24 replies to this topic

[David Styles]

This was an informal meeting, as such no minutes were taken. I record brief notes here from memory, for the purposes of working from them.

We discussed the possibility of teaming up with DGAB people for an ImmInst conference in Europe:

Pros: Share cost, enjoy greater publicity, more hands-on-deck, promotes cooperation between immortalist orgs.
Cons: Less flexibility, dates already set, German language of many presentations may be an issue

We discussed the possibility of teaming up with Timeship for an ImmInst conference in America:

Pros: No extra cost, greater publicity, very high profile speakers, promotes cooperation between immortalist orgs.
Cons: Less flexibility, current inabilty to make concrete plans due to the uncertainty regarding the release date regarding the location of Timeship.

We also discussed the possibility of ImmInst teaming up with HEALES for the European conference if we don't team up with the DGAB people.

Pros: Share cost, more hands-on-deck, promotes cooperation between immortalist orgs
Cons: Most (all?) HEALES members are ImmInst members anyway, so extra publicity would be limited

We also discussed options for conference locations in Europe and America for consideration in the event that we do not team up with another org. We agreed that the ideal place should be a large city, good air links, cosmopolitan culture. Suggestions included Amsterdam, Brussels, or London for Europe, and New York City for America. Obviously we have the home advantage in Europe as we are Europeans. I know plenty of Immortalists in NYC and surrounding areas whom I could easily rope into helping with a conference if needed, though.

We discussed content; presentations should be informative and related directly to life extension. We hope to include a level of interactivity that is greater than that afforded by questions and answers at the end of a presentation.

One question to which we have not yet found a suitable answer is how we should balance scientific depth against lay comprehension in terms of presentations.

I think that was it for discussion directly relevant to the conference planning. As this was an informal meeting, we also branched off here and there to discuss related topics (cryonics as one example, socio-religious issues as another, metformin as a third).

I daresay Sven will comment with anything I missed that he feels should be included here.

[s123]

Not all Heales members are Imminst members but surely a great percentage of them are. Yesterday, for example we introduced one of our recent members to Imminst.

We have a Heales member who was born and lived until a few months ago in Germany. He could assist with the communication between us and the DGAB (he didn't know DGAB).

I asked on the meeting yesterday if Heales would be interested in teaming up with Imminst for the conference and the board said they would.

We discussed content; presentations should be informative and related directly to life extension. We hope to include a level of interactivity that is greater than that afforded by questions and answers at the end of a presentation.

I may add that I proposed for a round table meeting. The cons were that this would not work if a lot of members took part. One possible way to make it work is by dividing the participants in smaller groups and let them discuss the various issues around LE in these groups. (Each group could maybe discuss one specific topic for example overpopulation)*. After this all groups should appoint a spokesperson. Then all groups come together and the spokesperson from each group gives the conclusions that his group has reached.

* Not said during the meeting.

[David Styles]

This was an informal meeting, as such no minutes were taken. I record brief notes here from memory, for the purposes of working from them.

We discussed the possibility of teaming up with DGAB people for an ImmInst conference in Europe:

Pros: Share cost, enjoy greater publicity, more hands-on-deck, promotes cooperation between immortalist orgs.
Cons: Less flexibility, dates already set, German language of many presentations may be an issue

Further information. I received these emails from Tristan of DGAB:

Hello David,

I have had a brief discussion with the other organizers. We have full support for your idea of involving ImmInst! :D

We believe that ImmInst's involvement would yield a mutual benefit. And we strongly believe that 1-2 ImmInst-speakers would improve the international aspect of the symposium a lot. We already have Sebastian Sethe on board and one organizer mentioned that winning for example Brian Wowk would be nice. Could you please informally ask a little bit around who might be a speaker?

We also have discuss how ImmInst's involvement could look like. What are your ideas?

