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All In The Mind

Our millennia-long obsession with immortality

5/2/202632 min

Would you want to live forever? The rich and powerful certainly do. 

There are numerous examples throughout history of people going to extreme lengths in search of immortality. These days, it's Silicon Valley tech bros, testing out everything from blood transfusions to merging our brains with the cloud.

Why are they/we so obsessed with dodging death? What is it about extreme wealth that makes people dream of defying biology?

Today, tech journalist and social psychologist Aleks Krotoski takes us into the world of the ‘immortalists’: what they think the future of humanity might look like, and whether the rest of us want to come along for the ride.

Guest:

Aleks KrotoskiInvestigative journalistSocial psychologistAuthor, The Immortalists: The Death of Death and the Race for Eternal Life

Credits:

  • Presenter/producer: Sana Qadar
  • Producer: Rose Kerr
  • Senior Producer: James Bullen
  • Sound engineer: Tegan Nicholls

Clips

Why The Wealthy Chase Forever
Understanding Them To Say No
The Hidden Costs Of Immortality
Escaping Time’s Gravity
Longevity As Modern Religion
Server Farms On Jupiter
Bryan Johnson’s Extreme Playbook
Death Drives Civilization
Placebo And The Testicle Tonic
Kurzweil’s Ever-Delayed Singularity

Transcript preview

First 90 seconds

  1. Speaker 00:00

    [upbeat music] ABC Listen, podcasts, radio, news, music, and more I'm Peter Martin, host of The Economy Stupid, where we find economics in relationships She only wants a man if he's really, really good In the Reserve Bank board I knew.

  2. Peter Martin0:20

    I knew. Everybody on the board knew recession was coming And in food It's about a cup of diesel's required through the life cycle to get that chicken patty on your burger The Economy Stupid. Search for The Economy Stupid on ABC Listen or wherever you get your podcasts [gentle music] Okay, so I wanted to start by listing some phrases from the book that are just so bizarre, they jumped out at me and made me wince, and I couldn't help but write them down.

  3. Sana Qadar· Host0:47

    And how exactly these phrases relate to immortality might not be totally clear as I list them out of context, but anyways, here they are. Yogurt enemas. [laughs] Biohackers post about their nightly erections.

  4. Aleks Krotoski· Guest1:01

    Mm-hmm.

  5. Sana Qadar· Host1:02

    [laughs] Juice extracted from a testicle of a dog or a guinea pig.

  6. Aleks Krotoski· Guest1:05

    Yeah.

  7. Speaker 01:06

    Yep.

  8. Sana Qadar· Host1:06

    Transplanted sex glands from the young onto the old. I could go on, but [laughs] I will stop there.

  9. Aleks Krotoski· Guest1:11

    You could.

  10. Sana Qadar· Host1:12

    [laughs] I could really go on. What do these lines tell us about the pursuit of immortality?

  11. Aleks Krotoski· Guest1:19

    Uh, they tell us that we will try anything- Yeah ... and we will, we will do anything, that we're pretty gullible. I think all of those things are interesting 'cause they have a whiff, just a

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