Sergey Young: Well, let's talk about longevity, okay? And so, when I, if you look at my book, I'm talking about, you know, three different time horizons. So one is now. It's actually right in the end of the book, in the bonus chapter. Again, it's twice as long as any other chapter in the book. There are so many things that you can do right now. And it's today is like high-tech part, high tech part of today is really about power of wearables, which are becoming our personalised healthcare devices. It's not activity tracker anymore. It's something which will really help you to monitor and manage your health and manage a lot of risks on a day-to-day, on like minute-to-minute basis, actually. Right now and very soon. And the other high-tech part of it is like early diagnostic, just using like this all these three Tesla MRIs, the beauty of medical screening to detect killer monster diseases, which are responsible for 90% of our deaths after the age of 50, which are cancer, heart disease, diabetes and neurodegenerative diseases, at least in developed world. Yeah, just doing the medical screening every year. As I always say, the most important day of your life every year is the day of your medical screening. You know, my wife has a kind of different answer to that question and she disagreed with me, but I actually think like when I have 30 seconds on longevity, I push people to do their medical screening. And it should be as comprehensive as possible that you can really afford, and it should be at least once a year. And I'm doing this every year in San Diego, California, in Human Longevity Centre. But you don't need to go to San Diego. Proper check-up is not a rocket science. Any meaningful, experienced doctor will be able to advise you on and arrange it for you. So that's actually about now. And so that's the high-tech part of it and low-tech part, we just discussed it, it's your lifestyle changes, okay? So then in a book, majority of the book is actually dedicated to so-called the near horizon of longevity innovations. And these are technologies and and scientific discoveries which will be available to all of us in the next 5, 10, 15 years. And there are many of things and this is where we actually invest with my longevity vision fund. We're investing in, we're looking at 200 companies a year to invest in eight or 10 of them. And when people ask me like, Sergey, what are the most exciting technologies which should be available to us in a decade or two, which will help us to break this sound barrier of 122 years, the maximum lifespan on earth and add decades of healthy and happy years to our life. I'm always talking about three things. So one is gene editing and gene therapy. Because we already know all 3,000 genes in our DNA. We can either amend the DNA, which is basically gene editing, or we can influence the way these genes express themselves inside our body. So this is called epigenetic. And actually epigenetic reprogramming is one of the things that Professor Sinclair from Harvard Medical School and many, many other talented scientists are working on. So if we can influence this expression of these genes, then we can actually reverse aging inside our bodies on a genetic level. And if we can reverse our own age by three years, become three years younger in the course of eight weeks, just by changing sleep, exercise and diet, imagine what we can do on a genetic level. We can actually fight, you know, all the rare genetic diseases. And while they're called rare, there are 400 million people on earth who are suffering from rare diseases all together. So that's one. And we, we actually on gene editing, we made a huge progress on that. 25 years ago, it took 13 years and I think it was $3 billion for the United States to sequence human genome. Right now, you can do it in just in a few hours and it costs few hundred bucks, right? This is how far we went on that thing. So the second piece is what I call longevity in a pill. I'm talking about a completely different class of drugs, category of drugs, which would not look at the symptoms of particular disease, but would help us to to manage aging process and influence aging processes inside our bodies, slow them down, you know, kind of freeze your aging process or even reverse them. And it can easily be a new drug developed with the help of artificial intelligence. AI changed a lot in healthcare. AI is is a theme in probably three-fourths of our investments and longevity vision fund. And or it can easily be a repurposed drug, the drug that we already know like metformin, the old diabetes drug that we know for probably at least 60 years with pretty safe risk profile. It's still a prescription drugs in majority of countries, so you'll need to see your doctor and consult with him or with her. But it seems to me that metformin can be a good candidate for longevity drug. We still need to run a human trial and there's a very good friend who I'm seeing in Boston this Sunday, Professor Nir Barzilai, who is together with the American Federation of Aging Research, I'm a board member of AFAR, American Federation of Aging Research, are trying to start the massive 3,000 people study where in the course of few years, metformin is going to be tested in the context of longevity drug, not only as a diabetes drug. So the side effect of metformin, and this is the hypothesis we need to test in the scientific terms, is certain life extension for all of us, or at least for the group which are predisposed for or have higher risk of diabetes. So that's, that's the second piece of the near horizon of longevity innovation called longevity in a pill. And the third one is replaceable organs or organ regeneration. This is part of the bigger area called regenerative medicine, like stem cells are there as well. But well, think about the old car. We can extend as a metaphor, we can extend the lifespan if you want of