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Apple Chairman Art Levinson to Head Google Spinoff Dedicated to Solving Age-Related Health Issues

Rogifan said:
Hmm...I'm not sure why Apple would keep Levinson on as chairman. And WTF is Tim Cook giving comments in a Google press release?!! Also, I don't think it's coincidental that Google announced this the week Apple releases new software and iPhones.
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Probably because it has nothing to do with smartphones, but deals more on the matter of health and medicine. That said, WTF are we trying to prolong the human lifespan more than what nature intended it to be. I think, not taking into consideration war, famine and disease, we live quite long lives compared to say 100 years ago. The world is already quite crowded and nature will always find a way to balance things out. Here comes World War Z!
 
pubwvj said:
Oh, really? Not long ago lifespans averaged half as long as they do today. Clean water, sanitation and such are responsible for most of that doubling of lifespans. Sometimes simple little things reduce the death rate and aging of organisms. "Aging" is quite complicated. Perhaps with some other simple things it might again be doubled. I realize there are some people who are bored with life and want to move on but some of us are quite busy and have a lot more to do before we're done. Another thousand years might make a dent in my to-do list...

Hmm... Yet some organisms live for thousands of years and their descendants are also alive.
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The upper end of life span is very complex. It's genetically determined and honed through evolution. Maybe we'd live a thousand years if it were hard to get pregnant or live until reproductive age. Clearly not the case with humans. It's all a delicate balance.

Causes of early death are considered disease, some of which you mentioned. This kind of research goes on everywhere, every day. But I doubt this is what these 'researchers' are looking into though. Most likely they want to lengthen life span beyond genetic predetermination because they think they are so important. That's a waste of money.

Aging and death are natural. Everyone and everything that has ever lived and will ever live, will age and die. Aging does not equal disease.
 
Almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure -- these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

- Steve Jobs



We are going to find ways to make you live longer, stronger, faster. And then we will make more money pushing ads into your face when you're 119 years old. We got this figured out.

- Eric Schmidt
 
IJ Reilly said:
People don't want to live longer? Well, I do, so that kind of shoots your theory.

Dying of cancer is a totally natural death, not that anyone would choose to go that way, except over the many others that even more unpleasant.

The issue here is the vague mission of this company. What are their goals? How are they going to achieve them? Not to be too cynical here, but it seems to me like this is the ultimate good guy move by Google. They get great press, even if this company does nothing of use, which seems highly likely.
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Why would you want to live longer? Do you see how people age by time they are 80. Most can't even drive. What's the purpose of going past 110 years or 120 or 140 years??

This company is trying to find cures to diseases we encounter, not stretch the lifespan by finding ways to prevent skin aging.
 
unplugme71 said:
Why would you want to live longer? Do you see how people age by time they are 80. Most can't even drive. What's the purpose of going past 110 years or 120 or 140 years??

This company is trying to find cures to diseases we encounter, not stretch the lifespan by finding ways to prevent skin aging.
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Lots of people are doing great beyond 90 these days. Driving (as this was life itself), and even working -- generally enjoying life and not fixing to die anytime soon.

You'll get it when you are older.

What this company is trying to do is unknown. Right now, its mission seems to be providing positive PR for Google.

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UnfetteredMind said:
Just what the world needs, more people living longer.
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We're looking for volunteers to make more room for the rest of us. I nominate you to go first.
 
Cancelling death from disease is only a part of the picture. We can't cancel death if we haven't figured out how to cancel wars. Look around and it would seem we've a way to go on that one.
 
IJ Reilly said:
Lots of people are doing great beyond 90 these days. Driving (as this was life itself), and even working -- generally enjoying life and not fixing to die anytime soon.

You'll get it when you are older.

What this company is trying to do is unknown. Right now, its mission seems to be providing positive PR for Google.

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We're looking for volunteers to make more room for the rest of us. I nominate you to go first.
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That's great. And I hope many people do too. And maybe improved health will extend life. But I don't want to be taking meds just to live longer.
 
skunk said:
I believe life is the problem: death is the solution.
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This makes you an honorary Russian, or a dead one.

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unplugme71 said:
That's great. And I hope many people do too. And maybe improved health will extend life. But I don't want to be taking meds just to live longer.
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So the first time a doctor prescribes a medication for you that will save your life, you're going to say, "no thanks doc, I'd really rather die"?

The hell you will.
 
IJ Reilly said:
We're looking for volunteers to make more room for the rest of us. I nominate you to go first.
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I keep hoping for the super volcano in the Yellowstone caldera to go (and that's not too far away from where I live), but it hasn't happened yet :( ;)
 
Doctor Q said:
I expect that self-driving cars will actually save lives, but that occasional failures will be huge black eyes for publicity. Imagine if someone told us that on average flying is safer than driving. We might believe them until a single plane crash frightens us into thinking that flying is much more dangerous.

