> Why aren't these rich people throwing money at SENS research?
Because at this moment science is very far from solving human aging problem, and significant investments wouldn't likely help much.
Because at this moment science is very far from solving human aging problem, and significant investments wouldn't likely help much.
One might question, for example, the overall value of medical enhancements which lead to gerontocracy, and the subsequent economic and political disadvantage to the generation that comes along afterwards, a problem that the developed world is beginning to experience.
You've been dying since the moment you were born. I was once a child. That child is nowhere in the world. He is dead. In his place is a young man. Some day, very soon, that young man will no longer exist and in his place someone else will live.
Death and rebirth are constant processes. You cannot live without changing. And what is death but change? Three weeks ago I was a man who was ignorant of opengl. That man is now dead forever. In his place, reborn, is a man who has a passing knowledge of it.
The event we normally call death is simply a dramatic version of what occurs every day, every possible moment.
Duality is one of the triumphs of western thought. It has allowed us to escape superstition and is the basis of science and engineering. It keeps the bridges from falling down, but it is not a perfect description of reality and it falls apart if expected to be.
What I'm saying is that so far as it is meaningful to specify things* are "you" and parts of "you", these things do not end or disappear with real, physical, heart-stopping, rotting in ground death. The things which are lost with physical death are in constant flux, so they are constantly being lost anyway.
* No need for a soul or some sort of material ectoplasm. You are in constant subtle contact with everything.
Actually, no. When the Great Flux fluxes and the flux that is you goes away, it is not exactly the same thing as when the flux that is you fluxes and the flux that is some property of you goes away. Let's not interpret Taoism as yet another rationalization of death.
A lot of very intelligent people think otherwise. Do you have a good justification for such a position?
But "significant investments wouldn't likely help much"? I rather think they would, actually. There is a lot of research to be done, a lot we need to know. This is going to take significant investment; it is hard to think of any comparable research project that hasn't.
This guy, Felix Dennis, is over 60 now. He's worth somewhere north of half a billion. What else does he plan to use the money for? He even says, and I quote:
"Could you turn the clock back for me by forty years, I would willingly swap you every penny and every possession I own in return. And I would have the better of the bargain, too!"
If he believes that, then why not at least throw the dice on aging research? Just 20% of his (largely unnecessary) loot would have an unimaginable effect on the project. Especially if he could shame other rich old coots to match him. And who knows, they might find something quickly enough to give him his extra life. As opposed to doing nothing, that is, and all those zeroes in his bank balance being transferred directly to Her Majesty's Finest the moment he predictably keels over. Why not try and throw a spanner in the works? Mix things up a bit? See what the judicious application of Amount of Funds A to Promising Line of Enquiry B can come up with?
Maybe I lack the perspective of being a grizzly rich old goat but geeze, with their own lives on the table you'd think they would find more productive uses of their money than paintings and bonds. Where altruism fails, naked self-interest should start kicking in. Why isn't it?
If your net worth ran into the hundreds of millions and you'd expressed the heartfelt desire to live longer, as Mr. Felix has, then upon noticing you hadn't taken any action in furtherance of that desire I'd suggest your investment in life extension research, too. But it's just a suggestion, of course.
That said, sometimes compulsion is reasonable. I would not argue with tax money going towards SENS research. A better use than guns and foreign bases, certainly.
Spending tons of money guarantees only one thing -- spending money.
If there were promising results in anti-aging research -- savvy investors would be heavily investing into that field. But they don't, because savvy investors understand that it's not practical at this point, even considering HUGE demand for anti-aging technology.