the old car just by replacing, you know, different parts. You can even replace like an engine. And I think the technology and the approach of the future for us is at least as far as we remained in the current biological form, is going to be to replace organs or systems inside our bodies. In fact, actually two most difficult things to replace are our brain and our heart, which is not a surprise. But then we just, it's just an example. So you like to replace organs, you can use different avenues, like you can actually 3D print organs. We still are not there in terms of massive production, in terms of compatibility of 3D printed organs with our bodies, but a lot of 3D printed organs printed from biomaterials are actually used for scientific experiments. And this is, this is great relief and huge efficiency driver of scientific experience because before that you would actually need to use either animal models or human organs for this experiments. So you can do like 3D printed organs, you can use other animals to regrow human organs, like pigs, we're very genetically close with pigs. Or you can actually regrow organs inside our body, in our lymph nodes. And three years ago, we invested in a company called Lygenesis. They're based in Pittsburgh. Amazing company. What they do, they take donor liver. And by the way, like liver transportation is, at least in the US, is extremely expensive procedure. It's six to $800,000. You would need to wait for a month for your donor liver to arrive and and be available. And in terms of like organ transportation, it's a huge shortage of organs. As far as I recall, last year we had like 117,000 people who were on the waiting list for donor. Some people die while they're waiting for their organs. So what you can do, you can take donor liver, split it into 50 to 70 pieces. Well, here's your opportunity to help, you know, not to give a hand of help not to one person, but like 50 to 70 people from one donor liver. And they put it there inside your lymph node. It's actually right here, with a very simple surgery. And then in the course of three to six months, your body will regrow the new liver. And it's just a lot of interesting things happening. In fact, your new liver, like a liver B, stops to grow exactly at the moment when it takes all the, you know, necessary function which is suitable and needed for your body. That's actually pretty cool. So they've done a lot of studies in animal models, like with dogs, with primates, obviously mice, pigs, etc. And it was very successful. And this January, actually, 2022, they started, they got FDA approval and they started human trials. And they had huge demand to be participating in that with people from people who have like a terminal liver disease and about to die from their unfunctioning liver. So I'm like really excited about our ability to replace organs or regrow organs and therefore extending the healthy part of our life called healthspan. So that's really briefly around three most exciting avenues, three most exciting fields of science and technology, which would help us to live far beyond 80 or 100 years, which seem to be like a current limit for human lifespan.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think just to anchor the listener as to why we're talking specifically about these different areas of longevity research and funding. If you think back to the different hallmarks of aging, there's inflammation, there's epigenetic changes, there's there's breaks in the DNA. There's a whole bunch of different areas. And then also at a political and science level, aging isn't as recognised as it should be as a disease in itself, which is the root cause as to why we see cardiovascular disease, strokes, dementia, the the suite of of issues that we we lump as lifestyle related. So I think, you know, going after those root mechanisms behind why those actually lead to the diseases of aging is basically where it sounds that your investments are concentrated. And a lot of people don't don't hear this and they don't understand why this is so important because we're not just talking about this narcissistic endeavour to make us all immortal. It's actually about looking at how we can improve the healthspan as well as the lifespan as well.
Sergey Young: Yeah. So I you're exactly right. And our chances or risk to suffer from, you know, all these terminal diseases or killer diseases that I call them, increase exponentially after aging processes start to start to manifest inside our bodies. It's usually starts from the age of 40 to 45 with certain deviations, but like after age of 50, like every few years will increase the chances of getting and dying from, you know, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, neurodegenerative disease exponentially. And and and you're right, there's no economic and regulatory model today to invest in longevity and aging. Like do a simple experiment. Go to, well, if we are in UK, go to Boots, right? Or if you're in the US, go to Walgreens or CVS and ask for drug against aging. They would think you're crazy or they would just send you to cosmetics or to supplement section, right? And I I don't think it's actually logical. If we can influence something, you know, on the roots level, on the, you know, on the underlying level, we should use this opportunity.
Dr Rupy: Absolutely. And you've used this term in the book called longevity escape velocity or radical longevity extension. I would love for you to give us an insight into what you think the world might look like in a little bit longer. And I know you're known for saying if you just last an extra 15 or 20 years time, you're going to have access to all these technologies that are rapidly growing that could even, you know, bring us even further. So what what does that like waking up in in 50 years time look like and and the things that you're most excited about as well?
