find his scientific contributions both rigorous and unusually translational. He doesn’t just publish papers - he builds systems, tests interventions in clinical trials, and tries to implement science into healthcare. In this conversation, we cover the science, history, and application of fasting, nutrition, and longevity - including new work on cancer, metabolism, and organ regeneration. We also discuss the philosophical and political obstacles that stand in the way of real change. What you'll learn in this episode: ✅ The story of Longo’s early music career - and why he left it to study aging. ✅ How calorie restriction shaped modern longevity science. ✅ Why Biosphere 2 and Roy Walford's work was both inspiring and cautionary. ✅ The origins and mechanisms of the Fasting-Mimicking Diet. ✅ What Longo learned about autophagy, stem cells, and organ regeneration. ✅ Why protein intake before and after age 65 should be treated differently. ✅ What the media and doctors get wrong about obesity, food, and metabolism. ✅ The dangers of high-protein and ketogenic diets. ✅ Why Longo is deeply skeptical of TRT, growth hormone, and biohacking shortcuts. ✅ How fasting can enhance cancer treatment - and why Longo wrote his new book Fasting Cancer. ✅ Why we need a new kind of “digital school” for lifestyle medicine. 🚀 Special offer for our LEVITY audience: Join Vitalism today and receive a 30% discount on your membership using the code LEVITY at checkout. https://www.vitalism.io/membership 🚀 Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com --CHAPTERS-- 00:00 Introduction to Dr. Valter Longo 02:44 From Music to Aging Biology 06:40 The Supposed Longevity Zones of Italy 09:04 Personal Experiences Shaping Research 12:04 The Path to Aging Biology 13:15 Calorie Restriction and Roy Walford 26:25 Transitioning to Fasting Mimicking Diet Research 34:56 The Eureka Moment 39:51 The Rationale For the 5-Day FMD 52:54 The Un-conspired Conspiracy 01:01:18 Conflicts of Interest 01:04:52 Protein Intake: Balancing Muscle Health and Longevity 01:14:30 Autophagy: The Body's Self-Repair Mechanism 01:21:12 The Power of Genetic Variants in Longevity 01:27:18 The Debate on Growth Hormone and Aging 01:36:18 Insights from Laron Syndrome and Longevity 01:40:10 Fasting Mimicking Diet: A Path to Health 01:46:06 Valter's New Book, Fasting Cancer 🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode) 📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/ 📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524 ----- Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.