Google has the funds to study very challenging problems like these. I don't know how successful they'll be but I'm glad they're funding the projects.
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Yes, I see your points. Fully autonomous airliners have been possible for decades now. There's far less to hit in the air, and modern airports have all manner of automatic landing aids.

But would the flying public trust a computer to fly (and especially land) their next flight? I doubt it. Just look at what happens when airport landing assist systems are down. You end up with Asiana Flight 214 crash landing at SFO. Because Asiana 214's pilots only know how to push buttons and haven't had enough training to manually fly an airplane.

Self-driving cars face vastly more real-world hazards than airliners. Close proximity to all manner of obstacles, pedestrians, recumbent bicycles, stop signs obscured by leaves, bad human drivers, icy patches of road in the shade, wet leaves, late afternoon sun glare, unscheduled road maintenance, stopped motorists waving traffic around accidents, and yes, outdated digital maps.

The first person to be injured by a Google self-driven car will be an instant billionaire.
Good thing Google has all that cash on hand. They do, don't they?
 
SockRolid said:
But would the flying public trust a computer to fly (and especially land) their next flight? I doubt it. Just look at what happens when airport landing assist systems are down. You end up with Asiana Flight 214 crash landing at SFO. Because Asiana 214's pilots only know how to push buttons and haven't had enough training to manually fly an airplane.
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I'd wait for the NTSB report but from what we've heard thus far I would not come to this conclusion about the causes of this accident. Situational awareness lapses are not the same as not knowing how. Not even remotely close to the same, really.
 
Solomani said:
If this company remains a Google satellite/subsidiary, and its leader is an Apple Board Chairman.... then this is a massive conflict of interest. The same way that resulted in a Federal investigation into Eric Schmidt (that would be me!) being a Google mole inside Jobs-era Apple.

The conflict of interest is erased once this new company becomes completely independent from Google.... which does not seem to be the case.
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Only that's not at all why Eric Schmidt was being investigated. Nor we he alone in being investigated. But go ahead and spread FUD. The investigation by the FTC had to do whether the two companies (APPLE and Google) violated antitrust laws by sharing common board members.

Mole? LOL. Yeah - ok - live that fantasy...
 
This is why i love google they are in all sorts of things from longetivity, driverless cars, and things that can benefit humankind etc. But of course apple seems to play it safe is sticking to just what they seem to always do which is profits and more profits.
 
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I'm honored Google wants to frolic in the inefficiencies of big pharma, because lets be honest here -- they won't be functioning like a smaller biotech.

This is destined to be about as stinky as current in-house R&D at the "leading" big companies. They'll require Google's large purse to purchase smaller companies IP because nothing will come from internal innovation. They probably picked one of the hardest fields to specialize in too, given that so little is known.

Long gone are the days where companies can act like early Genentech and go on a broad spectrum research bonanza with little thought of commercial valuation. The two don't mix in todays economy -- the excess fat has been trimmed.

They would do better funding academia or starting smaller companies -- if they actually cared about the societal impact over profits.
 
ThisIsNotMe said:
Google simply wants to compile health data for marketing purposes. Nothing more.
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Proof? But asking for proof from most on this board is useless. We all know if it was apple that was doing this then there would have been a much different response from the MR community.
 
samcraig said:
See post #8. Congrats! It only took one page!
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Companies have one goal - to make money for their shareholders.
Google is a company.
Googles only goal is to make money.
Everything Google does is designed to make money.

This is no different.

Nothing "wrong" with what Google is doing but it is incredibly naive to think otherwise.
 
Rogifan said:
As long as this company is independent from Google.
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Rogifan said:
But it got Google on the front page of Time Magazine the same week Apple is launching new iPhones. Only good thing is people don't read magazines anymore. :D
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This is the kind of sickening attitude that needs to be killed in our community. If one company decides to do something great for humanity, we damn well ought to praise that company, or at the very least give it an inkling of respect. There are so many people here that claim to hate Google yet use it every day for search. Hypocrisy at its best. I'm actually getting flashbacks to the Jobs keynote with Bill Gates as a guest... shameful.

Like it or not, Google has done a great deal of great things for the world and for the Apple community. Their research laboratories have created some of the best innovations in the world, like the driverless car, and and their services (Gmail, Google Maps, Search, YouTube) are second-to-none.

Instead of being blind, mindless fanboys, let's think about how we can work together to help improve humanity.

Division between camps is what's causing the crap political and social problems we're having today. Let's be better than this.
 
Oh god no. The last 50 years have revolved around "What The Baby Boomers Want" as it is. Lucky to survive their triggerhappy and predatory economic and military conquests, we're now looking down the barrel of their accumulating health care costs bankrupting/enslaving at least a generation to indentured servitude, and now they want to live forever too? And let me guess, keep voting and calling all the shots from on high too.

Civilizations advancements never come because some revelation is made that changes everyones minds. They're made because the old generation dies off and their kids are just clever enough to see they don't want to live in a world like that anymore, and work to improve it.
 
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