International Longevity and Cryopreservation Summit in Spain, May 2017
Members of the Spanish longevity science and cryonics communities have organized a conference to be held later this year in Barcelona, Madrid, and Seville. Good for them; it is always pleasant to see the various regional groups of our broader community growing in sophistication and reach. Advocacy and publicity for the cause of radical life extension moves forward one modest step at a time. The more that we talk to the public and the more that we work to build larger networks of supporters, the closer we move towards the realization of technologies that can extend healthy life spans. Further, the cryonics industry remains small enough at this time to benefit considerably from greater efforts to draw together the groups of supporters that exist in numerous countries around the world. We can hope that such an initiative will lead in time to the successful foundation of new cryonics service and support companies outside the US, an evolution of the industry that is long overdue.
Spain will host the first International Longevity and Cryopreservation Summit during May 26-28, 2017. Fundacion VidaPlus will be the main organizer of this world congress, with the help of other leading associations and organizations working on longevity, indefinite lifespans, cryopreservation, and other biomedical areas. Longevity extension has been one of the dreams of humanity since the beginning of recorded history. Even starting the 20th Century average lifespans were just about 40 years in the first industrial nations, and starting the 21st Century average lifespans have doubled again to around 80 years in the most advanced countries. The possibility of doubling again lifespans is increasing rapidly again thanks to exponential technologies and new medical research and development. On a parallel front, cryonics has also advanced considerably since the first spermatozoids were frozen and successfully reanimated about half a century ago. Then followed eggs, embryos, many tissues and complete organs, in different kinds of animals, including some small mammals. What will the future bring? Science and technology should lead the way!
Several institutions have been advancing research on longevity extension, from governments to private companies. Institutions like the Life Extension Foundation and the SENS Research Foundation, to name just two, have been pioneers in promoting investigations and applications on human longevity extension. Additionally, the two major US cryonics institutions, Alcor Life Extension Foundation and Cryonics Institute, have been holding successful regular meetings for their members and other insterested audiences during the last four decades. In Europe, there was an initial regional meeting in Goslar (Germany) in 2010, followed by Dresden (Germany) in 2014, Utrecht (Netherlands) in 2015, and then Basel (Switzerland) in 2016. KrioRus has also been promoting cryonics in Russia and other countries.
Now we are planning to host in Spain the first International Longevity and Cryonics Summit open to people from all continents, with participants coming from the United States to the United Kingdom, from Argentina to Australia, from Africa to China, from Russia to Venezuela. The topics considered will be very broad, ranging from recent medical advances to human cryopreservation. Spain will become the meeting point for this first summit, where there are plans to create an International Cryonics Society to gather and accredit the different groups working around the world. The first part of the May events will be the international congress in English during the weekend of May 27-28 in Madrid, followed by national events in Spanish on May 29 in Madrid, May 30 in Barcelona, and May 31 in Seville. The objective is to combine the international reunions with local audiences and to help promote longevity and cryonics research and development in Spain.