WATCH XPRIZE Launch Its Biggest Prize Ever, A Game-changer For Human Aging | XPRIZE Healthspan
I feel like I've been talking about the potential for extending human lifespan (perhaps even indefinitely?) for 20 years. And throughout that time, the topic has always been viewed as fringe-science and unserious. So, it's pretty cool to see this massive $101 Million XPrize for increasing the human "health-span".
Healthspan does differ from lifespan in that it focuses more on the health quality of life (esp in later years), compared to lifespan which focuses more on the number of years. The distinction though is often, let's say, political. For instance, for many years researchers have had difficulty getting funding and gov't approval for research into extending the human lifespan, mostly because dying of old age is considered normal and therefore there's no need to spend money to try to stop it. In contrast, healthspan argues about improving the quality of our existing years, and so is treated differently. However, most of the time it is understood that a significant increase in healthspan would correlate with an increase in lifespan.
Furthermore, when you hear how some researchers talk about biology, it's clear that the distinction becomes meaningless. After all, if biology is just "squishy mechanics", there's no reason why aging couldn't be halted or even reversed, just like how an old car can be restored, but instead of using a monkey wrench, we'll be using tools like gene editing.
Of course, that level of control over biology would require an extremely deep understanding of how we work and abilities to manipulate our biology. But with advancements in science - such as AI - we are rapidly advancing both of those goals. And with something like the XPrize which is helping to normalize and promote this kind of research, we could potentially soon unlock incredible power to control our biology.
Last point: Longevity Escape Velocity. LEV is an idea that once humanity starts to increase its lifespan, most people will live to the point that we have complete control of our lifespan. Here's why: Say the XPrize manages to add 10 years of life to us all. Now we have an extra ten years. Meanwhile, within ten years from that breakthrough, we'll likely have more advancements, further extending our lifespan, say by 20 years. And the process continues.
It's possible that we may well be the first "immortal" generation, or possibly the last one to die.