Forever
Tristan

______________________________________________________________________

David,

I forgot to mention. We already have invited a couple of people that are a little bit "down-to-earth" in comparison to others in the big field that we are dealing with. We have for example people from medical examination and anatomy. We have to prevent that those guys feel being "put in the wrong corner", so to say, when facing speakers that are a little bit "metaphysical".

You see, there is a certain degree of diplomacy involved here. We are have to be very careful to ensure that the symposium will be as "secular" as possible.

So I think it would be best if you would be so kind and reach out with your feelers, looking for potential speakers from ImmInst. If you would then tell me a bit about the candidates I could talk to my people and make sure that everyone will he happy.

Forever
Tristan

[Mind]

wrt the perception that the Immortality Institute is more "metaphysical", this is not the case. It is no more metaphysical than any cryonics organization. You can communicate with them that Imminst is all about the scientific conquest of death. Any Imminst speakers would focus on scientific topics.

[David Styles]

wrt the perception that the Immortality Institute is more "metaphysical", this is not the case. It is no more metaphysical than any cryonics organization. You can communicate with them that Imminst is all about the scientific conquest of death. Any Imminst speakers would focus on scientific topics.

I have done so.

[Mind]

Just some figures from past events that Imminst has hosted, sponsored or co-sponsored.

2005 Imminst (Atlanta) conference: Approximate cost - $27,000, All but a few hundred was covered by dedicated donations and registration fees, so Imminst did not lose much money. Imminst officially only approved $800 of its own money in support of the conference. $16,000 up front payment was needed for the conference facilities. We had a handful of large donors. These might be sources of conference sponsorship in 2010 as well, whether it is in Germany with DGAB, with Timeship, or a stand alone conference.

2007 Alcor conference. Imminst sponsored 1 (maybe 2) Alcor conferences to the tune of $2,000. Imminst members attended but there was no official Imminst presentations or Imminst booth as far as I am aware.

2008 UABBA. Imminst sponsored with $2,000. Imminst members attended but there was no official Imminst presentations or Imminst booth

2008 Convergence08. Imminst co-sponsored with $4,000. Ended up with a net loss of $1,500. Shannon and Mind manned an Imminst booth.

2009 SENS4. Many Imminst members attended and there was an ad hoc meeting. Imminst paid $1,000 travel expenses for Mind to attend.

[s123]

Any Imminst speakers would focus on scientific topics.

One of our questions is: "How 'scientific' can these lectures be?" Can the speakers use some jargon (given the fact that most Imminst members have some scientific knowledge) or should it be understandable for the man on the street. David proposed to ask it to the members in a poll but I just wanted to hear your opinion Mind because you have already organized Imminst meetings.

[David Styles]

Any Imminst speakers would focus on scientific topics.

One of our questions is: "How 'scientific' can these lectures be?" Can the speakers use some jargon (given the fact that most Imminst members have some scientific knowledge) or should it be understandable for the man on the street.

I think we should err on the side of depth rather than ease; especially in light of the recent rejection from the Warsaw Science Picnic, I'd rather we be accused of being too scientific than not scientific enough.

David proposed to ask it to the members in a poll but I just wanted to hear your opinion Mind because you have already organized Imminst meetings.

To be clear, I intended such an idea as an opinion poll, not a referendum.

That said, in light of recent events, I am not sure if even an opinion poll is such a good idea.

[s123]

Any Imminst speakers would focus on scientific topics.

One of our questions is: "How 'scientific' can these lectures be?" Can the speakers use some jargon (given the fact that most Imminst members have some scientific knowledge) or should it be understandable for the man on the street.

I think we should err on the side of depth rather than ease; especially in light of the recent rejection from the Warsaw Science Picnic, I'd rather we be accused of being too scientific than not scientific enough.

I agree. Most Imminst members have a reasonable knowledge of science so if we ask the speakers to explain the more difficult jargon than everyone should be able to follow the lectures.

