Billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel has revealed that he’s signed up to be cryogenically frozen after his death - but he doesn’t seem too confident about the whole process.
Thiel, who is worth a staggering $8.13 billion according to Bloomberg, has previously spoken about what he believes to be a stagnation in science and tech in the US.
And during a recent interview on the Honestly with Bari Weiss podcast, the billionaire has shown how far he’s willing to go to try and push advancements by agreeing to be frozen as he believes it’s the ‘sort of thing we’re supposed to try to do’. Fair enough.
It was first reported back in 2014, that Thiel, 55, had signed up with a company called Alcor to be frozen after his death.
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In an interview with the Telegraph at the time, he shared his stance on death.
“You can accept it, you can deny it or you can fight it,” he told the publication. "I think our society is dominated by people who are into denial or acceptance, and I prefer to fight it.”
Appearing on the podcast last week, he spoke once again about the possibility of ‘conquering death’ to which he said: “We haven’t even tried. We should either conquer death or at least figure out why it’s impossible.”
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Weiss asked Thiel: “Is it true that you’re signed up to be cryonically preserved when you die so that you might be brought back to life in the future?”
“Yes, but I think of it more as an ideological statement,” Thiel replied.
When asked once again if it was true, he responded: “Sure. I don’t necessarily expect it to work, but I think it’s the sort of thing we’re supposed to try to do."
He was then asked if he’d stumped up the cash to have any loved ones frozen, too.
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“I’m not convinced it works,” Thiel explained. “It’s more, I think we need to be trying these things. It’s not there yet."
According to Alcor, cryonics is ‘the practice of preserving life by pausing the dying process using subfreezing temperatures with the intent of restoring good health with medical technology in the future’.
However, much like Thiel plenty of people don’t think the idea can work.
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Neuroscientist and professor at King’s College London Clive Coen described the procedure as ‘a hopeless aspiration that reveals an appalling ignorance of biology’ to MIT Technology Review last October.
Claire Reid