If you are anything like me, this story is going to freak you the **** out. Bryan Johnson is a 45-year-old entrepreneur and software developer. He founded Kernel, a company that monitors and records brain activity. He also founded the web payment system Braintree. Braintree bought Venmo and then PayPal bought both. In short, Bryan has too much money. What has he done with his money? He pulled a Cher and turned back time. Through a strict regime of diet, exercise, sleep and a whole battery of supplements and medicines, Bryan is hoping to revert most of his organs and other parts into their 18-year-old version of themselves. He undergoes monthly medical procedures to monitor his de-aging process in his custom medical suite he’s built in his Venice, CA. home. The only problem is his doctors disagree on whether this is actually working.
Wealthy software entrepreneur Bryan Johnson, 45, has one goal: To have the brain, heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, tendons, teeth, skin, hair, bladder, penis and rectum of an 18-year-old.
To accomplish the feat, he will spend at least $2 million this year on a medical program that has more than 30 doctors monitoring his bodily functions. Led by regenerative medicine physician Oliver Zolman, 29, the team aims to reverse the aging process in every organ.
To do so, Johnson and Zolman scour scientific literature and use Johnson as a guinea pig for promising treatments.
“The body delivers a certain configuration at age 18,” Johnson told Bloomberg Businessweek in an interview published Wednesday. “This really is an impassioned approach to achieve age 18 everywhere.”
Dubbed “Project Blueprint,” the program includes strict guidelines for diet (1,977 vegan calories per day), exercise (one hour per day, with 25 different exercises, and high-intensity three times per week), and sleep (at the same time every night, after wearing blue-light-blocking glasses for two hours).
According to the article, Johnson starts each day at 5 a.m., when he takes supplements and medicines including lycopene for artery and skin health; metformin to prevent bowel polyps; turmeric, black pepper, and ginger root for liver enzymes and to reduce inflammation; zinc to supplement his vegan diet; and a microdose of lithium for brain health.
And it’s working. Tests show he has reduced his biological age by five years, Bloomberg Businessweek reported, offering that findings suggest he has the heart of a 37-year-old, the skin of a 28-year-old, and the lung capacity and fitness of an 18-year-old.
Toll told Bloomberg Businessweek, “All of the markers we are tracking have been improving remarkably.”
Dr. Zolman, however, sees things differently.
“We have not achieved any remarkable results,” he told Bloomberg Businessweek. “In Bryan, we have achieved small, reasonable results, and it’s to be expected.”
“If you say that you want to live forever or defeat aging, that’s bad —it’s a rich person thing,” Johnson told Bloomberg Businessweek. “If it’s more akin to a professional sport, it’s entertainment. It has the virtues of establishing standards and protocols. It benefits everyone in a systemic way.”
No matter how this is being framed, it’s definitely a rich person thing. Even if some major medical breakthrough comes from it, I sincerely doubt this kind of high-end, multi-process, on-going procedure is ever going to trickle down to the ‘regular folks.’ Diabetes patients have trouble getting insulin because insurance companies deem it a non-necessity (what?!) so I really don’t think “18yo bladder” is getting rubber stamped for Joe Blow. I know people far smarter than me will give several ways this will revolutionize the aging community. Hell, watching my own parents age I wish I could turn back their biological clocks during their twilight years. But at some point, we have to pay the piper, don’t we? As I said, the person who deserves this is the guy who dug ditches his whole life to put food on the table and now his whole-body hurts and he deserves a pain-free retirement. But the person who is getting this treatment is the party boy who abused his young life and now gets to turn back the clock thanks to Daddy’s trust fund.
You can read more about Bryan’s intense regimen here. I give him credit for making himself the guinea pig for the procedure. This leaves me with more questions than it answers, honestly. And $2M isn’t something I can swing, but rich people can. That’s not ‘joy ride into space’ money, that’s ‘mid-life crisis convertible money.’ I’m a cynic, so I don’t think anyone is going to do it for the right reason. It’ll be a pickup line, ‘Yes, but my d*ck is only 18.’ It’s a regimen, though, so whoever goes for this will have to work for it. As I said, I don’t have that kind of cash to spend on resetting my anatomical clock, but I can eat better, exercise and try to get more sleep. I haven’t had it tested or anything but I swear since I’ve gone back to the gym I’ve acquired the lungs of a 53 1/2-year-old instead of my 54-year-old self.
Photo credit Instagram
I actually went to his site to read what he eats and does in terms of exercise and treatments. It’s INTENSE, but with such a regime, one sort of expects these kinds of results, no?
