Zoltan Istvan

Zoltan Istvan, an American-Hungarian, began a solo, multi-year sailing journey around the world at the age of 21. His main cargo was 500 handpicked books, mostly classics. He's explored over 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 by The New York Times, Outside, Wired UK, Slate, Vice, San Francisco Chronicle, BBC Radio, CNN, CBS, RT, Fox News, the Travel Channel, and in much other media. 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. Zoltan later became a director for the international conservation group WildAid, leading armed patrol units to stop the billion-dollar illegal wildlife trade in Southeast Asia. Back in America, he started various successful businesses, from real estate development to filmmaking to viticulture, joining them under ZI Ventures. He is a philosophy and religious studies graduate of Columbia University and resides in San Francisco with his daughters and physician wife. Zoltan recently published "The Transhumanist Wager," an award-winning fictional thriller describing philosopher Jethro Knights and his unwavering quest for immortality via science and technology. It was a Top 5 Amazon book. Zoltan writes futurist and transhumanist-themed blogs for The Huffington Post, Psychology Today, and Vice's Motherboard. Zoltan is also founder of the Transhumanist Party and ran a successful and widely viewed 2016 US presidential campaign. He is one of the most visible and popular futurists in the world. In 2018, he was an endorsed Libertarian candidate for California Governor.