Options for his talk (we get to vote on which 2 or so he gives): How to be a successful heretic, SENS overview, how to obviate mtDNA mutations, how to eliminate intracellular junk, how to really really prevent cancer, and longevity escape velocity - Shirley Wu

Aubrey starts at 9:36AM with beer in hand :) - Shirley Wu

we get to pick what he will be talking about - Pedro Beltrao

The two picks: How to be a successful heretic and how to really really prevent cancer - Pedro Beltrao

First talk - Not the TED commandments (or How to be a successful heretic) - Shirley Wu

Derides the TED commandments as being so over the top that you can't tell if they're joking or not. Prefers some wisdom from successful heretics instead (Gandhi, Haldane, etc). But there are lots more unsuccessful heretics. How to be successful? - Shirley Wu

why are there so many unsuccessful heretics? - Cameron Neylon

1st rule to be a successful heretic: "Be Right" :) - Pedro Beltrao

get the details right, they are important - Cameron Neylon

There is a lot of crap in theoretical biology ... to be a good heretic you need to know about the current state of the art - Pedro Beltrao

Quote from Sean Carroll, Edge 2008: "Heresy is more romantic than orthodoxy.... but casual heretics can't be bothered [with the details?]... Galileo knew the reigning orthodoxy of his time better than anyone so he was better able to see beyond it" - Shirley Wu

Rule 3 - Be a doer (as well as a talker) ... (I missed the 2nd rule) - Pedro Beltrao

Rule #3 = be a doer (as well as a talker). (what was rule #2? - Doh, missed it too..) - Shirley Wu

Rule #2 Be boastful (about your subject) - Cameron Neylon

talking about the methuselah mouse prize - another example of prize money as a way of motivating scientists when you can't acutally fund the research - Cameron Neylon

Rule 4: be indomitable (?) - Pedro Beltrao

(if not invincible ;) - now showing examples of criticism against his science. - Shirley Wu

Rule 5: be diplomatic (maybe not all the time) - Pedro Beltrao

Rule 6: Be everywhere - Pedro Beltrao

(a pint is worth 1000 words) - a conversation over alcohol can make all the difference - Shirley Wu

to respond to critics he says running around conferences is important - Pedro Beltrao

Rule 7: have a sense of humor (?) showing a clip of him with Colbert in Colbert report - Pedro Beltrao

rule 8: be inspirational - Pedro Beltrao

The Colbert Report clip was an example of Rule 7: be pithy (under pressure) - Shirley Wu

Rule 9: Be selfless (control is only a means to an end). Basically get out of the way when the idea grows - Pedro Beltrao

It seems Aubrey gives about 40 talks a year. That's a lot of talk/travel - Ricardo Vidal

Rule 10: reiterates rule 1 - Be right - with an emphasis on effective communication to both experts and laymen - Shirley Wu

comments on the importance of proper organisational structure and good management. Richard Branson when asked about his successs said 'detailed management accounts' - Cameron Neylon

Second half of keynote: How to really really cure cancer. Claims that cancer is the hardest part of aging to solve. We can probably solve other aspects of aging pretty soon, add decades to human life. But if we don't cure cancer, we'll just die later, and die horribly. - Shirley Wu

Why is cancer the hardest part to solve? Cancer is the only part of aging that has natural selection on its side. "The smarter we get, the smarter it gets." 6Gb of DNA is a lot to play with. Treatment selects for mutants that resist treatment. Is there a cleaner solution than drug/treatment "cocktails"? - Shirley Wu

cancer is the only aging related problem that has evolution on its side.Each cancer cell is an evolutionary (?)furnace - Pedro Beltrao

is there are 'clean' approach to cancer treatment or are we stuck with 'cocktails' such as HIV treatment - Cameron Neylon

proposal he is going to make is not what he wants to happen - therapy of last resort. What is being worked on at the moment might work and that would be better - Cameron Neylon

He is thinking of a last resort solution to cancer , not what he wants to happen - Pedro Beltrao

selection can only do so much - the problem with cancer is that it works by doing some rather easy and common - changing gene expression levels. But what about gene existence changes? - Cameron Neylon

Proposed therapy: WILT - Whole-body Interdiction of Lengthening of Telomeres - Shirley Wu

Proposal is to re-engineer a person every decade of so with stem cells that are delted for telomerase and ALT genes - ok he said it was radical - Cameron Neylon

Here are a couple photos: http://flickr.com/photos... - Ricardo Vidal

current treatments only try to restrain metastasis - by removing telomerase cancers don't make it through crisis stage - Cameron Neylon

4 paths: Without any cancer treatment, cancer activates telomere elongation, malignant metastasis, death. With current and foreseeable treatment, you just cycle back to the start of malignancy but usually can't regress for sure. With just telomerase deletion you get indefinite regression but eventually your renewable tissues stop renewing (aging). WILT is the 4th option, combining telomerase deletion with indefinite replenishment of renewable tissues - Shirley Wu

Question: there might be other functions of telomerase that are important. - Pedro Beltrao

Question: is "heresy" the right term to describe controversy between scientists and the rest of the scientific community? (examples of Galileo and Gandhi were battling against external pressures, differences in morality). Anyone catch the answer? - Shirley Wu