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Open Longevity
Openness Concept
Openness Concept
We are implementing the concept of radical openness in life extension.
That's why we are Open Longevity.
That's why we are Open Longevity.
What does it mean?
The commercial sector in longevity is developing at a good pace, but is not able to solve such a complex problem as aging. It’s a paradox: you can make money on longevity, but you cannot achieve longevity itself.
Means of radical life extension with proven effectiveness (or at least mild such means exceeding the effects of a basic healthy lifestyle) simply do not exist yet. You have heard about some promising medicines (metformin, rapamycin etc), but these are just the grains of possible knowledge on aging. The grains which effectiveness for prolonging life, again, is still not proven. And it is unlikely that these drugs will have a significant effect. The same can be said about different diets. You cannot buy a reliably working medicine even in the most expensive pharmacy in the world, you cannot ask for therapy from your physician. There is simply nothing to sell yet, the anti-aging industry being on a different level — the level of collecting and analyzing information.
Means of radical life extension with proven effectiveness (or at least mild such means exceeding the effects of a basic healthy lifestyle) simply do not exist yet. You have heard about some promising medicines (metformin, rapamycin etc), but these are just the grains of possible knowledge on aging. The grains which effectiveness for prolonging life, again, is still not proven. And it is unlikely that these drugs will have a significant effect. The same can be said about different diets. You cannot buy a reliably working medicine even in the most expensive pharmacy in the world, you cannot ask for therapy from your physician. There is simply nothing to sell yet, the anti-aging industry being on a different level — the level of collecting and analyzing information.
We need a lot more data on aging.
And if our primary task is to create
therapies in the next 5-30 years,
it is necessary to disclose the data
obtained during the experiments
effectively and instantly.
And if our primary task is to create
therapies in the next 5-30 years,
it is necessary to disclose the data
obtained during the experiments
effectively and instantly.
I’d like to emphasize this once again: the attempts to make money on life extension often harm and do not help to move the research forward. Even if the company's management is sincerely interested in prolonging people's lives, they operate in the logic/infrastructure/rules dictated by the commercial sector: profit, stock growth, return on investment within a specified period.
We are convinced that in solving such a difficult task as defeating aging — a task more complicated than flying into space and splitting an atom — it would be a mistake to try to sit on both chairs.
A commercially successful company creates the illusion of effective development, taking away resources for its legal services, information concealment, and marketing. I don’t really mind these costs, but we haven’t seen this approach to be fruitful in a needed way so far.
Open non-commercial projects will increase the speed of data exchange, increase the level of expertise and involve more participants.
We must reveal the whole process of creating scientific knowledge: from the origin of an idea and the search for initial funding to the technical nuances of conducting experiments and evaluating their results. Also, it is only possible to reveal all of the above completely when refusing of IP protection and academic priority.
We are convinced that in solving such a difficult task as defeating aging — a task more complicated than flying into space and splitting an atom — it would be a mistake to try to sit on both chairs.
A commercially successful company creates the illusion of effective development, taking away resources for its legal services, information concealment, and marketing. I don’t really mind these costs, but we haven’t seen this approach to be fruitful in a needed way so far.
Open non-commercial projects will increase the speed of data exchange, increase the level of expertise and involve more participants.
We must reveal the whole process of creating scientific knowledge: from the origin of an idea and the search for initial funding to the technical nuances of conducting experiments and evaluating their results. Also, it is only possible to reveal all of the above completely when refusing of IP protection and academic priority.
How exactly to implement openness?
1. Generalization, systematization, and clear presentation of knowledge in convenient databases is a mandatory tool of openness. A chaotic pile of information doesn’t serve our purpose.
2. Openness of primary data
3. Simply opening access to information without an additional effort to spreading it is meaningless.
4. Opening and spreading of information require funding of their own. Clear and accessible presentation is a necessity when talking to non-specialists. And we do want to talk to them since it’s the interest of non-specialists that often determines research funding (both private or public). At the same time, the vast majority of researchers do not have a budget for popularization of their work, for producing pop-science presentations and animation. In order for experiments to cause a public outcry, we must work with a significant budget.
5. Openness also gives an opportunity to participate. We need a simple entrance into scientific projects. The science of life extension should also have transparent pricing. And later on, these prices should be minimized (for example, by automating the experiments).
6. Openness is also about the transparency of unsuccessful experiments, a detailed analysis of the side effects. After all, the non-commercial approach does not need to embellish the result. We need to find out and publish as many details as possible.
7. We need ratings of open projects (in fact, it’s only open projects that can be evaluated objectively). Do you remember the economist George Akerlof and his 1970 work about the "peach and lemon market" on the example of used cars? If the buyer (investor / sponsor) does not have enough expertise to evaluate the product (project), then the quality of the product inevitably falls: the seller puts up only "lemons", that is, worse goods, because the buyer can’t distinguish them from the “peaches”. Open evaluation is a prerequisite for good quality projects to obtain funding and public attention.
This is why we’re called Open Longevity.
And we’ll do our best to implement all of the above.
And we’ll do our best to implement all of the above.
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