Aubrey de Grey has a new book out about how to "engineer" human
immortality. The man, who is apparently a likeable fellow, is as
controversial as his proposals, and I think an excellent example
of how to promote an idea to media honchos eager to fill up space
and time with nutrient-free sawdust to be surrounded by
advertising bread.
Here are some facts about Aubrey de Grey, who is 44 years old:
His full name is Aubrey David Nicholas Jasper de Grey, which he
likes to either use in its full version or likes to write as
Aubrey D.N.J. de Grey. I frankly don't understand it. I have a
middle name that I threw out a long time ago (with its middle
initial) because who needs the excess baggage? But certainly he's
entitled to use whatever name he likes to identify himself, five
names or fifteen names.
He has a beard almost down to his belt, a full russet bushy beard
hanging from a thin face. He's a thin man, six feet tall and 147
pounds. It's not a crime to have a beard, but I admit I have no
understanding of the point of it, since a beard that long gets in
the way of nearly every move you make. The beard, however, does
give de Grey the look of a prophet.
De Grey has a B.A. in computer science from Cambridge University.
He has a Ph.D., but it's a degree peculiar to Cambridge, which
has a rule that if you're a graduate of that university, you can
offer a book you've published as a doctoral dissertation, and if
you successfully defend the book as a scholarly contribution they
will award you a Ph.D. without your attending any classes or
passing any qualifying examinations in anything at all. De Grey
offered a controversial book in theoretical cell biology (about
mitochondria), a book he published in 1999, and he received his
Ph.D. from Cambridge in 2000. Given that most graduate students
in science spend four, five, or six years of sweat, toil,
aggravation, and general misery in a stinking bench laboratory or
coughing up chalk at theoretical blackboards to get a Ph.D., de
Grey's feat at Cambridge is an item. I don't know anyone else in
modern science who has accomplished this feat at a major
university. If you know of anyone, please let me know.
But de Grey doesn't call himself a scientist, he calls himself an
engineer. He says the fact that he's not a scientist means he can
think differently than scientists and see scientific problems
from an engineering perspective.
If you want to see de Grey in action, there exists an interesting
video of him presenting his ideas to an audience. There's nothing
dull about it: he's a showman, an enthusiast in the way he
presents himself.
Like many media-savvy people these days, de Grey has an acronym
to label his ideas: SENS.
SENS stands for "Strategies for Engineering Negligible
Senescence." The essentials are that he proposes 7 types of aging
damage and he says we need to approach each as an engineering
problem, solve each problem and endless life will result:
1. Prevent cancer-causing nuclear mutations and epimutations.
2. Prevent mitochondrial mutations.
3. Get rid of intracellular junk.
4. Get rid of extracellular junk.
5. Stop cell loss.
6. Stop cell senescence.
7. Remove extracellular protein crosslinks that damage function.
All of these are individual objectives that have been familiar to
cell and molecular biologists for many decades. What de Grey has
done is put them all together and give them a label: SENS.
Thus is created a media phenomenon called "Engineered Negligible
Senescence".
De Grey has also apparently accumulated enough money to offer
what he calls the "Methuselah Mouse Prize" -- more than $3
million to any researchers who extend the lifespan of mice to
unprecedented lengths.
Gold always works, doesn't it?
Unhappily, most biologists, and especially most biologists who do
research on the aging of cells and tissues, are firm in saying
we're so far away from any of de Grey's objectives that it's all
wishful thinking that confuses the public about aging and
longevity. No one has yet collected the prize.
Meanwhile, I'm intrigued by de Grey's idea of how to do science -
-- his idea of arranging a "strategic" list and labeling it with
an acronym. So here I offer my own to advance the science of
cosmology:
I call mine SIST: Strategies for Intergalactic Space Travel.
If we complete the engineering of my strategies, we will have
what we need to roam the Cosmos. The strategies are as follows:
1. Achieve Complete Human Suspended Animation
2. Design and Achieve Near-C Spacecraft Velocity
3. Engineer an Autonomous Million-Year Nutrient Supply
4. Design and Achieve an Interstellar Debris Shield
5. Engineer Automatic Reversal of Human Suspended Animation
6. Design and Achieve an Error-Free Return Trajectory
7. Perfect Treatment of Post-Intergalactic-Travel Stress Disorder
As de Grey says about his own list, we don't need to complete
these objectives all at once: step by step will be fine.
If any philanthropist wants to write a handsome check to start a
foundation for SIST, I promise to gladly accept it.
But I cannot promise to be as effective as Aubrey de Grey. I have
too many handicaps, one of them the absence of a beard of any
kind, color, or length. I also lack a British accent. My accent,
unfortunately, still reminds everyone of the Bronx.