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We Were Taught to Call Death a Blessing

CGP Grey

7M subscribers • 6 videos on Rounds

YouTube
  • Recommended by 12 people, in Hacker News, across 11 different months.
  • Sells products. The upload promotes a product, supplement, program or service, or the speaker sells what they recommend.
  • Debated among experts. Its central claim is contested, so look for the other side.

For anyone, no background needed. Education, not medical advice.

11M views8 years ago12 recommendations

Aging and longevityBiology of agingLongevity interventionsHealthspan and aging well

CGP Grey animates Nick Bostrom's philosophical fable advocating for the scientific defeat of aging and death.

Adapted from Nick Bostrom's paper: nickbostrom.com/fable/dragon.html Made possible with the support of my Bonnie Bees: patreon.com/cgpgrey Made with the support of: Andrea Di Biagio, Andrey Chursin, Ben Schwab, Bob Kunz, Cas Eliëns, Christopher Anthony, David F Watson, Donal Botkin, Edison Franklin, Friedrich Gies, GameGo, James Bissonette, Jeremy Banks, John Buchan, JoJo Chehebar, Mark Govea, Michael Cao, Nevin Spoljaric, Oliver Steele, Richard Comish, Roman Pinchuk, Stephen W. Carson, Tianyu Ge, Tien Long, and James Gill.

Why it's here

12 people recommend this

What people say. Highly recommended as a concise and compelling argument for treating aging as a disease that should be cured.

snvzzin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Around the World, People Have Surprisingly Modest Notions of the ‘Ideal’ Life”

Most people confuse age with aging, because aging is still unavoidable, and as it's always been the case, it looks like it will remain so forever. But that's wrong. The outlook is different now. Yet, unfortunately, most still see it as unavoidable. Everybody should watch The Fable of The Dragon Tyrant: link to this video
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jeffreyleesin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Matter: How Long Can We Live? The Limit Hasn’t Been Reached, Study Finds”

I've always found this to be an interesting topic. See here for more: link to this video . The argument made there is basically that death (human aging, at any rate) is a sort of condition, or disease, if you will, like any other, that could be solved if we plied it with enough resources. Maybe the real question is where on the scale the extension to life happens? If we keep reaching adulthood, and then elderly, more inhibited lifestyles at the same ages, just prolonging the elderly state via good medical practices, that's one thing. But if we could slow aging in general to extend younger and middle-aged sections of life, that'd be another thing altogether.
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dtujmerin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Longevity and anti-aging research: ‘Prime time for an impact on the globe’”

"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." Well, maybe not the last one, but still an important one. Nick Bostrom has a great story describing the underlying philosophy in the fight against aging: link And here it is in video form as well: link to this video
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mLubyin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Alan Turing to be the face of new £50 note”

…ion will likely be built off the same accumulation of knowledge, not some rainforest frog extract the ancients could have refined. The only way I can imagine we don't have this in 1000 years is if someone's nuke finger gets twitchy. Want to accelerate research? Make "The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant" required reading/watching for all schoolchildren: link to this video (That this might be controversial is itself interesting.)…
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seerin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Scientists identify pathways that extend nematode worm lifespan fivefold”

CGP gray's videos on YouTube are maybe the most concise and fun to watch materials I've seen on the subject. link link to this video And you'll be surprised how many people _are_ indeed thinking about all of the outcomes. Have in mind though that as with any technology it is not good or bad, and if it is possible someone will do it sooner or later. It makes no sense to not do it as your adversaries will, and then they'll dictate how it is used, probably not to your liking. If you develop it first you can talk and deliberate at your leisure and find solutions that look much better to you and yours.
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cosmojgin Hacker News • Recommends

On “On Old Age”

"Those who live in the desert learn to worship thirst." — vharuck There's no reason we should accept the consequences of old age without a fight. Donate to SENS, or even better, dedicate your own work to extending human healthspan. See also: The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant by CGP Grey — link to this video
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chr1in Hacker News • Recommends

On “LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online”

