| abstract
| - Interview with Michael Anissimov. by Jonathan Despres. Go to the Interviews. I have a background in working for transhumanist organizations. I co-founded the Immortality Institute in High School and went into fundraising, activism, and self-education on a full-time basis shortly thereafter. My current project is building up the Lifeboat Foundation - the only organization exclusively devoted to addressing a variety of existential risks. So my primary focus is considering existential risks in detail, corresponding with scientists and other academics on the topic, proposing and pursuing specific strategies and policies to ameliorate risk, and raising money so that this activity may be continued. I am also a strong supporter of the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence. Outside of work activity, I am writing a book on transhumanism. Educate as many people as possible on the potential benefits and risks of advanced technology, particularly artificial general intelligence and molecular manufacturing. We have it now - it's called cryonics. Only mystics and dualists believe that technology will never be able to restore a frozen brain, because they don't believe that intelligence and personality resides in the physical structure of the brain to begin with. All others recognize that it is just a matter of time, once they take a close look at the issue. With regard to life extension methods outside cryonics, I think it will take between ten and thirty years before serious results are achieved. From that point onward, the process will snowball rapidly, because initial demonstrations of feasibility will garner much excitement and investment. Who wouldn't be willing to pay for a few more extra years of good health, if they knew it would be feasible? The tremendous amount spent on health care for the elderly today is empirical evidence in favor of this. I believe that cryonics preserved the information content of the human brain, yes. It has already succeeded. If you mean, "when will we revive cryonics patients?", I'd estimate between twenty and fifty years. I have no emotional investment in timescales, though, so even if it ended up taking a thousand years, I wouldn't cry about it. I think that many might be inclined to give overly conservative estimates because they are making their projections based on the grandiosity of the outcome rather than the nuts-and-bolts difficulty of the task itself. This depends on what metrics you're using for measurement... advances have been made with vitrification in the last decade, for instance. If you mean "why can't we revive cryonics patients yet?", then the answer is because it's inherently a very difficult task. No. Molecular assembler, because it's a necessary prerequisite for molecular manufacturing. I advocate artificial intelligence. Advanced AI will be necessary to make sense out of the vast amount of biological data our sensors pick up. When I realized that life was fun. Like David Pearce, I'm going to have to say: sell snake oil. Pretty handy. Don't know. Hopefully people will be able to do whatever they want. I think it's a good idea. A fellow transhumanist, Michael Raimondi, once remarked that humanity's relationship with suffering is like that between a kidnapper and captive suffering from Stockholm syndrome. I think that the word "Singularity" has become associated with so many unrelated ideas that most people don't even have a clue what they're talking about when they try to remark on it. My definition of "successful Singularity" is good by definition - it denotes the technological enhancement of intelligence and compassion. Clearly the Internet is merging with the physical world, which is quite fascinating. Whatever solves our problems and amuses us. I think we should switch from fossil fuels to nuclear power, and then finally to fusion and solar power. We should minimize waste, recycle frequently, walk instead of drive, eat vegetarian, and stop buying so many useless toys. Yes, in the long run. Most present-day environmentalists get all up in a huff about this, because it allows us to have our cake (a clean environment) and eat it too (pollute as much as we want because it can easily and quickly be cleaned up). But there is no physical reason why it shouldn't be eventually achievable. End of Evangelion probably. The laws of probability theory, which many so-called rationalists are actually unaware of. The laws of probability theory are in total conformance with reality, and reality should ultimately be our predominant "religion". Socially very liberal, economically centrist. Find that at my blog. Michael Vassar is a good target, I usually like sending people after him.
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