State of CaliforniaCandidate for Governor

Zoltan Istvan is often considered the world’s leading transhumanist and a top Libertarian futurist. Zoltan began his futurist career by publishing The Transhumanist Wager, an award-winning, #1 bestseller in Science Fiction and Philosophy. The libertarian-minded novel has been compared to Ayn Rand’s work many times in major media and was a Top 5 Amazon book. During the 2016 elections, Zoltan interviewed with Gary Johnson to potentially be his preferred Vice Presidential running mate. Zoltan is also a well known technology journalist and a former filmmaker for the National Geographic Channel. As a successful entrepreneur, The New Yorker cited Zoltan made a "small real estate fortune." Zoltan also has executive experience via his former position as a director at a major wildlife nonprofit, WildAid. In total, Zoltan’s public work has received hundreds of millions of views, much of it through his political activism. He is running for California Governor for the Libertarian Party in 2018. Zoltan has spoken at the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, Microsoft, and been the opening Keynote at the Financial Times Camp Alphaville. He is a graduate of Columbia University, and lives in San Francisco with his physician wife and two young daughters. In a 5000-word feature on Zoltan, The New York Times wrote Zoltan is “polite and charismatic” and has a “plausibly Presidential aura.”

Like many entrepreneurs, I became a libertarian because of one simple concept: reason. It just made sense to embrace a philosophy that promotes maximum freedom and personal accountability. “Hands off” was my motto—and in business, if you wanted to succeed, those words are sacred. But “hands off” applies to more than just good entrepreneurial economics. It applies to social life, politics, culture, religion, and especially how innovation occurs.

I’ve been a passionate science and technology guy—an advocate of radical innovation—ever since I can remember. In college, I focused on the ethics and challenges of science for my Philosophy degree. But my stories for National Geographic and my witnessing of the Great Recession viscerally reminded me that government and the growing fundamentalism in Congress was desperately trying to control innovation and progress—even at the expense of people’s health, safety, and prosperity. With plenty of free time after the sale of my business to mount a challenge, I decided to take science and technology into the public and political realm; I decided to make a run for the U.S. presidency in 2016 as the self-described “science candidate.”

I knew I couldn’t win the election, but it was a great way to awaken many Americans to the desperate plight of our country’s increasingly stifled science and innovation sector. My experience in media has helped propel my candidacy. I spoke at the World Bank, appeared on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, was interviewed by the hacker collective Anonymous, and consulted for the U.S. Navy about technology, among other things. Even 2016 Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson invited me to interview as his possible vice president. Alone in his New Mexico house, we talked shop for 24 hours solid. He chose Governor Bill Weld as his VP, but I left Johnson knowing I would soon be making a stand for the Libertarian Party.     

Due to the fact I was arguably the first visible science presidential candidate in American history, I ran a very centric, science and tech-oriented platform, one that was designed to be as inclusive of as many political lines as possible. With leadership comes some compromise, and I veered both right and left (mostly left) to try to satisfy as many people as I could, even when it meant going against some of my own personal opinions. I believe a politician represents the people, and he or she must never forget that—or forget the honor that such a task carries.

One thing I didn’t stray from was my belief that everything could be solved best by the ‘scientific method’—the bastion of reason that says a thing or idea works only if you can prove it again and again via objective, independent evaluation. I’ll always be a pragmatic rationalist, and reason to me is the primary motivator when considering how to tackle problems, social or otherwise. I continue to passionately believe in the promise of using reason, science and technology to better California and the world. After all, the standard of living has been going up around the globe because of a singular factor: more people have access to new science and technology than ever before. Nothing moves the world forward like innovation does.

Yet, in the political climate of 2018, few things seem more at risk as innovation. A conservative, religious government stands to overwhelm California with worries about radical tech and science, such as implementing Federal regulation that stifles artificial intelligence, driverless cars, stem cells, drones, and genetic editing.

Sadly, the same could be said of immigration, women’s rights, and environmental issues. Then there’s America’s move towards expanding its already overly expensive military, which you and I pay for out of our pockets so that generals can fight far-off wars. America can do better than this. California can do better than this.

And we must. After all, the world is changing—and changing quite dramatically. Even libertarians like me face the real possibility that capitalism and job competition—which we always advocated for—won’t survive into the next few decades because of widespread automation and the proliferation of robot workers. Then there’s the burgeoning dilemma of cyber security and unwanted tracking of the technology that citizens use. And what of augmenting intelligence via genetic editing—something the Chinese are leading the charge on, but most Americans seem too afraid to try? In short, what can be done to ensure the best future?

Much can be done. And I believe it can all be done best via a libertarian framework, which is precisely why I am declaring my run for 2018 California governor. We need leadership that is willing to use radical science, technology, and innovation—what California is famous for—to benefit us all. We need someone with the nerve to risk the tremendous possibilities to save the environment through bioengineering, to end cancer by seeking a vaccine or a gene-editing solution for it, to embrace startups that will take California from the world’s 7th largest economy to maybe even the largest economy—bigger than the rest of America altogether. And believe me when I say this is possible: artificial intelligence and genetic editing will become some of the first multi-trillion dollar businesses in the near future.

We can do this, California, and it doesn’t have to be through stale blue or red political parties, which have left many of us aghast at the current world. It can be done through the libertarian philosophy of embracing all that is the most inventive and unbridled in us—and letting that pave the way forward. A challenging future awaits us, but we can meet it head on and lead the way not just for California and America, but for all of humanity.