He isn’t really turning back the clock. He is just becoming a high-performance athlete with some nice cosmetic treatments on the side.
But I don’t feel like he has stopped aging…I do wonder if he will be more resistant to its effects later on though. (Still being relatively active at 100+).
Yep, it’s a lot of fancy words for good diet, reasonable supplements, targeted exercise, good sleeping habits, and first class medical care.
It’s a two million Fitbit with regular blood work and a trainer.
I understand wanting to take care of oneself, because this approach truly pays dividends in terms of quality of life when you’re old – but trying so desperately to outrun the clock is sad.
I agree that diet and exercise (and less alcohol) make a big difference with growing older. But I grew up in a very outdoorsy very vegetarian community and disease comes for us all.
Tech bros with obsessive health lifestyles and extreme restrictions are fascinating. They get to be “so disciplined” and the “blueprint for wealth and success”, when in reality, it’s no different than women trying to stay relevant by smoking and starving to stay thin.
It’s so funny. I remember when Jack Dorsey started talking about eating 1 meal a day & having so much energy & focus. Women on Twitter were like, congrats, dude, you’ve discovered eating disorders.
@Lizziebathory So true about the eating disorders! I had an argument with my brother about this last week. He was all “no, one hour of eating a day is a legit healthy fasting technique!” I couldn’t roll my eyes hard enough at men relabeling anorexia as “biohacking” dumbness!
I could not stop guffawing at this orthorexic poser with too much money and time on his hands….all to look like an effeminate hypothermic robot who looks AWFUL in bed.
But… why does he look like those people generated by an AI? Is that what looking young at 50 means? Looking like a cyborg?
@SARAHFRANSISCO
My thoughts exactly. He might be healthy as a horse, but he is totally vacant behind those eyes. No lights on whatsoever. No soul.
It’s actually really eerie and I feel like I’m watching a character from a Black Mirror episode.
This has become the whole estethic and it doesn’t look like it will change.
Dead eyes started as a “cool thing” for young women and influencers to do, and now…it’s all everyone wants to look like. Even men.
We really are moving towards a soulless and colder future. I don’t want to live forever to see that.
Totally looks like Data on Star Trek Next Generation. Wth
But we’re supposed to get old. Aging is apart of the cycle of life and if he’s doing all this is he even living?
That’s my thought. Who cares what age his body is – this sounds like no way to live.
Right?! Like how “joyful” can you be with all of this? So f’ing weird.
IDK about living. He’s giving off Vampire Lestat vibes…
At least Lestat had some fun! This dude is spending so much time and money trying to reverse aging (which is never gonna work; no amount of tumeric and avocado will do that) that he’s not doing anything of his life.
Agreed.
I can understand having some small procedure here and there, but torturing yourself for what ?
I’ll be 42 in few months and I have come to think that the most transgressive thing I can do is embrace my aging body.I go to the gym, eat healthy, I am fit but far from perfect, my body is different (losing weight seems now an impossible task) , but I want to be healthy and strong, and live my life not running after my 20 yo self, but moving on to the next chapters, and those chapters we all know how they are going to end so I don’t want to waste them for something that belongs to the past.
He doesn’t look younger. He looks like a middle-aged man who got work done.
This
Agreed. In the photos I’ve seen, he has a waxy-like surface on his skin, like Jared Kushner. And it’s oddly smooth. He doesn’t look young so much as he looks well preserved.
Nailed it!
And like many middle aged people who’ve had work done, his hands look old.
Exercise, eat better (as needed for your particular body), sleep regularly and well, wear sunscreen and a hat, are a start; having enough money so you’re not stressing out over keeping a roof over your head, food on the table, or being able to pay for your dental exams and insulin, other needed medical stuff and a rich white guy not subject to harassment, prejudice, discrimination? Yeah, just about ANY person who can live like that is going to reduce, slow the effects of aging somewhat, no navel and other body part gazing monitors and colonoscopies needed.
Michael Pollan: eat food, not too much, mostly plants
St Augustine: it is solved by walking
Right there is a good start.
Add laughter, compassion, meaningful relationships, meaningful occupation (ie work or other thing that you put your effort and attention to), curiosity, ability to enjoy and wonder at the natural world, and oh yeah, having the first several levels of Mazlow’s hierarchy of needs covered would do it.
I dont understand the obsession to stay young forever. Just live your life to the fullest, leave a beautiful legacy to the people you love, and go in peace. We’re already overpopulated, there’s no need to make believe you are young, you’re not.