Sergey Young: Yeah, so this is what I call the far horizon of longevity innovation. And these are the things which will be available to us in the next 25 to 50 years. I'm actually waiting for this with combination of excitement and fear, okay? So some of these technologies are really, I couldn't really accept the fact that we're going to be using that. But knowing what I know about longevity field as an insider, let me share with you what are my takeaways about this whole thing. And by the way, when I'm talking about this, my, you know, keep in mind that the ethical dimension of this is extremely important. Because we seem to be like creating technologies to extend our life, but we haven't created life that we want to extend. 60 to 80% of the people don't want to live longer. I mean, so there's just a lot of misconceptions about longevity, but let's not discuss that. So what I'm saying, we need to fix this world, like inequality, you know, different social constructs, our relationship with modern nature before we can actually enjoy our life in a different form or with completely different longer healthspan and lifespan. Okay, so and by the way, I've just last year, I've done, it was in London, I've done a TEDx talk called Morality of Immortality. So if if you guys have 15 minutes, you can take a look at this as well. So moral implication of that is important. So how the world will look like in 25, 50 years from now? Well, remember the near horizon of longevity innovation? And I told you like, within the near horizon, we will be able to break this sound barrier of 122 years. We'll have all the technology and all the science to live beyond 120 years, probably to 150, like whatever the number is. So what's next? I do believe that it's almost impossible for us to live beyond 150 years in the current biological form. So in the future, man and machine will become one, okay? And it's going to be, it's actually the theme for my next book, for my second book. And we are, we're going to be living in a, in a world where humans going to be, we're going to be different version of humans, like it's going to be world of human argumentation, it's going to be world of human body and mind 2.0. And what are the technologies that we're going to enjoy? We all going to be full of sensors. Sensors will, will be embedded and and they're actually going to be interconnected. So we'll have similar to internet of things that you know today, we're going to have internet of bodies from the word body in the future. And it's going to be artificial intelligence which will help us on the individual and a societal level to manage and monitor our health. It's going to be world of nanobots which are going to be flowing inside our different liquids inside our body and kind of fixing different problems, doing diagnostic as well. It's going to be a world of human avatars. And funny enough, we were about to invest in in avatars and we were hesitating between robotic form and and virtual avatars. And it seemed to me, actually, and it was shocking for me to realise that reconstructing ourselves in a virtual environment was much more efficient and cheaper. So, and I hated this idea, so we didn't invest to robotic avatars because we were not sure they they had a winning dimension of this development because I hated the idea of living in in a virtual environment. But it was very interesting. So for the for my book, when when we were covering the human avatar part of the text, I actually interviewed Professor, I think his name is Sasumi Tachi. He's from Japan, and he was the one who invented human avatar concept back in 1980. He's still called it tele-existence. Amazing guy. And I also spoke to Peter Jackson, the man behind Avatar, Lord of the Rings, Hobbits movies about the future of the world and the influence of avatars on that. Our brain going to be interconnected with computer power and with artificial intelligence. Funny enough, we already have this integration with computer power with and with artificial intelligence. And it's our smartphones. We outsource a lot to our smartphones. Like the simple example is we outsource the task of memorising phone numbers to our smartphones, right? I just know like phone number of my wife and my assistant. That's that's basically it. Yeah, not even my parents. And this is what done, we're just using very inefficient interface today. Like I'm using my eyes, you know, ears, you know, to and my fingers to type something. This will change. So man and machine will become one, brain computer interface, similar to what is done today by Elon Musk in Neuralink. And and and the trade-off here it's between kind of invasive form of this integration versus non-invasive form of integration between the brain and computing power. That's basically it. So here's the world. And then you already touched on the point of immortality. I'm not a big fan of immortality at all. I actually think if you take out the death from the human life cycle, we're not going to be humans. But again, knowing what I know from the field, it doesn't look like we would need to decide one day whether we're becoming immortal or not. The way it's going to look like technically, it's like every 5 to 10 years, you will need to decide, are you going to live another 5 to 10 years? Are you going to embrace and enjoy and use the the latest outcome of, you know, available science and available technology to extend your lifespan. So that's, that's the whole idea. So it's going to be like a series of your life extension decision every three, five, 10 years. And it's actually it raises a lot of moral issues as well because in the current world, your decision not to extend your life is considered a suicide or considered like a playing God. So just a lot of things that we need to change, debate and discuss on a societal level from the ethical perspective to switch into this paradigm of living. But I'm pretty sure it's going to be available for everyone because the way technology develop itself, we're talking about the huge democratization coming to the healthcare. And almost every technology that we invest in in longevity vision fund, remember my mission and our mission is to bring affordable and accessible version of medicine and technology to the world. Decrease the cost of the against the current treatment or current intervention, current way to deal with particular disease by factor of 5, 10, sometimes even 20 times. So the future medicine going to be data driven, technology based, and it's going to be much, much cheaper to the extent that I do believe and I this is my dream that one day the highest and the best version of healthcare services is going to be offered to everyone for free. But I'm always been idealistic, so what voices of some skeptical guys as well.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I I'm an eternal optimist, but I do hear a lot of pessimism around this, particularly when it comes to equality. But I think you you made a really nice parallel in the book with the inventors of the of human flight, Wright brothers and a few others as well about how, you know, initially when you're even broaching the idea of human flight, it's A, ridiculous and B, you know, once you do achieve it, it's inaccessible to the majority. But, you know, decades later, it's accessible to most people on average incomes. It's allowed an incredible amount of globalization, we can experience cultures around the world, and we see it as a net positive thing, aside from the environmental pollution aspects, which hopefully we'll be figuring out as well. So I think that's a nice lens to view longevity in.
