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[Bruce Klein]

ImmInst Member Gives Immortality Talk
Ravi Kuchibhotla

On July 29th, 2003, Immortality Institute member, Ravi Kuchibhotla, gave a speech to a class of 20 students (12 males and 8 females) at a Student Science Training Program at the Universtiy of Florida in Gainesville. Ravi's talk addressed how science is moving us closer to extreme life extension and how the possibility of physical immortality is close at hand. The talk lasted twenty minutes and questions were asked afterwards.


http://www.cpet.ufl.edu

Ravi said that most of the questions were covered by the ImmInst FAQ. Although, some of the students seemed a little 'dazed' by the topic. After the talk two students stayed and asked more questions saying they'd been thinking about immortality but had no idea there were groups out there talking about it.



About Ravi

Ravi lives in Gainesville, FL and is attending the University of Florida. He was born in Bombay, India in 1984 and then came to the US with his parents in 1986. Ravi says his parents practice Hinduism, but "haven't really forced me to practice the religion".

Ravi became interested in immortality in 2000. Ravi said, "one day I sat down and started thinking what will become of me when i die".

Hindus believe that they willl be reincarnated in their next life, Ravi said. "If you were good in this life, you will be reincarnated into a cow. A cow is the most sacred animal in India. However, if you are bad you could be reincarnated into a tree or ant."

While researching other religions, Ravi noticed that in Christianity, "They believe that you would go to heaven or hell after death." Ravi asked, with different religions offering such varied answers about death, "which one could be right?"

Ravi then asked, why die in the first place and risk oblivion or punishment when science seems to be close to an answer. An inspirational quote by RobertEttinger was the turning point, "Being born isn't a crime, so why should it carry a death sentence". After further research, Ravi decided to pursue physical immortality as an ultimate goal.

After an internet search, he then came across the Immortality Institute’s website and joined in January of 2003.