For the topics of the lectures, I would propose that we have at least some speakers who explain basic biogerontological knowledge (free radical theory, protein cross-linking, inflammaging, stem cells, lipofuscin, amyloid deposits, antagonistic pleiotropy, IIS signaling, calorie restriction,...). One lecture can briefly introduce several of these topics. So, not all topics need a separate lecture. This can be completed with some more specific lectures and lectures on supplements, cryonics, nanotechnology,... (however, I would be careful if we want to attract a more broader audience).

[Mind]

"Basic" lectures on cryonics, nanotechnology, SENS, stem cells, etc... would be great for a general audience.

For Imminst members and members of other longevity minded organizations, they would probably enjoy newer information. Technical jargon would probably not be an issue, since many would be familiar with the topics.

[s123]

Notes informal meeting 28 Feb. 2010:

We agreed that the best option at this moment is to do the conference independant from other organizations.

1) Place

- Amsterdam (Bildberg hotel conference facilities,...) (I will explore other possible places)
- Brussels (I will explore possible places)
- London (David will explore possible places)

2) Number of participants

We will start a poll to investigate how many participants we can expect.

3) Time

We think that later on the year is the best option. Maybe September but not Oktober.

4) Lectures

- General introduction in biogerontology (Unless we find someone else, I would volunteer to do it)
- Heales (Some board member) [maybe also HJB]
- Cryonics (David)
- Calorie restriction (Shannon, Matthew,...??)
- SENS (Aubrey)
- Medvedev

American speakers can be expensive due to travel costs, so we would try to avoid them unless a good high-profile speaker is willing to come.

[s123]

We might decide to allow everyone to give only one lecture. We also might decide to split the lectures in small and bigger ones (10 and 30 min. respectively?). For example, the lecture about Heales and Imminst would only take 10 min. or so while talks about other topics might need more time to explain the topic in the needed detail.

Lectures:
I proposed that Vincent would give the lecture about Heales and HJB (waiting for his answer).
I asked matt if he wants to give a lecture about CR but I am still waiting for his reply.
I would like to give the lecture about introduction in biogerontology
David would talk about cryonics.
Shannon could, if she wants, give the introduction about the past, present and future of Imminst.

[David Styles]

Here is what I most recently sent to Tristan:

____________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________

Dear Tristan,

Consensus appears to be against the collaboration of the DGAB symposium and ImmInst.

There seem to be (albeit unfounded) fears at your end that ImmInst is not sufficiently scientific, and Klaus Sames (when speaking with Sebastian Sethe) seemed not only of this impression but also of the impression that we had already formally agreed on a collaboration.

I had thought I had made it clear that it'd still need to be voted on at our end and anything I said in the meantime was merely contingent possibilities; I apologise if I did not communicate sufficiently clearly in this regard.

This, coupled with the likelihood of language-based inconveniences, and that you suggested ImmInst bringing only about two speakers, make official collaboration for this event seem quite unlikely.

If you are in agreement, I'd like to draw such ideas to a close and say that we're now (in a polite and friendly manner) disinclined to collaborate in the manner previously proposed.

This does not affect myself coming over to speak, or Sebastian unless he says otherwise

Regards to withdrawing from doing a joint conference, I do not in this email speak on behalf of ImmInst, because I haven't put it to a Board vote, but I can speak on behalf of the ImmInst events planning committee, whose Chair is Sven Bulterijs, and which is unanimous in this opinion.

I hope that this does not inconvenience you, which hopefully it shouldn't if you understood correctly from my previous words couched with words such as "contingently".

Did you find financial sponsors of the event (aside from ImmInst who would share costs if participating of course but is unlikely to assist otherwise)?

Eternally,

David

[s123]

From Didier C:

I think that it should be London or Brussels.

Brussels is de facto the European capital, central in Europe, easy to reach and we could have a potential big impact, It could be the first activity in this field with workshops in French and Dutch. And we could hope to attract the attention of people in this part of the world.

But London is of course a prestigious city where you can find more active transhumanists. And if you can convince people like David Wood or Anders Sandberg to help, it would be a lot easier to organize.

