Tucker Carlson sat down with Bryan Johnson, a tech billionaire whose life’s mission is to achieve immortality, for a conversation that predictably veered into deep philosophical territory as the two grappled with questions of purpose and morality in light of the rise of AI superintelligence.
Ep. 89 Bryan Johnson is a very smart, very rich, very well-meaning man who wants to live forever. That sounds like a terrible idea. This is one of the most interesting debates we’ve ever had. pic.twitter.com/XN8BPLvc3b
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) April 5, 2024
Johnson has about 30 doctors working round the clock, monitoring his vitals and recommending substances and workouts for him to increase his body’s longevity. He explains that some of his body parts have obtained the medical age of teenager, despite the fact that he is 46. He claims to have achieved a rate of “accumulating aging damage” that is slower than 88 percent of 18-year-olds. He collected his philosophical arguments for his pursuit into a free book titled Don’t Die, as well as a “fun fiction” novel called We the People.
As part of his “algorithm” to prevent his body from aging, Johnson takes over 100 supplements per day, eats a strict vegan diet of zero processed foods, and goes to bed at 8:30 p.m. (always alone). The program, called “Project Blueprint,” costs him $2 million a year. He made his money by growing multiple healthcare technology companies, including the neuro tech firm Braintree, selling the latter for $800 million. At one point, he even attempted shock therapy on his penis.
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Johnson stressed to Tucker that he aims to make his practices affordable to the point where anyone could do them for themselves, and is making the entire process public and transparent on his venture’s website, blueprint.bryanjohnson.com. His website offers a line of products, such as supplements and his own custom brand of olive oil, for people to copy his regimen.
Johnson went into detail about injecting himself with his son’s blood, explaining that he saw no benefits in himself but his father’s speed of aging reduced from a 70-year-old to a 45-year-old.
Tech millionaire @bryan_johnson is on a mission to stop aging. Part of this experiment included injecting himself with his son’s blood.
Why? He explains: pic.twitter.com/ypATKA7gqe
— Tucker Carlson Network (@TCNetwork) April 5, 2024
Johnson believes that superintelligence, which could figure out how to stop aging in human beings, will force humans to redefine what it is to “be human.” This is because, as Johnson articulates, all traditional explanations of the human condition will evaporate. Previous generations of philosophers all took human mortality as the premise on which they built their meanings; the meaning of life is to reach heaven, to amass wealth to give to your offspring, to have offspring to pass things onto, to be remembered, and to leave a good legacy.
“The only objective of existence was to continue to exist… don’t die.”
Can human existence really be boiled down to merely not dying?
Watch @TuckerCarlson and anti-aging tech millionaire @bryan_johnson debate: pic.twitter.com/WtlerS8uhI
— Tucker Carlson Network (@TCNetwork) April 5, 2024
Tucker repeatedly attempted to bring the conversation back to Mormonism, the religion in which Johnson was raised. However, the tech entrepreneur, who said it would “be nice to have some evidence” for its claims, was not perturbed at the chance that the Creator could smite him for his hubris. “Do you worry about that?” Tucker asked. “Not in the least bit,” Johnson replied.
“I wonder if part of you fears that when you start to say things like we can defeat death, that you won’t be smote down by the God of the universe for assuming His role. Do you worry about that?”
“Not in the least bit.”@TuckerCarlson challenges @bryan_johnson on his mission to… pic.twitter.com/mzidvXiBsa
— Tucker Carlson Network (@TCNetwork) April 5, 2024
Shane Devine is a writer covering politics and business for VT and a regular guest on The Unusual Suspects. Follow Shane’s work here.
Braintree is not a nuero-tech firm….it’s a Fintech company that was acquired by PayPal. Kernel is the nero-tech company he started after his background in fintech.