“Buddhism and Epicureanism combat the fear of death by accommodating the emotions to the reasonable certainty of death. Contemporary immortalism (which includes projects such as life extension, cryonic suspension, and universal immortalism) argues that scientific and technological solutions to the problem of death can be found, thus...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

According to those who research them, capuchin monkeys think only about two things: food and sex. As a result, the vast majority of their behaviors are also geared toward the acquisition of food and sex. Not surprisingly, these desires can be exploited to teach the monkeys other behaviors. However, no one has ever observed animals [...]

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

A recently conducted study brings a warning to technophiles who think that the facts are all that matter when informing a group of people about a new technology. The fact of the matter is that the message matters more. In their article “What drives acceptance of nanotechnology?” (Nature Nanotechnology), the Cultural Cognition Project...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Esquire magazine features an article on scientist Mark Roth and his research into “suspended animation.” As the website title “The Mad Scientist Bringing Back the Dead…. Really” indicates, this is not supposed to be a detailed account of Ikaria’s recent advances in induction of depressed metabolism but a...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Molecular nanotechnology pioneer and cryonics advocate Eric Drexler has launched his own blog called Metamodern: The Trajectory of Technology. This is what we can expect: In this blog, I’ll discuss current progress in science and technology, often with a specific perspective in mind: how current progress can contribute to the development of...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

The Dutch psychologist Piet Vroon once opined that philosophy has lost much of its relevance because it  has lost touch with the (natural) sciences. Although philosophers associated with logical positivism and critical rationalism made great efforts to discipline the practice of philosophy by encouraging logical thinking and verification (or...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Over the years, experimental science has developed a standard protocol for the testing of medical hypotheses using animal models which calls for the use of males only. Why? Because no laboratory scientist wants to deal with those pesky female hormones. Female hormone fluctuations are viewed as just another variable to be controlled (generally by...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Minimalism was first recognized as an art and design movement in the 1960’s. The essence of minimalist art is the reduction of the art work to its bare essentials, which is expressed through simple geometric forms, repetition, neutral surfaces, and industrial materials. Minimal  art downplays self-expression  in favor of the object itself, ...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

On Barely A Blog, Ilana Mercer reports on Robert Aumann’s recent inaugural lecture of the Center for the Study of Judaism and Economics at the Jerusalem Institute for Market Studies.  Robert Aumann, who won the 2005 Nobel prize in economics with Thomas Schelling, is known for his work on repeated games and the role of [...]

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

As documented in David M. Friedman’s The Immortalists: Charles Lindbergh, Dr. Alexis Carrel, and Their Daring Quest to Live Forever, Lindbergh and Carrel considered the human body a living machine made of replaceable parts. A major reason why Carrel was interested in developing and refining equipment to perfuse isolated organs is because he...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

What is the relationship between individual choice and collective choice? What should be the domain over which a democracy chooses? Prevailing answers to these questions are an important factor affecting the size of government. One argument why imperfect foresight should favor limited government, or no government at all, involves the difference...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

From David M. Friedman’s The Immortalists: Charles Lindbergh, Dr. Alexis Carrel, and Their Daring Quest to Live Forever: The initial stages of these studies were performed in Carrel’s operating suite, which the two men now entered. Lindbergh had never been in an operating room before, and this one defied his expectations. The floor,...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

One of the most neglected aspects of cryonics is that its procedures, and the research to support them, can have important practical applications in mainstream fields such as organ preservation and emergency medicine. Contrary to popular opinion, cryonics does not just involve an optimistic extrapolation of existing science but can set the...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

The Prisoner is a British television series from the 1960’s which over the years has reached cult status because of its intriguing story line,  themes such as mind control, dream manipulation and various forms of social indoctrination, and ultimately, a lot of unanswered questions as to the meaning of the series. The series is about a [...]

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

James Warren is to be complimented for writing a thorough and persuasive book on Epicurean thinking about death. In Facing Death: Epicurus and his Critics, Warren offers a detailed review of Epicurus’ view that “death is nothing to us.” His treatment of Epicurus’ critics should be considered a success for the following...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Brownian motion started when Robert Brown looked into his microscope and observed that pollen suspended in water moved around in a continuous random motion. Wanting to rule out some “vital life force,” Brown also  investigated dead things such as sand and metals but he observed the same jittery motion. The dead danced as well. Or [...]

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Recent advances with the use of hydrogen sulfide, carbon monoxide and “hibernation induction triggers” to depress metabolism in animal models have  renewed interest  in the possibility of human hibernation.  The ability to drastically depress human metabolism without the use of cold (or in combination with cold) would have a number of...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

Japanese scientists have managed to clone a mouse that had been frozen without any cryoprotection for 16 years at minus 20 degrees Celsius. The researchers used the researchers used brain cell nuclei, and planted it into an egg of another living mouse, leading to the birth of the cloned mouse. Although the objective of cryonics is [...]

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

John Schloendorn, who is a  postdoc at ASU’s Biodesign Institute and doing scientific research on the LysoSENS project for the Methuselah Foundation, asks you to support Chris Heward’s fight against cancer. A new Facebook group to support Chris in his fight has been created here. The white blood cell donor screening form is located...

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.

In the introduction to his collection of writings, Socratic Puzzles, Robert Nozick writes that  he never responded to the sizable literature on Anarchy, State and Utopia. His natural inclination would be to defend his views. As Nozick notes, “How could I learn that my views were mistaken if I thought about them always with defensive [...]

Visit Depressed Metabolism for the complete post, other content, and more.