Sergey Young: I agree. I agree. All right, we live in a world when Ryanair or EasyJet will, you know, bring you from A to B with the same speed like private jet or, you know, business class on British Airways. And I really enjoy it.
Dr Rupy: What what's your main sort of argument against people who say that we shouldn't be entertaining this idea, particularly with regard to how we are going to be uploading our memories and our personality onto the cloud, which almost seems quite inevitable. I mean, we already do a lot of sharing across social media, albeit in a relatively analog way. It's just like an extra step towards that. Like all my stories, all my information, everything is on social media, it's on my website, everything's already been uploaded. So it doesn't seem that far a step for integration.
Sergey Young: Yeah. So what I think, well, number one, we doubled our average lifespan in developed world in the last 100 years. So it's, you know, it's went up from 35 to 40 years. Think about this, the average person 100 years ago were living in this world, you know, for like 35 years, okay? And so we almost doubled that. It's it's well above 70 years and above 80 years in some of the countries like Switzerland, Japan, Singapore as well. So no one had a debate whether we need to increase the average lifespan from 40 to 80, okay? So this this will continue and and this will grow. And right now when we have the access to exponential technology and and and different scientific breakthroughs again, supported and enabled by exponential computing power that we have, I don't think it's it's really, it's really a matter of choice. It's almost inevitable from from this perspective. So that's one. Second thing, we tend to think about ourselves as a peak, as a like maximum of what human of evolution of human beings and homo sapiens will look like. But we're just part in in in this evolution process, right? And and future humans, well, they they should not necessarily be similar to us. So we'll just we'll have another dimension, right? Or the horizon within the human evolution process as well. And there are a number of, you know, things there, like people always ask me like, will mother planet sustain this whole growing population? And my answer is always like, well, think about food. Like in the US only, 45% of food goes to waste every evening from restaurants, households, supermarkets. This is ridiculous. We have enough food on this planet to feed more and more people, not to talk about advancements in in agriculture. Energy, like renewable energy sources will will be super helpful in this regard. And and in terms of population of on earth, if you look at the latest studies, the way it looks like, it's going to peak somewhere around 2050 from current 8 to 10 or 11 billion people, and then it's it's going to go down to eight again by the end of the century. China alone will will lost in the current, in the current rates will lose 600 million people from 1.4 to 800 people. And and and all all the parts of the world with the exception of Africa, which will retain the positive reproduction rate. The rest societies and and population on country by country basis will become older, but more efficient, more productive and younger in biological age terms. So for me, it's not an option to bring longevity technology to the world. It's a response to this silver tsunami and massive demographic changes that we already seen and we'll see in the future. And like forget about 2050. I was just speaking this summer, sorry, summer 2021, I was speaking at Singapore and Singapore will have 25% of its population at the age of 65 and above by the end of this decade. So the time is now, we need to respond to that.
Dr Rupy: So we actually started our conversation talking about this area, supplements, his daily routine, but I thought it would probably be better to listen to this in the second half. So we've flipped around the podcast. So you're going to hear now all of Sergey Young's incredible morning routines and how that aligns with the longevity technologies that he's aware of and why that might have benefits for yourself. One, I'm father of four. So they're like the best day for me is just Saturday and Sunday when I can spend time with four of my kids, okay? And we live by the river in a huge house. We rent this, I'm not owning this. Because all my resources, I'm not Elon Musk, but like he's a great model for me. All my resources are committed to longevity and investment, not necessarily to owning any piece of real estate. So we live by the river and I usually do like three or four hours of walking while listening to podcasts and, you know, different scientific lectures as well. So if you do, if you, if you look at like Monday to Friday, so what do I do? When I start, I have like 30 minutes. It's not a magic morning. I don't know if your audience is familiar with the magic morning book and routine. It's not like a magic morning, but this is my version of the magic moment. So I need to do something for my body, I need to do something for my brain, and I need to do something for my soul. So body, it's usually, I I six out of seven mornings, uh, during the week with exception of Saturday morning, I start with physical exercises. So, you know, twice a week I do yoga and stretching, twice a week I do functional training, and twice a week I do Pilates. So that's, that's kind of my body thing. Uh, then for, for my brain, uh, I I just usually do like five or 10 minutes of reading. And, and usually it's pretty, you know, science heavy literature, uh, or something dedicated to human health and biology. Uh, like the latest read was Younger You by Dr. Kara, uh, I think it's Kara Fitzgerald, who's done