About a specific place in Brussels, the best place would be in an University (ULB or VUB) but it is not sure at all that we could convince the authorities. But I know a couple of not too expensive places in Brussels.

[David Styles]

From Didier C:

I think that it should be London or Brussels.

Brussels is de facto the European capital, central in Europe, easy to reach and we could have a potential big impact, It could be the first activity in this field with workshops in French and Dutch. And we could hope to attract the attention of people in this part of the world.

But London is of course a prestigious city where you can find more active transhumanists. And if you can convince people like David Wood or Anders Sandberg to help, it would be a lot easier to organize.

About a specific place in Brussels, the best place would be in an University (ULB or VUB) but it is not sure at all that we could convince the authorities. But I know a couple of not too expensive places in Brussels.

These seem reasonable considerations.

[brokenportal]

Some notes from the board meeting:

Heres the 2005 page that has a lot of template info: http://imminst.org/conference-2005

The attendance then was around 150 people. If possible, probably try to aim to show growth, at least 200 to 300 probably.

Heres the press release web site that MaxWatt suggests: http://www.prnewswire.com/ He said it works alright for some people he knows, that once in a while you get somebody to pick up your release via prnewswire.

I wonder if there is a way to order blocks of plane tickets. If you could verify say, 100 people are planning on flying in, then you might consider reserving a block of say, 60 tickets so people could get them at lower prices.

[David Styles]

Some notes from the board meeting:

Heres the 2005 page that has a lot of template info: http://imminst.org/conference-2005

The attendance then was around 150 people. If possible, probably try to aim to show growth, at least 200 to 300 probably.

Agreed.

Heres the press release web site that MaxWatt suggests: http://www.prnewswire.com/ He said it works alright for some people he knows, that once in a while you get somebody to pick up your release via prnewswire.

Ah, that's useful, thanks.

I wonder if there is a way to order blocks of plane tickets. If you could verify say, 100 people are planning on flying in, then you might consider reserving a block of say, 60 tickets so people could get them at lower prices.

That would be great - though... Would that not require that they be coming from a given airport via a given journey?

[s123]

What will the rules for the lectures be? How long will we allow people to speak? We could also have long and small lectures. Some people may want to give a small lecture of 10 min. or so while others would need 30-40 min. Who will decide which submissions are approved and which don't? Do we decide that everyone can only give one lecture or do we allow multiple lectures by the same person? For the round table meeting, how will this be organized? Will we have poster presentations? Who will get free entrance? Will we give members and/or lifetime members a reduction? This could encourage people to become members. Do we give students a reduction?



My proposals:

I think we should have short and long lectures. Short lectures could be 15 min. and long lectures 45 min.

All invited speakers will be asked to give a long presentation. It would be ridiculous to pay travel costs and maybe even paying them to give the lecture and then only have a lecture of 10 min.

For the non-invited speakers, I suggest that we let them choose if they want to give a long or short lecture but that we have the final decision. We cannot fore people who want to give a small lecture to give a long one but we can decide that people who ask to give a long one only get a small one.

I think that me and David should make a the first selection of submissions for lectures and after this we put our proposal in a topic in the 'Votes & Important Issues' and ask the board if everyone agrees with this proposal.

I would opt to allow only one lecture by a speaker but we could allow someone to give 2 lectures if good reasons exist.

I suggest that invited speakers and journalists get free entrance. If the 'normal' income fee is for example 100$ then we might consider to let members and lifetime members in for maybe 80$. The same could be done for students.

Once we have the location, we should try to make a deal with a nearby hotel to give the people who come to our conference a reduction.

We should also provide the attendees with a super and dinner. This might not be easy because our members have very different diets ranging from Paleolithic to CR.

For the round table meeting, one solution to make it work with so many people would be by dividing them in 'work groups'. Each 'work group' would get one topic to discuss (for example the pro-death trance and how to deal with it). These groups would appoint a spokes person and after the group meeting this person would present the conclusions reached by his group to all participants.

