The Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever

About two years ago, I learned about the amazing and seemingly inevitabe destiny of mankind to saturate all matter in the universe with consciousness. Futurist Ray Kurzweil presents page after page of compelling evidence for a technological Singularity in his 2005 book, The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology. Reading this book forever changed the way I look at the world around me. I can't help but think "OH WOWIE-ZOWIE!" everytime I see a new piece of technological progress. I can appreciate innovation for its own value and because I know we are soaring ever higher in the realms of expanded consciousness.

Dying is the tragic and as of yet irrevocable loss of the unique patterns that make us who we are.

Not that dying doesn't always suck, but wouldn't it be cosmic irony to be the last human being to ever die involuntarily? No mind backups, no digital selves, no nanorobotic life-support systems, none of the benefits of the digital revolution. Just cold, limp, decaying dumb matter where there was once a mind running over with the patterns of thought.

I do not want to die. Ever.

And if the philosophical implications of "cosmic evolution" are correct, then I will never have to die. How you ask?

Not long after reading The Singularity Is Near, I picked up another book called The Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever. This book was co-authored by Ray Kurzweil and Terry Grossman, a practitioner of naturopathic medicine. Once again, one of Kurzweil's books radically changed the way I look at the world. I began to see the connection between diet and health. Not just to understand that there is one, but to clearly see what happens biologically and chemically when you introduce different vitamins and nutrients to your body.

The research in the book was cutting edge at the time of its publication, but the scientific insights when it comes to heavy-hitters like Vitamin D and Resveratrol have grown exponentially. However, I still highly recommend the advice they had to offer when it comes to diet and especially when it comes to choosing how to supplement your diet. If you have the time and are curious, I think you would find this Short Guide to a Long Life summary to be very worthwhile to read. It is basically all of the key points contained in their book, minus the scientific evidence and explanations.

There are very few diseases that cannot be prevented if you take the time to understand your biological machine. The whole of consciousness may seem mind-boggling, but the fact that you are the aggregate of a finite number of cells with a finite number of biological processes means that you can begin to understand in great detail how you work. And once you understand the how, you can take your destiny into your own hands.

There is so much to live for even if we weren't on the brink of a technological Singularity. Doesn't the fact that we are make your lifestyle choices even more important?

Please don't die. Ever.