this amazing study when they reversed the aging in a group of people by three years. So all of them became three years younger in a course just of just eight weeks. Changing, what is the miracle tools? Sleep habits, physical exercise habits and the diet. I love it. I love it when we all can become younger, almost like free of charge in a course of eight weeks. So younger you. I'm reading the new Keith Ferrazzi, uh, book about, he called it present of work, not the future of work. He's a very good friend of mine. Keith Ferrazzi is the author of Never Eat Alone, like the best and and the most famous networking book, uh, in the world, I think. Uh, so, so that's, that's my kind of brain stuff. When I'm just trying to read something in the morning which I can use for my kind of thinking processes and reflection time, uh, during the day. And for the soul, it's usually, I like, I'm like less disciplined of doing, uh, in doing something for my soul. So like every, and I'm doing this probably every second morning, not every morning, uh, because I'm kind of lazy and, uh, have attention deficit disorder. I have so many things on my plate intentionally. Uh, it's usually like meditation or gratefulness or reading something, uh, of the spiritual nature. That's it. Yeah. So like once a week, I just do like meditation on, uh, how do you call it in English? It's like, uh, nail beds. So I'm like, you know, piece of wood with a lot of nails on it and you just stand on that. Yeah, it's pretty painful. This is like probably the most painful experience I've ever had. But after first five minutes, you actually can stay on that for as long as you want. I usually do like 40 to 50 minutes and it's, uh, it's very interesting. So that's, that's my morning routine. So then I do, so I'm just trying to integrate in the picture of my day for our audience. I'm just trying to integrate different longevity habits that I'm I'm using. So it's kind of one. Then the second thing, if if you look at my kind of food consumption pattern, I am big fan of fasting, which is not a surprise because there's a lot of disagreement in the scientific communities, what actually extends our lifespan, but there's one agreement. Uh, decreasing our calorie intake would actually add at least two, three or even five healthy years to your life. So I'm I'm a big fan of it. I I love this whole kind of access of energy that I get in the end of fasting. So I I actually do like two types of fasting, three types. One, every day, I you know, I try to fast at least for like 18 hours, including my sleep time. And then my, so my food consumption window is within like six hours. And it's, I'm not really a morning person. So that's why it's always like a lunch and a dinner between 12 and six. So that's kind of one type of fasting. It's called intermittent fasting. Obviously, you your audience heard about this this thing. And it's like easiest thing to to, uh, where you can start developing your fasting habits. The second type of fasting, which is weekly fast, I usually do Sunday evening to Tuesday morning and it's 36 hour fast. And I love it as well. I started with 24 hours, but then I thought, okay, you know, I'm going to go to bed in the next hour or two, okay? So can I just extend my fast for like from 24 hour to like 36 hour? Uh, because I'm sleeping anyway. I mean, I'm not taking any food, uh, during my sleep time. So this is what I do on a weekly basis. And then once every six months, I'm going to detox centre and I usually do like four to five days fast. All of my fasting is with, uh, like a lemon water or herbal tea, etc. I actually tried like a dry fasting a few times for like 36 hours without any liquid taken. I like it more, but I still didn't feel that it's it's like the friendliest routine to my body. So I actually, I actually thought like fasting with water or herbal tea is, uh, like a safest way to do it. For some of the people, it's, uh, fasting cannot be natural or against their medical condition. So like if you, if you're trying to experiment with fasting, probably intermittent fasting is fine to experiment with, but for longer fast, I would actually consult with your doctor first and then you can, you can start it. So I I love this, this whole fasting thing and that's why. So my diet is mostly plant-based. Because this is the easiest, I mean, it's easy to say, Sergey, you need to, you know, eat at least or take out at least 20 or 25% of your calorie intake, but it's really difficult to do. So fasting is helpful because automatically you just take out a lot of, uh, extra calories from your day or from your week. Um, my second, uh, tool on that, I don't do any added sugar food or drinks. And and actually, you know, I'm, uh, uh, I'm a CEO of the fund. So my team, uh, they don't have a choice, like getting access to sugar drinks. So if you look at our small kitchenette that we have in the in the office, it's it's like lemonade that we produce ourselves with no sugar, just lemon, grapefruit, uh, there as well, uh, different herbal teas, decaf coffee is always offered. I'm on decaf coffee for the last, um, four years, because I'm very, I'm very like receptive to the caffeine. Uh, and like if I would drink a couple of espressos of like 2:00 p.m., then I'll go to bed around 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. And actually my deep sleep moves from kind of midnight or from the beginning of the sleep time towards the morning, which is not really helpful. But I love coffee. So, you know, I do like three or five espresso equivalents every day with, uh, usually with coconut milk. Uh, and, um, and I really, I actually do think the current level of development of, um, coffee production, uh, is so advanced, so you