Tom Ough tells us about the Big Things that may end humanity - and what we can do and in some cases have done to prevent these. Did you know that if all the risks, the one that is most likely to end you is aging? What are we doing to stop aging? Tom is a journalist and writer who is currently Senior Editor at UnHerd, a London‑based online magazine of culture and opinion. After several years working at The Telegraph, he moved into research on global catastrophic risks and wrote a nonfiction book titled The Anti‑Catastrophe League about individuals and efforts to prevent humanity’s extinction, and he also co‑hosts the Anglofuturism podcast.

-- IN THIS EPISODE WE LEARN --

Why aging itself can be understood as a catastrophic risk, and what it would mean to treat it with the same seriousness as other existential threats.

What it would actually take to detect, deflect, or survive an asteroid impact.

Why space expansion and Mars are a part of long-term civilizational resilience.

Why some catastrophic risks may be overestimated, and how to think more clearly about climate change relative to other existential threats.

What we know about super-volcanoes, why they’re rare but devastating, and why preparedness matters despite uncertainty.

How nuclear war remains a central catastrophic risk, and why deterrence, miscalculation, and escalation still deserve serious attention.

How to think about AI risk, what distinguishes it from past technological threats, and why uncertainty makes governance difficult.

What p(doom) means, why people disagree so strongly about it, and how probabilities shape policy and public discourse.

Who typically gravitates toward anti-catastrophe thinking, and what motivates people to focus on low-probability, high-impact risks.

What Anglo-futurism is.

🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe

Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode)

📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/

📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524

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Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe

LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today we’re diving into one of the strangest and most ambitious ideas in longevity: using crypto trading to fund real-time lifespan experiments.

Benji Leibowitz, founder of pump.science, joins us to explain how decentralized science works, why tokens can finance studies in worms, flies and mice, and what happens when a single post on X suddenly turns Metformin into a viral experiment. That intervention, by the way, is being spearheaded by LEVITY friend Linus Petersson, founder of the Swedish Longevity Cluster, who also joins the discussion.

In this episode we announce our new collaboration with pump.science. For now, that means they’ll contribute written content to the LEVITY newsletter - and later we may explore a dedicated Youtube format together.

More info here: https://reachlevity.com/p/desci-is-exploding-we-re-partnering-with-pump-science-to-help-you-follow-it

And check out pump.science's first post here: https://reachlevity.com/p/the-most-radical-idea-in-longevity-right-now

Key highlights in this episode:

– How pump.science turns attention and trading volume into funding for worm, fly, and mouse experiments.

– Why decentralized science emerged, and what problems in traditional science it tries to fix.

– What tokens, smart contracts, and DAOs actually mean in practice.

– Why Solana, not Ethereum, underpins the system.

– How real-time experimental data (like fly racing) could change how we evaluate longevity interventions.

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🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe

Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode)

📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/

📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524

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Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe

LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Intro – How crypto could fund longevity & Pump Science × LEVITY

05:14 DeSci 101 – fixing broken incentives in science

07:00 Benji’s origin story: lucid dreams, superheroes & cancer genomics

08:45 Discovering crypto & using incentives to fix healthcare

15:52 What’s broken in science funding – and why DeSci might help

30:20 Is crypto just belief? Money, gold and “Ponzi scheme” fears

37:44 Linus Petersson joins + crypto glossary (tokens, smart contracts, NFTs)

59:18 Vitalik’s retweet, 40× price spike & $14k for Linus’s experiments

1:10:24: How to “play”: exchange accounts, Phantom wallet & buying a token

1:17:50: Why does the website look like a retro video game forum?

1:20:53 Network state for not dying – community, human trials & products

1:27:45 Why scientists are skeptical & how to recruit labs and students

1:32:15 Kings of the pill & the coming longevity leaderboard

1:39:59 Skepticism vs optimism, call to action & book recommendations

🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe

Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode)

📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/

📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524

-----

Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe

LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Valuable time is being lost because there is not enough funding for science with real life-extending potential. No major political party is promising to address aging, even though aging harms and kills more people than anything else. Most people—and most leaders—still do not understand that aging is both a problem and something that can be solved through science. We need a political movement that demands action and insists that something be done to save our lives.

And this is where this episode's guest comes in.

Felix Werth is the founder and chairman of the German Party for Rejuvenation Research — a political movement dedicated to accelerating scientific progress in regenerative medicine and longevity. Originally trained in biochemistry, Werth founded the party in 2015 (then called the Party for Health Research) to push for greater public investment in research aimed at combating aging-related diseases. Through his activism, Werth has helped bring the topic of longevity and healthy life extension into the political conversation in Germany and across Europe.

In this episode you'll learn more about:

• The longevity scene in Germany
• How to start a longevity party
• How to get the message out
• A dating site for the longevity community
• Using AI to solve within SENS

CHAPTERS

00:00 Introduction

01:08 Berlin and the global longevity community

05:20 Who is Felix werth and why did he start the longevity party?

15:00 How he started the party

21:49 The public's reaction

27:16 Why change the message from health to longevity?

32:50 Message strategy: posters and videos

34:34 Funding issues

39:20 Campaign video

41:50 Dating site for longevity people

44:45 Does Felix recommend forming a political party?

54:20 What is the optimal outcome for the party?

59:00 Is there any support for longevity among the German elite and government?

01:04:20 Using AI to solve aging within the SENS approach

01:10:16 Winning aging hacking contest with the West-Coast Vectors

01:16:00 Using de-sci for funding, Pump-Science

01:23:00 How do you keep in shape?

01:24:29 Do you do any extreme risk-avoidance?

01:25:22 Three good books

🗞️ SUBSCRIBE to the LEVITY newsletter: reachlevity.com/subscribe

Get all LEVITY DeSci content here: reachlevity.com/t/desci (sorry about the wrong link in the episode)

📕 Check out Patrick's book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262543163/the-case-against-death/

📗 Check out Peter's book (only available in Swedish): https://www.adlibris.com/sv/bok/evigt-ung-min-och-manniskans-drom-om-ododligheten-9789179652524

-----

Show notes for this episode will be available soon after this airs. Sign up for the LEVITY newsletter to get them straight to your inbox: reachlevity.com/subscribe

LEVITY is co-hosted by Patrick Linden, philosopher and author, and Peter Ottsjö, journalist and author.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.