I gather it’s more like an experiment and as that usually goes, it’s ultra expensive and wonky. Like those first Teslas – electric and all, but super expensive and not perfect. A decade later, more people can afford it and in another decade more still will be able to. And on and on…
It’s not the worst hobby for a middle aged person to have. And he sands his own money, but…my god, he looks like a robot.
And because he’s doing all that work for very little benefit, he comes across as desperate and insecure to boot.
Exactly what I thought over the weekend.
this is what i came here to say lololol… why is it whenever middle aged men get cosmetic procedures they end up looking like creepy dolls or middle aged women?
Total rich people problems. I read that he taken 33,000 images of his colon and wears a nightime monitor to measure the number of erections he gets. You cannot stop aging and you cannot avoid dying. He will be healthy but does he get any joy from life? Does he make the world a better place? Also, the doctor in charge of this is….29 years old. So. A NEW doctor.
Yeah, that was my general reaction (after ‘rich people have too much money’), what about quality of life? Great to (presumably) not have the aches and pains that gather as we age but living like this every day?
Also here to add my probably now annual question about how on earth people can live in the USA in 2023 and worry about dying because they can’t afford insulin every month? I know your healthcare system is built on a fundamentally different model to ours here in the UK but how can people with any kind of a conscience feel this is acceptable? The status quo is being maintained so clearly someone thinks its ok.
To add emphasis to your last points:
The people who figured out insulin refused to patent it because they thought it was such an important medicine that anyone who needed it should have access to it. Why do executives need to make billions off it – at the expense of human life and limb and eyesight etc – hundred years later?
Yeah a 29yo physician/team leader is such a sign of quackery! You can’t be 29 and have a MD-PhD and a fellow. It’d be the very minimum to claim some level of expertise. I can almost guarantee that doc has never done any supervised research outside of, perhaps, a 3 months internship or something like that.
We are all aging and are going to die at some point but his life seems so self-obsessed that it doesn’t look like a life worth living
LOL. So many of my friends who were athletes all their lives had bodies like Greek Gods for so long. But, try being 70. No matter what you do time takes its toll. Hips, knees, shoulders, etc. break down, especially after a lifetime of sports. So, good luck with that.
Seriously. We have a friend who was an athlete (martial arts) his whole life and had an amazing body. He just turned 60 and he has so many neck and back issues, has had both knees and hips replaced, he just seems creaky and in pain most of the time. Aging comes for all of us.
So he lives until 110 with the saddest life known to man, no joy no pleasure nothing but intense exercise, not enough food, unnecessary meds and invasive medical tests. So fun.
I was thinking along the same lines…like when does this man „live his best life“?
Thinking the same. So much time wasted. So many opportunities for happiness missed. Huge loss for someone who would have the chance to have it all.
this man is already dead
To be completely honest, I find his entire routine quite appealing. I would love to do what he does. I adore intense exercise, for me food is not entertainment (going out with friends at a restaurant is, but not the food itself), and supplements work for me (I fixed a lot of issues with my menstrual cycle with Vitex and Inositol) and the idea of being monitored by docs is actually extremely appealing because I have lots of medical anxiety and always think that is something wrong with me. So, getting a clean bill of health monthly is just the dream. But to each their own.
i would love to hear about your dosages for vitex and inositol <3
He looks a bit *waxy* for me – is this what poreless good skin is supposed to look like? Nice abs, but with his exercise routine I should damn well hope he looks fit
He looks like a 45+ year old man…
I think he looks like a 45 year old woman.
I looked better than him when I was 45 and I didn’t do squat.
Hum, metformin? That’s for diabetes- I’d be very careful of messing with my endocrine system.
Weirdly it’s been found to increase the lifespan of earthworms … so I suspect some “anti-aging” “doctors” use that to justify prescribing it to people for non-medical reasons
Metformin has some truly gnarly digestive side effects (I’m on it to treat insulin-resistance) I don’t know why anyone would take it when it’s not medically necessary.
Well, it’s nice he’s got a hobby, and doubly nice it’s not in politics.
It’s arguably some of the less harmful asshattery a too-rich software bro can get up to.
That’s all well and good, but I have to think of that level of obsession, tracking, and restriction isn’t great for one’s long-term mental health.
I bet he’s the kind of person that doesn’t yell or smile because it will give him wrinkles.
He still looks 45 though…
He looks older than 45 to me. The hair color ages him more than anything else. And his waxy skin. As they say, there’s no fool like an old fool.