couldn't really tell the difference whether it's, you know, uh, decaf or normal coffee, uh, as well. So then again, how do I decrease my calories? One is is mostly plant-based. Uh, sorry, first is fasting, second, yeah, took out all the sugar, uh, from food and drinks. And third, I'm mostly plant-based. I'm not really religious in terms of, you know, becoming a vegetarian, but a lot of my friends are vegans. Um, but I'm trying to balance my diet. So I decrease really radically my my intake of animal protein and fish protein as well. And if if I do it, then it's, uh, in most of the cases, uh, is organic. Um, and some people think it's expensive. I I was actually looking at the study done in the US a couple of years ago, when when, uh, on the family basis, if family switch to more plant-based version of the diet, so like integrate more plants and vegetables in their diet, and they prepare it at home, they actually saves at least $950 per household on on an annual basis. So that's, that's actually healthy for your finances, um, as well. So that's kind of food stuff. Um, I'm trying not to eat after 6:00 p.m. though I you know, I love doing that, but, uh, it's not necessarily helpful for my sleep as well. So we'll come back to the sleep in the end of, um, of conversation. So what we covered, uh, morning, uh, fasting and diet habits and physical exercises. We we did discuss, you know, that I'm doing something like six out of seven days, um, every week. What is important for me is doing my 10,000 steps a day. And we have this binary view of, um, of, uh, how our physical activity should look like. So it's either, you know, I'm I'm just sitting at home, uh, watching the screen where other people do, uh, football, you know, or, uh, any other sport. So this is my way to exercise. Or the other extreme, you know, I need to run a marathon, or I need to, uh, become an Iron Man or Iron Woman. So I do think there's something in between and and doing 10,000 steps a day, measured by your favorite wearable, whatever you like, um, is a great baseline because it helps your body, like it helps with a lot of things in terms of your metabolic balance, um, joints, um, bones, uh, muscles, uh, activity, etc. So, um, that's what I'm doing and I'm again, I'm like in my case, I'm using either Whoop or or Apple Watch to measure 10,000 steps a day as well. And I'm integrating walking in a lot of, um, activities that I do during the day. Usually at least one or two Zoom calls, I'm doing when I'm walking and it's pretty cool. I have a very strong right hand because of that, because I need to carry my smartphone so people can see me on Zoom, but it's, uh, I think it's it's kind of cool that we can integrate walking in so many parts of our life. What else? Uh, obviously, you know, I I'm avoiding all the bad habits. So I'm not smoking. I did, uh, probably four years of smoking when I was young and when I was a student, but it was 25 years ago. I'm 50 now. Uh, if you in by my chronological age, my biological age, yeah, so my biological age is somewhere around 43 at the moment. But it was 25 years ago and, uh, and so I don't do smoking because smoking is like literally 10 minus 10 minus 10 years from your lifespan and healthspan. It's almost like a cancer lottery, you know, in a way. I'm always using my seat belts, even if I'm on a rare seat and even if when I'm in a country where you can actually avoid using your seat belts on a rare seat of your car. Um, I don't, I avoid, you know, all this spike of interest into motorcycle riding, what I've seen in the circle of my friends. I don't know if you've seen this, uh, graph, um, or this chart. I think it was done by Harley Davidson and, um, it's for the male and and how the sales volume for motorcycles look through the years, through the age, different age cohorts for men. So it's like this, this and this, and then around 45, it peaks like that, and then it goes down. So motorcycle riding is 17 times more mortal and more dangerous than driving the car. So, uh, so this this whole piece that we just discussed in the last two minutes, for me is don't die stupid or don't do stupid things for passive longevity, if you want to have a polite way of, um, uh, saying that. Um, so we mostly covered, uh, this one. And finally, in terms of our spiritual health, there there's important part of my, you know, different longevity buckets that I cover in the book. By the way, the book called The Science and Technology of Growing Young. It was published August last year and immediately became Wall Street Journal bestseller, USA Today bestseller, number one on Amazon in three different categories. So it became very popular. The the largest part of the book, the largest chapter in the book is a bonus chapter called Who Wants to Live Forever, but it's not about living forever, it's about 10 longevity choices that you can make. And so, um, and I do believe that, um, the final part of it, which I call a peace of mind, is extremely important. So I actually put sleep there because sleep is very important for our hormonal and, uh, our mental health as well. My rule is eight hours in the bed, which is seven hours of sleep. And, uh, quoting one of my friends who, uh, owns, uh, and runs longevity clinic in London, uh, every evening, we can visit the most powerful clinic in the world. Uh, we go to bed. So it's it's a it's a really nice way of, um, of putting or highlighting the importance of sleep for us. I'm I I changed my relationship with sleep after reading, um, Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker. And, uh, before that, I was just using my sleep hours like an endless credit to do some other stuff in life. Right now, I'm I'm actually pretty disciplined in terms