SENS Challenge: the verdict !

[gusl]

Nobody has won the $20,000 SENS Challenge!

Technology Review's article:

Last year, Technology Review announced a $20,000 prize for any molecular biologist who could demonstrate that biogerontologist Aubrey de Grey's "Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence" (SENS) -- a much publicized prescription for defeating aging -- was "so wrong that it was unworthy of learned debate."

P.S. Amazingly, it seems I beat crasch and tdj to the punch this time.

Comments

[thefowle.livejournal.com]

lol.

de Grey does disturb me. as much as i fucking love the "just fucking do it" vibe, there's just something about him that lends an air of discredit to two of my favorite things, longevity treatments and the just fucking do it attitude. i just wish his credentials were more in line with his sermon.

and i really would like to see a good criticism grounded in equally long-sighted stride. most of the current repostes are "we cant do that now", without really addressing feasibility.

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

This debate is a great illustration of how philosophy is important in forming scientific opinions (and how important methodology is for resolving such controversies).

Aubrey is obviously someone who likes promoting radical ideas, and Estep seem like quite the opposite (a "traditional" academic). I personally lean towards the wild ideas side: Aubrey probably wouldn't be too surprised to be proven wrong.

[spoonless.livejournal.com]

Wow... I'm somewhat surprised, but pleased. I skimmed all 3 of the critiques, as well as his responses a month or so ago. And it seemed to me that they had better arguments against it than he had supporting it. However, since their task was to prove his ideas were completely "unworthy of learned debate" I suppose they didn't quite reach the bar. They only made his plan seem unlikely to work... not impossible or unworthy of debate.

While I do think this is excellent news, and I hope that he is right, I still trust the mainstream geneticists more than him. Even if he got all the funding he wants, I wouldn't expect him to do it in such as short a time frame as he thinks he can.

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

I think they should have been more precise about what does and doesn't count as being "worthy of learned debate", with concrete examples.

Personally, I'm pleased that his plans and ideas are being critiqued: if he's going to get anywhere, his ideas need to be exposed and scrutinized as much as possible. He seems to be quite good at getting exposure... unfortunately, as always, it is very hard for outsiders to evaluate the merits of a scientific project or program (since TrustOPedia doesn't exist yet) ...except by looking at things like the scientists' reputation, which may be why Estep et al had to resort to ad hominem, attacking Aubrey's patterns of behavior (or
"misconduct", as they would say).

[tdj.livejournal.com]

I don't solve problems for under 100k!

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

Are you saying that if the prize were bigger, you would have accepted the SENS challenge?

[tdj.livejournal.com]

Nah, I'm just making excuses because I'm lazy.