[s123]

Didier suggested a location to me. I asked him to check the possibility of eating lunch and dinner at the location. This brings up the question about meals provided by us. Will we provide both the lunch and dinner? Will we stick to sandwiches for lunch or something more elaborate? Do we provide coffee and tea during the pauses?

[s123]

Didier has looked for a room in a school. It would cost about 650 euro for a room for 200 people. Insurance is not included. Meals in the school would only be possible on Saturday not on Sunday. You have the choice between vegetarian and regular. Each meal would cost about 8 euro.

[David Styles]

What will the rules for the lectures be? How long will we allow people to speak? We could also have long and small lectures. Some people may want to give a small lecture of 10 min. or so while others would need 30-40 min. Who will decide which submissions are approved and which don't? Do we decide that everyone can only give one lecture or do we allow multiple lectures by the same person? For the round table meeting, how will this be organized? Will we have poster presentations? Who will get free entrance? Will we give members and/or lifetime members a reduction? This could encourage people to become members. Do we give students a reduction?



My proposals:

I think we should have short and long lectures. Short lectures could be 15 min. and long lectures 45 min.

All invited speakers will be asked to give a long presentation. It would be ridiculous to pay travel costs and maybe even paying them to give the lecture and then only have a lecture of 10 min.

For the non-invited speakers, I suggest that we let them choose if they want to give a long or short lecture but that we have the final decision. We cannot fore people who want to give a small lecture to give a long one but we can decide that people who ask to give a long one only get a small one.

I think that me and David should make a the first selection of submissions for lectures and after this we put our proposal in a topic in the 'Votes & Important Issues' and ask the board if everyone agrees with this proposal.

I would opt to allow only one lecture by a speaker but we could allow someone to give 2 lectures if good reasons exist.

I suggest that invited speakers and journalists get free entrance. If the 'normal' income fee is for example 100$ then we might consider to let members and lifetime members in for maybe 80$. The same could be done for students.

Once we have the location, we should try to make a deal with a nearby hotel to give the people who come to our conference a reduction.

We should also provide the attendees with a super and dinner. This might not be easy because our members have very different diets ranging from Paleolithic to CR.

For the round table meeting, one solution to make it work with so many people would be by dividing them in 'work groups'. Each 'work group' would get one topic to discuss (for example the pro-death trance and how to deal with it). These groups would appoint a spokes person and after the group meeting this person would present the conclusions reached by his group to all participants.

I am broadly in agreement with your suggestions; I may offer some slight tweaks tomorrow.

It is very late, I've been a couple of days without sleeping, I've had 18 hours of flying, and I'm 8 hours in the wrong timezone, so my brain isn't at peak performance right now, and I'm about to get off to sleep once I've responded to a few things at least briefly.

I will however respond to this with tweaks or comments within this next 24 hours, as once I've slept I'll be fine and then it's just a matter of getting online again later in the day sometime.

[caliban]

Mainly, I'd like to see some indication that you are able to attract more than 20-30 people with this event.
Which speakers apart from the ones above did you have in mind?
What do you want the conference to achieve apart from disseminating information by lectures?
What is the total budget?

[David Styles]

Good suggestions, Sven.

I think we should have short and long lectures. Short lectures could be 15 min. and long lectures 45 min.

Sounds good to me. I’d suggest 20 and 40 rather than 15 and 45, but that’s only because of my tendency to shift things towards multiples of twenty minutes since on average the human brain seems to operate best on a given thing for twenty minutes at a time.

All invited speakers will be asked to give a long presentation. It would be ridiculous to pay travel costs and maybe even paying them to give the lecture and then only have a lecture of 10 min.

Agreed.

For the non-invited speakers, I suggest that we let them choose if they want to give a long or short lecture but that we have the final decision. We cannot fore people who want to give a small lecture to give a long one but we can decide that people who ask to give a long one only get a small one.