of spending eight hours in the bed. And I'm I'm using Oura ring during the night. So I'm taking out my Whoop and I'm taking out my Apple Watch. Um, and I do think Oura has a very good algorithm, specifically Oura 3, uh, for different sleep stages. So I'm trying to maximize my deep sleep for this to be at least two hours every night. I started with 30 to 45 minutes and, uh, I think it was Dave Asprey, uh, very good friend, uh, father of biohacking in the world and Matthew Walker with, uh, his book influenced me and gave me a lot of, uh, small tips how to, uh, structure my approach to sleep and maximize my deep sleep and my sleep hours, uh, as well. Um, yeah, but also the rest is like meditation, uh, sense of purpose. It is very important to have healthy relationship with, uh, with the world. Give more than you take, make other people winners, manage your ego and, uh, trying to do something for the world to become a better place. So this is, I found my mission back in 2014 after my personal health crisis and, uh, it's been probably the most enjoyable part of my life. Um, and there's the other and final comment on that, um, I actually start my day with mantra while I'm still in the bed. And this mantra is in the context of psychological aspects of aging. Uh, there's a part of my book, it's actually called Think and Grow Young, uh, which, which says like, if you think about yourself like as a younger person, your body will respond to that on so many levels and systems. So a few years ago, I started to to begin my day with the mantra, uh, which I'm repeating a few times in the morning and it says, I'm going to be living 200 years in the body of 25 years old man. And my body responds to that beautifully. Um, so in fact, I actually have four ages, if you want to hear about this. One is chronological. I'm I'm 50 years old. I'm 50 years young, okay, I'm Sergey Young. So 50 years young. Then my biological age measured by a set of biomarkers and photo and video age, which is basically AI measuring, uh, predicting your biological age by using your photo and video is 43 years. Then I feel myself like I'm 35 years young. And then but my target age, psychological age is you just heard is 25. So I have like four different ages and this is a beautiful psychological experiment that all of us can do. Just in the next month or so, start every morning with with your thoughts that you are much, much younger than, uh, than the figure that you see in your own passport. And look how your body and and mind will respond to that. You'll see the difference. It's just amazing. And I okay, so I can go on and on about, you know, different, we still haven't covered supplements. This is my supplements. Yeah. Yeah, this is my afternoon set of supplements. I'm a big fan of supplements because I'm a typical placebo guy. Like 30 to 40%, 30 or 40% of the supplements, um, like an impact on our health is actually driven by placebo effect. So if I if I do believe that it actually works well for my body, then it works well. Uh, so, um, I love it.
Dr Rupy: Yeah. I love it. You know, you know, as I was listening to your day and all the things that you talk about, you sound like someone who listens to the Doctor's Kitchen podcast and has put everything in action there, which is great to hear because you know, we talked about fasting with Walter Longo, we've had a number of different researchers looking at sleep as well. And so it's lovely to hear that it's actually been put into practice. But I guess, you know, when you're in this, when you're in this field, it's very hard to not want to put these things into action immediately. And I guess what I'd love to get your opinion on, given that, you know, you live and breathe this and you're actually walking the walk as well, is what is the investor field looking like in terms of the future and what things are on the 5 to 10 year horizon versus ones that are a lot later. And I think we can probably split these up into different areas as well because as as I imagine from your book as well, there's so much stuff going on and it's it's quite complicated. And what what were the supplements that you just took as well? I just want to
Sergey Young: Yeah, so supplements. I actually on my website, which is sergeyyang.com, and it's all for free. Um, there is, uh, infographic called 10 Longevity Supplements. I don't know if you can see that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I can see that. Yeah, yeah. So like or your audience can download this. We have a beautiful newsletter actually, distilled in science into very simple word. Um, and, uh, so supplements. And again, remember, there's a placebo effect and if you're a placebo man or woman, you're going to respond to that. Um, so vitamin D, I do believe that our lifestyle has changed significantly in the last thousand years. We're always under the roof. We're either in the car or in the office or at home. So we don't have time to develop like appropriate level of vitamin D. So I'm supplementing myself with vitamin D. By the way, for your supplement mix, you can experiment yourself, but I would advise actually to ask the help of the doctor or nutritionist. Um, then it's going to be much more comprehensive. Um, so vitamin D, then omega-3, I have particularly high cholesterol level and I'm genetically predisposed to have high cholesterol. So I'm actually, I'm taking quite a lot of omega-3. I usually use the Nordic one, which they do from small, oily, wild fish. Um, then what else? Milk thistle for my liver. And and it's all on rotation with exception of vitamin D and omega-3, the rest is like, you know, I'm taking this for a month and then I'm waiting three to five months to do another one month course, right? So