Zoltan Istvan
OPTIMIZER OF FUTURE HUMANITY
Transhumanist, Speaker, Writer, Entrepreneur, Volcano Boarder
Mill Valley
Zoltan Istvan is a leader of the transhumanist movement, which advocates using radical science to improve and evolve the human being.
After graduating from Columbia University with a degree in philosophy and religion, Zoltan began a solo, multi-year sailing journey around the world carrying 500 handpicked books, mostly classics. Zoltan has explored more than 100 countries—many as a journalist for the National Geographic Channel—writing, filming, and appearing in dozens of television stories, articles, and webcasts. His work has also been featured in various media including The New York Times, Outside, Wired UK, Slate, Vice, San Francisco Chronicle, BBC Radio, CNN, CBS, RT, Fox News, and the Travel Channel. In addition to his award-winning coverage of the war in Kashmir, he gained worldwide attention for pioneering and popularizing the extreme sport of volcano boarding. Later, Zoltan worked for the international conservation group WildAid in Southeast Asia. Upon returning to America, he started various businesses, from real estate development to filmmaking to viticulture.
Zoltan’s award winning thriller, "The Transhumanist Wager," describes philosopher Jethro Knights and his unwavering quest for immortality via science and technology. Zoltan also writes futurist and transhumanist-themed blogs for The Huffington Post, Psychology Today, and Vice's Motherboard.
Zoltan is the founder of the Transhumanist Party for which he was the 2016 presidential candidate. As part of his campaign, he toured the country in the Immortality Bus, and on this journey he delivered the original Transhumanist Bill of Rights to the US Capitol. In 2018, he was an endorsed Libertarian candidate for California Governor.