2 mil on rectum checks and $8 on box dye.
OMG you’re not kidding. Box dye for sure.
He looks like a creepily preserved 60 to me.
Hahahaha, came here to say the same, he looks way older than 45 and plastic af. Like a creepy antique doll at a flea market.
You can’t turn back the clock. Degredation happens on a cellular and molecular level. Your DNA loses fidelity, and your telomeres degrade as the molecules are copied over and over and over again. You cannot undo this. It simply is. This is a rich man’s folly.
That’s what I was going to say. It’s been a while since I learned the mechanics but my understanding is that the roots of aging are at the sub-cellular level.
there is actually stuff one can do to prevent aging on a cellular level. Peptides. Bioregulars specifically. Google epitalon for starters. It can lengthen telomeres. I imagine this guy does loads of peptides I mean if he’s not he’s wasting his time. The russians have done a lot of gerontology research, a doctor Khavinson he is the one who discovered most of the bioregulator peptides. Their government funded it, say what you want about communism but at least they did a couple good things theoretically for the good of their people. I’ve tried a lot of the peptides and they work. There’s a peptide for each organ system, and one that is natural (animal derived) and one that is synthetic. I don’t use them for anti aging BTW I have serious health problems (biotoxin illness called CIRS and lyme disease) but the peptides are legit and kind of miraculous. It’s a shame they aren’t exactly legal in the USA which is only due to greed (you can’t patent a naturally occurring peptide that the body produces). Peptides work better than any drugs I’ve tried, when it comes to healing the body. Anyway that guy is a creepy douche no doubt but thanks for coming to my ted talk on peptides. Lots of peer reviewed research on these compounds, super safe and they WORK. I translated a lot of the papers w google chrome/scholar.
Wow, wildly expensive body dysmorphic disorder. Congrats, dude.
All that money, effort and time and no wisdom. Hyper-focused on the superficial and missing out on the substantial. These guys are all just vain.
I love that on the same day we get to celebrate Sheryl Lee Ralph proudly proclaiming her natural 60 year-old self…we also get this dude–who looks like a 45+ dude who has had work done and is willing to spend $2mill per year to “turn back time”. Eat better, have some exercise, drink water, wear sunscreen, moisturize and ENJOY YOUR LIFE.
Men will do anything to avoid therapy
LOL!
Maybe strive for the wisdom of a 45-year-old instead of the skin of a 28-year-old. Which he does not have. You’re 45. And with discipline, a healthy lifestyle (whatever that is) and lots of cosmetic procedures, you can look a fresh 35 but that’s it unless you have the genes. Which this guy doesn’t have.
God I’m so so so over the youth obsession, the buccal fat removal, the injections, the implants, the diets, the diabetic drugs to get skinny, the 30-product-bedtime-routines, the what-I-eat-in-a-day-lies. I’m about to turn 39. I have good genetics on both sides and I’m grateful for that. Could I be fitter? Yes. Could I eat healthier? Yes. But I am generally healthy and that’s not a give. That’s something to be grateful for. I have also wasted most of my teens and 20s feeling shitty about myself and I refuse to participate at this point.
This dude can spend his time obsessing, I’m having the occasional beer and cake and I’ll enjoy it.
@emmi, “strive for the wisdom…”
💯
Sad isn’t it? All these values are so screwed up.
I looked 25 and had a brain that was sharp as blade until a series of life events pummeled me from 40-47. Suddenly I’m way older looking, mind is slower, etc. But by God I finally learned all the things I just didn’t understand in my previous 40 years of life: patience, forgiveness, self-regulation (that’s not compartmentalization or denial), seeing past my ego to understand what is motivating others, calmness in chaos, finding solutions in crisis…
Society loses so much when we all desperately cling to the appearance of youth. We don’t value what we lack most of all – the wisdom that comes with experience, the wisdom that can maybe get us out of this mess. Maybe it’s because we have so many older people who clearly didn’t get any wiser with age. Sigh. Idk.
Dude should get his money back because he looks late 40s.
Guy who runs his youth programme is not that excited by the results so far.
Honestly, heart of a 38 year old at 45? many people have the same. It’s not necessarily regime based.
As he gets older he will be increasing the crazy procedures, seeing as he’s so keen to treat ageing as some kind of flaw that only happens to little people.
And by the way there ia an article on his ex in the Fail (sorry about the source)- she is currently suing him after he dumped her for getting cancer.
Apparently once she was sick she was a ‘negative’ and he had to get rid of her. He also asked about her sexual past down to the number of partners and the sex acts.
