According to the website Quartz, several millionaires, who’ve made their fortunes by trading cryptocurrency, have now made grants to fund research on transhumanism. These individuals want to provide access to longer lives and better living conditions through potential discoveries related to the human condition.
Vitalik Buterin Subsidizes Transhumanism
Transhumanism is an interdisciplinary approach to finding solutions that could help us as humans overcome our biological limitations through technological advances.
One of the practices main goals is to provide humans with longer lives and to improve the physical, emotional and intellectual capacities of Man. These benefits are what pushes wealthy people, notably cryptocurrency millionaires, to invest in this area of research. For example, take Vitalik Buterin, the founder of Ethereum, who recently made a $2.4 million-dollar donation to a research foundation known as SENS.
SENS focuses on degenerative diseases linked to age and, more specifically, on the development of biotechnical rejuvenation. Moreover, another cryptographic philanthropist, known as the Pineapple Fund also made donations towards this type of research.
The Next Step for SENS
According to a British scientist for SENS, Aubrey de Grey, the foundation earns about $4 million dollars in funding each year. And, since December 2017, the foundation has received about 6 billion units of Bitcoin and Ethereum in donations, which were then sold to be turned into money to finance their projects. It should be noted that, as a non-profit organization, the foundation is not allowed to hold any sort of speculative assets such as Bitcoin.
Still, the main goal of the research is to quickly advance technology to find a way to slow down the aging process. Within the next 5 years, the research team hopes to be able to rejuvenate lab mice and then, with any luck, apply the process to humans.
Early Adopters Are the Most Interested in The Idea
According to Grey, the contributions from young cryptocurrency users is not surprising since, they too, want to extend their life expectancies. In fact, young consumers are considered “early adopters” and typically, they tend to automatically buy new products.
Moreover, this category of consumer is often more open to the idea that aging is a problem and that it can be solved, or at least, treated.