I'm I'm a huge fan of not constantly supplementing my own body, but leave a lot of capacity for body to develop this thing and get it from the food to the extent that we can, uh, given the current development of the food industry and food supply chain. But, um, so it's milk thistle, seaweed. I'm a big fan of seaweed. So I was born not in the middle of nowhere, in the end of nowhere, in the USSR, in a place, um, which which was closer to Japan. I live literally like 200 miles across from the northern Japanese island. And it was 300 miles to the regional capital and 200 miles to Japan. But it was former USSR. There's no way I can travel to Japan. Like I, you know, I do, uh, today almost every year or sometimes like a twice a year. So I'm a big fan of seaweed. And I have six different types of seaweed on rotation. So like every month I'll take like spirulina, um, kelp, uh, fucus, uh, some of the Japanese seaweeds, uh, as well, uh, to do that. Um, what else? In terms of longevity supplements, there's a number of like NAD+ boosters. The one that I take is NMN. And I'm doing this for the last, uh, two years. And this was after like talking to David Sinclair from Harvard Medical School, um, for to Peter Diamandis from X Prize Foundation, even Eric Verdin, uh, the head of, uh, Buck Institute of Aging Research, uh, they're based in California. Uh, they all like were so positive about NMN, so I thought, you know, I'll just need to give it a try. Um, yeah, I'm taking quite a lot of fiber in the form of, uh, plants, but also, um, like an added fiber. I use the Indian one. Uh, I don't know if I have it here. Yeah, it's like this. Uh, I yeah, this one. I it's beautiful. It's like the softest, yeah, the softest fiber I've ever had in my life. It's like it feels so great. I love it. Um, uh, what else? Uh, I actually, like, I I changed my relationship with fiber after experimenting with continuous glucose monitor. I don't have it now, but, um, for the last six months, I use, uh, CGM, uh, at least four times and it actually works for 14 days. And it's you can easily synchronize it with your, um, smartphone. And, uh, it was fascinating to see the relationship between the food and and drinks that I take with my glucose spikes. And some of the outcomes are pretty obvious, like, um, like if you take freshly squeezed orange juice, you think it's healthy, but it's like you just taking the sugar, right? You know, up to this level. Uh, it's going beyond any possible boundaries. Um, so I I was expecting that. Well, the other thing, uh, that I was not expecting, like if you take like a portion of vegetables right in the beginning of your meal, and, uh, the first time I I read this, what I think it was Tim Ferriss, either in four-hour work week, no, it was four-hour body, I think, uh, his book. And, um, you can actually take, um, uh, some of the prohibited or blacklisted food later on. So I'm like, I'm a big fan of pasta, big fan of, uh, gelato, which is ice cream in Italian. So I don't do it, uh, frequently, but if I do it like once a month, I would actually take vegetables first. And it's actually what it does, uh, if you start with vegetables, is actually slow down and and, um, and decrease the rate of growth of your, like it's almost like a smooth your glucose spike inside, uh, sorry, in, uh, in your blood. So it was really fascinating just to observe like a relationship between all these intakes that I have and my, uh, glucose level.
Dr Rupy: CGMs are going to be really useful, I think, when it comes to what food combinations work for different people because you're right, like that phenomena of seeing something that is, you know, quote unquote unhealthy being actually pretty good as far as we look at with regards to the the sugar level in your blood. That that's super interesting. I think that's like a very easy, understandable, tangible idea for for listeners to think about how data is going to really drive personalized nutrition.
Sergey Young: Yeah, it's just an example, right? But what I also like, I'm very visual person and I really respond to like visual stimulus, if you want, if I can use this word. And when you're actually about to take something which you know is not super healthy, you just visualize, okay, I'm going to, you know, in 15 minutes or like in 30 minutes, I'm going to look at my, you know, in my app which shows my, you know, glucose in the blood and I'll see the spike. It actually prevents you, uh, from making unhealthy food choices. That's what I like about it. But remember, I'm like, forgive me, I'm a placebo man, so I'm really responding to that.
Dr Rupy: Sergey, this has been, uh, brilliant in terms of all the information you have. The the book's brilliant. It's got so much information about what the future could look like and, uh, I think it's, you know, it might be premature to think about the, uh, moral implications. And, you know, as humans, we have a checkered past with, uh, power struggles and invasions and all the rest of it. So I think it's nice to think about this because like you said, this is inevitable. The technology around around longevity is coming, um, and we have to prepare for it as much as possible. So it's great. And the book's fab.
Sergey Young: Thank you. Thanks, Rupy. And to our audience, stay healthy and happy. We all going to be living longer or significantly longer than we expect. There are a number of implications from this thought and this key message of the book on so many dimensions like personal health strategy, personal financial strategy, relationship, career, education, kids, etc. Just give it a thought. It's, uh, it's an amazing journey to realize how many opportunities we have to live longer, healthier and happier life.
