Peter Diamandis, a Futuris with degrees of both MIT and Harvard, has spent much of the past two decades of a vision of a ‘abundant future’ powered by exponential technologies that will extend our lives. The serial entrepreneur and founder of organizations such as the Xprize Foundation and Singularity University also cultivated close ties with some of the world’s most influential issues, including Elon Musk.

Admirers subscribe to his optimistic predictions and arguments supported by the data that technology has already lifted billions of poverty and has improved global living standards. Them too Buy his books. Critics argue that its techno-uutopic vision overlooks the growing inequality and systemic imbalances, including in the US, where the lower 50% of households have less than 4% of national wealth, while the top 10% over two-thirds command.

Regardless of their views on Diamandis, many find him an interesting modern figure, and when we had the chance to talk to him recently about abundance and longevity – including what he thinks of Byran Johnson, a former acquaintance of his who tries to reverse the aging process – we grabbed it. (Diamandis, now 63, says he is “Biological 39. ”)

You can hear that conversation here;; Meanwhile, you will find extracts, edited for length, below.

Recently, you tweeted: “We are so close to the velocity of longevity that I request you to remember that your only responsibility is now to prevent you from dying from something stupid.” What inspired it specifically?

I feel like we are in the midst of a health team revolution. And it’s not a coincidence. This is the impact of mostly AI, calculation, sensors, single-cell sequence, cellular medicine-a number of converging technologies (that) help us understand why we age, how to slow it down, stop it, possibly reversing it. There is a concept called Lonvity Escape velocity, and it is the idea that science and medicine today expand your lifespan with a certain time, between a quarter of a year a year, to a third of a year per year. But there will be a point in which science extends your life every year for more than a year. Aubrey de Gray and Ray Kurzweil have the idea pioneers, I investigated it, I invested in it. And the current thinking is that we will hit in the next decade at some point in the next decade – if you are of reasonable means and with good health. And if that’s the case, you don’t want to miss it. You know, you want to be good enough, and you want to be here.

What does ‘reasonable means’ mean? Of course, because there is a lot of concern about what is happening in our society (regarding access to health care), let alone around the world. The numbers moved in the wrong direction.

Is the long life only for the rich? Is that what you ask? First of all, the things you can do now are free. First of all, this is your diet. What you eat is fundamentally important, right? Our bodies are never designed to consume as much sugar as we take. Sugar is a poison in the quantities we take. Earlier 200 years ago, we took the order of a few pounds a year sugar. Today, like 60 pounds a year, we take in sugar. It’s a neuro -inflammatory, it’s a heart inflammation … At the end of the day, your diet is critical. Sleep is fundamental. You need to get seven to eight hours of quality sleep, which means deep sleep and brake; The lack of it will cause you to develop a neurodegenerative disease, Alzheimer’s, whatever it may be. (And) exercise is the biggest thing you can do. I am in the gym five days out of the week, lift weights, maintain muscle mass. This is the key. None of these things cost me money. The cheapest thing, which is very powerful, is your mindset … Optimists live 15% longer than pessimists … So when people say: Oh my God, the long life is only for the rich, I cry dirty. No, it is for people who care about longevity and want to focus on it.

So it’s the base layer …

There is a next level of things that start to cost you access to money, which includes medication and supplements. I take a ridiculous number of medicines and supplements every day, but I have built it up over time. And then there are advanced tests to catch diseases early; The testing ranges in price from $ 500 to $ 50,000, depending on how deep you want to go.

But there is one last important thing. One of the hottest areas of longevity research is called epigenetic reprogramming. So we are all born with 3.2 billion letters from our mother and 3.2 billion letters from our father. This is our genome. This is our software … and you have the same genome if you are born, if you are 20, if you are 50, if you are 100. So why do you look different? This is what genes are and what genes are off. It is kind of the control mechanism to eliminate the genes in different tissues of the body as we grow older. The hottest investment area – and I am also invested in some of these businesses – is epigenetic reprogramming. Can I reprogram your epigenome to take you back to a more youthful state? … In the beginning, if it is risky and it does not work well, the billionaires will take the risks. But once it starts to work well, and we talk a single-digit years, it will be cheap and available to most all.

Is there a company in which you invested, that really illustrates your approach to longevity?

Over the past 30 years (as the founder of the XPrize Foundation), we have introduced about $ 600 million to prices, which produced $ 10 billion to R&D. And a one and a half years ago, I raised $ 157 million and launched a Health team XPrize. So it’s $ 111 million in prize money. The rest of it is to perform the competition and do all the testing. And in this xprize, teams must demonstrate the ability to stop the functional aging in cognition, immune and muscle, which means in population group 60 to 80 years, if I give you this therapy of the winning team, do you think as clear and competent as you were 20 years ago? Is your ability to mount an immune reaction than you are 20 years younger? Is your ability to build and maintain 20 years younger? And we entered that Xprize like 620 teams. It will be awarded by 2030. We are about to give away $ 10 million of the money to the top -40 teams; They each get a quarter million dollars in May this year. So I am very excited. There are all kinds of approaches you can imagine with 620 teams in the competition.

How would you distinguish your thinking in longevity with what Bryan Johnson does Blueprint?

I’ve known Bryan for ten years. I brought him into the longevity industry when he sold Braintree and he moved to LA. I had a company called Human Lonvity … Down in San Diego, and Bryan became an investor in it and a board member in the company, and we separated ways. How can I post it then? You know, what Bryan is doing is N-of-one experimentation. I am very happy that he does. He is kind of a pioneer, and we will see what is happening. I don’t necessarily think that I would talk about my erections at night, but I think he gets a lot of attention in the media. The approach I take through the Xprize Foundation is a large -scale global competition where we try hundreds of different approaches. It is measured exactly. Each team that competes should deal with statistically enough individuals in the right age group to demonstrate that they can do what they say. It is therefore a massive scientifically backed, experimentally normalized competition.

You can hear a lot more about diamandis hereIncluding how he got to know Musk, why he started a health company with Tony Robbins, and how he navigates what can sometimes look like outsiders like interests.