Yes, this seems sensible.

I think that me and David should make a the first selection of submissions for lectures and after this we put our proposal in a topic in the 'Votes & Important Issues' and ask the board if everyone agrees with this proposal.

That sounds workable. Really I would think that by creating a Committee out of us the Board has effectively delegated these kinds of decisions to us and that this mitigates the need for a Board vote, but I’m certainly not opposed to the Board voting if it is considered desirable.

I would opt to allow only one lecture by a speaker but we could allow someone to give 2 lectures if good reasons exist.

This sounds sensible.

I suggest that invited speakers and journalists get free entrance. If the 'normal' income fee is for example 100$ then we might consider to let members and lifetime members in for maybe 80$. The same could be done for students.

Although not something it’d even occur to me to do if I were planning this by myself, it’s not something to which I object strongly, and I do not see a strong argument against doing, much as broadly I’d prefer to not practice such discrimination.

Once we have the location, we should try to make a deal with a nearby hotel to give the people who come to our conference a reduction.

That would be good.

We should also provide the attendees with a super and dinner. This might not be easy because our members have very different diets ranging from Paleolithic to CR.

Certainly we should. That said, I don’t think it should be too difficult to accommodate the most common varieties of healthy eating, however. And if someone’s usual diet is burgers and crisps, then Hell, they can either eat healthily or fend for themselves for a weekend.

For the round table meeting, one solution to make it work with so many people would be by dividing them in 'work groups'. Each 'work group' would get one topic to discuss (for example the pro-death trance and how to deal with it). These groups would appoint a spokes person and after the group meeting this person would present the conclusions reached by his group to all participants.

This seems like a good middle-ground for getting input from everyone and yet not stifling input by having everyone wait for everyone to have a turn to speak, or else having chaos.

[s123]

Mainly, I'd like to see some indication that you are able to attract more than 20-30 people with this event.

This is something that we cannot prove at this moment. We could set up a poll to see how many people will probably attend. We will only notice this when the enterance tickets are sold. How should we do this? I guess that we should sell them in front but how would this work? For UKH+ I had to fill in a paper and pay the fee by PayPal. After that I received a pdf by mail which will function as an enterance ticket.

Which speakers apart from the ones above did you have in mind?

Here's a topic to discuss this item:
http://www.imminst.o...nce-t39868.html

What do you want the conference to achieve apart from disseminating information by lectures?

Maybe attracting some new members but also show the outside world that life extension is not a fantasy and that Imminst is focussed on science and evidence. In other words to make us more accepted by the general public and thus gather more support for our cause. Trying to have some journalists to attend the conference would be a good way to accomplish this.

What is the total budget?

We'll try to make a budget as soon as possible.

[caliban]

This is something that we cannot prove at this moment. We could set up a poll to see how many people will probably attend. We will only notice this when the enterance tickets are sold. How should we do this? I guess that we should sell them in front but how would this work? For UKH+ I had to fill in a paper and pay the fee by PayPal. After that I received a pdf by mail which will function as an enterance ticket.

You need some ideas of numbers. Electronic registration is a given. If you are relying on tickets to supplement the budget and pre-registrations do not reach a certain threshold at a certain time, you need to be prepared to cancel.

Here's a topic to discuss this item:
http://www.imminst.o...nce-t39868.html

Some of these speakers may be very difficult to get, most will cost a lot. I don't think you'll be able to afford many overseas speakers.

Maybe attracting some new members but also show the outside world that life extension is not a fantasy and that Imminst is focussed on science and evidence. In other words to make us more accepted by the general public and thus gather more support for our cause. Trying to have some journalists to attend the conference would be a good way to accomplish this.

Thanks. So the focus is more oriented to the external audience than an ImmInst members conference? Then maybe have fewer speakers and make this a debate between a small panel of reputable scientists where you can invite media and the general public.

We'll try to make a budget as soon as possible.

Very much will turn on that.