Want to stay young? Peter Diamandis says survive the next 10 years

Summary

Peter Diamandis, a futurist with degrees from both MIT and Harvard, has spent much of the past two decades evangelizing a vision of an “abundant future” driven by exponential technologies that will lengthen our lives. The serial entrepreneur and founder of organizations like the XPRIZE Foundation and Singularity University has also cultivated close ties with some of the world’s most influential business minds, including Elon Musk. Admirers subscribe to his optimistic forecasts and data-backed arguments that technology has already lifted billions out of poverty and improved global living standards. They also buy his books. Critics argue that his techno-utopian vision overlooks growing inequality and systemic imbalances, including in the U.S., where the bottom 50% of households hold less than 4% of national wealth, while the top 10% command over two-thirds. No matter their views on Diamandis, many find him an intriguing modern figure, and when we had a chance to talk with him recently about abundance and longevity – including what he thinks of Byran Johnson, a former acquaintance of his who is trying to reverse the aging process – we seized it. (Diamandis, now 63, says he is “biologically 39.”) You can hear that conversation here; meanwhile, you’ll find excerpts, edited for length, below. Recently, you tweeted, “We’re so close to longevity escape velocity that I urge you to remember that your sole responsibility right now is to avoid dying from something stupid.” What inspired that specifically? I feel like we’re in the midst of a healthspan revolution. And this is not by chance. It’s the impact of mostly AI, computation, sensors, single-cell sequencing, cellular medicines — a whole slew of converging technologies [that] are helping us understand why we age, how to slow it, stop it, potentially reverse it. There’s a concept called longevity escape velocity, and it’s the notion that today, for every year that you’re alive, science and medicine are extending your lifesp...