He sounds like the Andrew Tate of wellness.
He looks aggressively okay? His body is in phenomenal shape, but he looks his age.
The only picture which caused unimaginable envy is where he is bent at the waist while holding weight at an angle. My back cried looking at that.
I’m fascinated by the longevity people but after David Sinclair misled people about his resveratrol research I’m skeptical of this. Like the longevity guy who went on The Dick Cavett show, claimed he would live to 120 and immediately dropped dead on air!
Doctor perspective here: this is absolute garbage. None of it is true. You can’t “reverse the aging process”, it’s a physiologic impossibility. you can definitely make the most of your current age, but you can’t turn the clock back. it’s fantasy.
It’ll smack him in the face one day when he ruptures a disk, tears a ligament or breaks a bone.
There actually are some exciting new advances in de-aging cells, but they have nothing to do with whatever this guy is doing/shilling.
He is creepy.
I can think of two million wonderful things you could do with that amount of money instead of photographing your own colon.
I have to go now to eat some cinnamon coffee cake.
Comes across to me like one of those magical weighloss infomercials.
Just more expensive than those four easy payments of $99.99.
I felt invisible until I threw out my back the first time. My body has never been the same. I kind of believe we haven’t evolved much past cro magnon who only lived to 35. We live longer now but our bones do whither away. And there’s no shame in it.
Per my cardiologist, out parts just wear out sometimes.
When does he have fun? Connect with others? Sounds like a miserable existence to me.
Hasn’t this been done before? I swear I watched something on Netflix about a rich old guy trying to turn back time. I forgot what happened to him, he may have ended up in prison for sex trafficking.
It sounds like he needed a correction since he was overweight, stressed and suicidal (according to the article) when he was running his company. That he has selected 18 as his goal is creepy. It’s like a Leo DeCaprio goal, where you age out of attractiveness at age 25.
Particularly since we’re still growing at 18; we don’t even have all our bones yet!
First, he looks like something out of Madame Tussaud’s museum. Second, he must be the most boring person on the planet. He actually sounds like he’s got some obsessive-compulsive disorder. Dude, you’re conflating being healthy with never aging. It won’t work.
I read an article in the DM yesterday that said his ex-fiancée is suing him.
Apparently she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2019 and he broke up with her. He also allegedly “broke their contract,” b/c she became a “net negative” after the diagnosis.
Of course this was in the daily fail but I recognized him in this article after reading that. He sounds like an 18-yr-old man doll gem.
I would have never guessed he was only 45. I would have guessed at least 50’s. He looks botoxed and peeled to the nth degree. Uncanny valley to the max. His skin and expression actually reminds me of that closeup Martha Stewart posted of herself the other day. The other male he’s with in the last pic looks like it might be his son. Is he thinking they look the same age?
Not gonna lie, I’m kind jelly of this 29 y/o “doctor” (didn’t complete a residency… THAT’s always a good sign), who managed to con a tech bro out of $2million.
Tilda Swinton is coming for that Oscar.
This is …a lot.
Judging by the older adults in my family – the best outcomes are in people who are active and chill about it – walk regularly (not running) and eat healthy, keep stress low, do stuff with community and like garden and have hobbies. Contrast that with both the super intense exercise people and the very overweight people – both have issues with replaced knees and hips.
That is just a general observation and does not include the ones who suffered the randomness of bad luck with illnesses and things like cancer.
Isn’t this the guy who dumped his gf because she got breast cancer and it gave him “ bad energy”? He basically threw her on the street with no money and no job. Also he look 50. Sorry.
Yes, same guy!
Yes, she claimed he said she had become “a bad deal” and a “net negative” after her cancer diagnosis. If true, what a disgusting human being he is
Reading all these comments about this guy, he seems like the perfect one to pair with Princess Kate in England. He’s hard-core, she’s soft-core : they can start a project to help aging men look like they’re in their Early Years again! At last, a goal-oriented project for Kate!
But what were his first five years like?
It sounds like such a self-absorbed way to live, perfect for a tech bro.
LMAO, well, have at it my dude. If he wants to pay some doctor millions of dollars to tell him the lies he wants to hear, that’s 100% his prerogative. I, on the other hand, will continue working on creating a world where people like this are taxed out of their ridiculousness.
He looks like Caitlin Jenner to me?
If a woman had this goal of returning to biological age 18- AND HAD A TEENAGE DAUGHTER- she would be absolutely torn apart for mental health issues/jealousy etc etc