Leading singularity proponent Ray Kurzweil co-authored a book titled Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever. A singularity believer who thinks that if he makes it to the singularity he has an excelling chance of living forever, or at least for thousands of years, should be willing to sacrifice much for a slightly higher chance of living long enough to make it to the singularity. This is why I think singularity believers make up a vastly disproportionate percentage of members of cryonics organizations.
According to a new scientific article there is a medical procedure that might be able to greatly extend some peoples’ lives. Although we don’t have a huge amount of data one small study showed that several hundred people on average lived 14 years longer than those that didn’t get the procedure.
Singularity proponents should be extremely interested in the procedure. Indeed, a way of testing whether members of the SIAI such as Eliezer really and truly believe in the singularity is whether they at least seriously consider having the procedure.
The procedure is discussed at the end of this article.
Get 50 credit cards in one day and go on to accrue as much debt as possible over the course of a few years. Give the credit card companies a temporary address and a temporary phone number such that you can lose their annoyance easily. Put half of your newfound free money into high yield investment opportunities such that you have a shot of paying it all back later. Use the other half to travel the world, become Enlightened, learn highly useful skills, and get yourself in a good position to make a lot of money or otherwise gain a lot of utility. Downsides: no mortgages, difficult to rent a house or apartment (but still not that difficult), if you want a new car you have to buy it with cash, some jobs will be harder to get (but it's not that big a deal), it might be difficult to move to a new country, it might disrupt your peace of mind, structural uncertainty, and goal distortion. I think a free 50,000USD or however much is worth those costs.
(I am not a financial advisor.)
I didn't notice.