The viewpoint driving groups like the Lifeboat Foundation and the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology is illustrated well in this post from Accelerating Future: "There are two sides to living as long as possible: developing the technologies to cure aging, such as SENS, and preventing human extinction risk, which threatens everybody. Unfortunately, in the life extensionist community, and the world at large, the balance of attention and support is lopsided in favor of the first side of the coin, while largely ignoring the second. I see people meticulously obsessed with caloric restriction and SENS, but apparently unaware of human extinction risks. There's the global warming movement, sure, but no efforts to address the bio, nano, and AI risks. ... if we develop SENS only to destroy ourselves a few years later, it's worse than useless. It's better to overinvest in existential risk, encourage cryonics for those whose bodies can't last until aging is defeated, and address aging once we have a handle on existential risk, which we quite obviously don't." I disagree with this viewpoint; I think that history shows people do pay attention and organize to deal with threats of this nature as they become apparent; the Lifeboat Foundation is a part of that process. If anything, the problem is overreaction to perceived threats - and manipulation and exploitation of those who understand such threats poorly - while research and progress towards transformative goals like radical life extension is underfunded, poorly understood and much slower than it might be.

Link: http://www.acceleratingfuture.com/michael/blog/?p=539