[rob74]

> It's funny that it was considered a pseudoscience for such a long time, when there's lot of clinical applications outside of trying to live longer.

That's probably the reason why it's taken more seriously now (and not just by venture capitalists hoping to live forever): by now, all Western societies have population ageing problems. Due to better medicine, people live longer, but their actual productive lives are still comparatively short because of age-related diseases like dementia, increasing physical frailty etc. Plus, not enough children are born so the working population can sustain the elderly. So, even if the goal is not (yet) "living forever", societies are now more interested in at least tackling age-related diseases. Not sure if that will significantly increase life span, but it might still be an improvement.