If the name Bryan Johnson isn’t familiar, a picture of him might be. He is the somewhat alien-looking, strangely ageless 48-year-old Californian battling to defy death itself.
His efforts to do so have involved receiving a transfusion of blood plasma from his then 17-year-old son, an act that attracted headlines around the world, while Johnson’s own plasma was in turn transfused into his father. What was largely missed, but is documented in Alex Krotoski’s book, is that the procedure was deemed to be a failure. The tech entrepreneur will have to find another way to live for ever.
Even so, Johnson remains the pallid face of a global crusade to defeat death, radically extend human lifespan, and reclassify (and perhaps even stigmatise) ageing as a disease, rather than an integral part of the human experience. Krotoski, a psychologist and veteran chronicler of the tech industry, is well positioned to investigate and explain the phenomenon.
Her book is at its strongest when it explores the contradictions inherent in the movement, as well as its social consequences. Johnson might be a well-known figure, but Molly and Kris Nadell are not. Krotoski visits the couple, both in their 40s, because of the way they scrape together just enough money to continue living in their RV, in which they raise their two children.
The Nadells both donate plasma, often twice a week or more, earning between $30 and $70 a time. Maintaining this meagre income requires them to navigate online forums in search of advice on keeping their iron levels high so their donations aren’t rejected, and for tips on how to circumvent limits on donations. In a bitter irony, ageing is their nemesis, too. “The older you get, the less demand for your plasma … Kris and Molly are in their mid-forties. Their pay-per-litre is already going down.”
Krotoski approaches the life-extensionists with appropriate scepticism, noting many of them have backgrounds in technology, not medical science, and an attitude that, in some, seems to border on the cult-like. Johnson’s regimen involves 150 or more supplements per day, and meals that resemble nothing so much as the contents of a baby’s nappy. She shows, rather than tells, and leaves the reader to decide who cuts a credible figure and whose arguments ought to be dismissed.
The Immortalists is not without its flaws, though. Krotoski tackles so much at once that the experience can feel like being jerked about on a lead from one topic to another, without much in the way of a through-line. Some chapters are rich, character-led journeys, while others require the reader to wade through dense, stat-heavy exposition. Parts of it will feel very familiar to anyone who listened to Krotoski’s 2023 BBC series on the subject.
And in a book otherwise very conscious of the societal impact of the actions of the men it covers, it is jarring to hear no mention of the allegations made against Johnson by his former fiancee, who brought a lawsuit against him in 2021 alleging “manipulative and coercive behavior”. As a former employee she was required to settle her claims against him through an arbitration process, which ruled in Johnson’s favour. He has consistently denied all wrongdoing.
Reading The Immortalists, you at times feel unmoored from reality, in much the same way as some of its subjects. They argue about whether a lifespan of 120 years or 1,000 is possible, if it will take five to 10 years to get there or longer, whether immortality will come via fusion with AI, or through medical means. Krotoski puts these discussions in historical perspective, linking them to the fountain of youth and the philosopher’s stone. Is it really a matter of science this time, or does it come down to faith, just as it always did?
One thing is clear: stubborn reality is not on the movement’s side. In developed countries, improvements in life expectancy have all but ground to a halt, and in some cases even reversed slightly. Trump’s health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, has pulled funding for all kinds of promising research. The question of eternal life feels distant from more immediate concerns.
“My biggest fear with Bryan Johnson,” one life-extension advocate frets to Krotoski, “is that he dies.” A few hundred thousand years of human history suggests that the outlook on that front might not be great. For now, at least, the movement still lives in hope that the inevitable may, in fact, be optional.