Try watching videos of old people with Alzheimer's, and try imagining what people will be doing when you are dead to gauge how much your life is worth, and if small risk of dying in a car accident not caused by yourself is acceptable. For me in similar situation answers were not important and acceptable. But if you find that your life is precious to you it still would be better to channel the natural fear of death to more productive venues like link or much more importantly to donations to link because we are very close to solving the problem of death for good link to this video
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Tmpodin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Japanese scientists develop vaccine to eliminate cells behind aging”

CGP Grey has a video with him reading the short over some neat drawings, which is more enjoyable I suppose: link to this video
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montenegrohugoin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Your real biological clock is you’re going to die (2018)”

…ding nearly enough effort and money on this problem. It affects every human on earth, and the immense benefits of adding even one year of healthy lifespan to 7 billion people make it a moral imperative to act upon. Fighting death should be a multi-national effort that we focus on with all our might, _right now_. You shouldn't have to die. Related: link to this video…
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tjlinghamin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Scientists find way to wipe a cell's memory to reprogram it as a stem cell”

That's very easy to say until it's your partner, mother/father, or child on the other side of that assertion. If you're curious and have time, I'd suggest the following excellent exploration of the idea of extinguishing natural death by CGP Grey. He uses an interesting analogy to help challenge the ingrained belief that natural death is just link to this video
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nayukiin Hacker News • Recommends

On “‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’”

> our societal acceptance of death comes from an inability to imagine anything otherwise CGP Grey captures this sentiment nicely in this animated essay: link to this video "Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant" 2018-04-24
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willis936in Hacker News • Recommends

On “How ancient people saw themselves”

I don't think that death is a certainty. It is today, but we are working on it. We are not supernatural. CGPGrey's thoughts on this mirror a lot of my own. I grant that not all care given to aged is a kindness, but not fighting aging is not virtuous. link link to this video
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kbensonin Hacker News • Mentions

On “The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant (2005)”

To the dead comment, since it was killed right before I could finish and I can't reply there anymore (since I think a question deserves an answer): I suspect the video you say was this one.1 If so, you might have noticed in the description Nick Bostrom is the original author, or might have noticed the credits at the end. CGP Grey, the narrator of the video, is a fairly famous youtube personality, and have been on a sort of crusade against death and ageing lately with a few videos. I think it's more likely that it was posted here because of CGP Grey's video bring some new (or more recent) popularity to it. 1: link to this video
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shawnin Hacker News • Mentions

On “Ethical OS and Silicon Valley’s Guilty Conscience”

This is an excellent time to ask for a counterargument to CGP Grey's stance that immortality should be invented: link to this video Suppose there were a technology X which was going to be invented eventually. Suppose also that it's a highly unethical technology, for some definition of unethical. Is it therefore unethical to create X? Note: The constraint is that X is inevitable . The only question is who creates it first. And in that context, isn't it at least possible to argue from multiple axes that you should help to create it? The limit case of this argument would be "It's your duty to the society you live in to ensure it has the competitive advantage, not some other society." A less-hostile way to…
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mLubyin Hacker News • Mentions

On “Ageing in human cells successfully reversed in the lab (2018)”

Related: Fable of the Dragon Tyrant link to this video Ways to improve life expectancy: A. keep children alive till adulthood (mostly done) B. keep adults disease-free/healthy (somewhat done) C. keep old people alive till natural death (little done) D. stop natural death (possible?) E. reverse aging (possible?) If natural death is just rolling constitution checks long enough to get a critical miss, then perhaps it's enough to complete C. If natural death is some sort of cellular countdown, it may suffice to stop the time, as in D. I think for most people, what they really want is not eternal life in a 90+ year-old body, but to be able to live in a young body, which necessitates E. It's interesting to c…
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godelskiin Hacker News • Mentions

On “No Implants Needed for Precise Control Deep into the Brain”

- Several species have longer lifetimes than us. Doesn't seem to be a large disadvantage. - We've proven that we change faster culturally than biologically. If this weren't true most Americans still wouldn't be okay with gay people, black people, or pot. Beliefs seem more related to local tribalism than to age. I've seen plenty of older and younger people radically shift (for good or bad) their positions based on who they consider arbiters of truth. - We've heard this finite resource in the past. It has been solved many times. Fertilizer was the most recent one if you want to go back to 19th century history. We have hydroponics, aeroponics, etc on the way. We can also go into space. - Every…
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