." >> host: your columbia university we are pleased to be joined by award winning professor jonathan weiner who has won the pulitzer and the national book critics circle award for previous books. his most recent book is "long for this world: the strange science of immortality." professor, who is abu tigre? >> guest: he is one of the most eccentric and interesting scientists i have ever met. he grew up in london, he studied in cambridge, england. and he became a computer scientist and developed the idea that we might live forever. or at least 1000 years, 10 dozen years, some modest claim like that. oddly enough, the more time i spend with aubrey, some of his ideas about longevity should be worth taking seriously and be worth listening to. >> host: such as? >> guest: aubrey argues that aging should be viewed as something not immutable but something that we can study and understand and perhaps fight effectively. and that we can do more about aging now than we ever could before. those are ideas that i think the consensus is building around. although aubrey himself is extremely eccentric and ext