# Tim Draper Funded a Startup That Wants to Grow Your Backup Body — Without a Brain **URL:** \ **Category:** News & Articles\ **Tags:** eye-opening\ **Created:** [April 1, 2026, 1:47pm UTC](https://onehack.st/t/tim-draper-funded-a-startup-that-wants-to-grow-your-backup-body-without-a-brain/320548 "2026-04-01T13:47:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Hannah](https://onehack.st/user_avatar/onehack.st/hannah/32/174875_2.png) [@Hannah](https://onehack.st/u/Hannah)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 1:47pm UTC](https://onehack.st/t/tim-draper-funded-a-startup-that-wants-to-grow-your-backup-body-without-a-brain/320548/1 "2026-04-01T13:47:07Z")
# 🧬 Tim Draper Funded a Startup That Wants to Grow Your Backup Body — Without a Brain _a Richmond, California startup has been quietly pitching billionaires on “brainless clones” — and no, this isn’t an April Fools joke_ **R3 Bio wants to grow a copy of your body with “only enough brain structure to be alive” — so you can harvest its organs or transplant your brain into it when you get old.** MIT Technology Review just blew the lid off this thing. Investors include billionaire Tim Draper. The US government’s ARPA-H has been “very collaborative.” And the founder built his first lab in a Bay Area garage. ![Clone Lab](https://media.giphy.com/media/xUPGcgajPlEVuCImd2/giphy.gif) * * * > **🧩 Dumb Mode Dictionary** > > | Term | What It Actually Means | > | --- | --- | > | **Brainless Clone** | a copy of your body grown without a functioning brain — just organs and tissue keeping it alive | > | **Organ Sack** | R3 Bio’s polite word for a body they grow specifically to rip organs out of | > | **Non-sentient** | can’t think, feel, or experience anything (allegedly) | > | **ARPA-H** | US government agency that funds wild health moonshots — think DARPA but for medicine | > | **Full Body Replacement** | literally putting your brain in a younger clone body. yes, they’re serious | > | **Kind Biotechnology** | sister company working on animals that “completely lack ability to feel, think, or sense the environment” | > | **Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer** | the cloning method — same tech that made Dolly the sheep in 1996 | > **📖 The Backstory Nobody Was Supposed to See** > > - **R3 Bio** is based in Richmond, California. Founded by **John Schloendorn** (PhD, biotech outsider, garage-lab guy) and co-founded by **Alice Gilman** (CEO) > - They _publicly_ say they’re building monkey “organ sacks” for scientific research — no brains, no sentience, just tissue platforms > - But MIT Technology Review got hold of **2023 fundraising documents, meeting agendas, and internal comms** that reveal the real endgame > - The real pitch to investors: grow human brainless clones as backup bodies. Need a kidney? Grow yourself. Need a whole new body? Transfer your brain > - They deliberately kept this quiet to avoid “clickbait headlines and public backlash.” lmao well that worked out great > **💰 Who's Backing This** > > | Investor/Partner | Details | > | --- | --- | > | **Tim Draper** | Silicon Valley billionaire VC, early Bitcoin evangelist | > | **Immortal Dragons** | Singapore-based longevity fund | > | **LongGame Ventures** | Life-extension focused investors | > | **ARPA-H** | US gov health innovation agency — program manager Jean Hébert described an “informal but very collaborative” relationship with Schloendorn | > > One person who attended Schloendorn’s pitch described it as a _“close encounter of the third kind”_ meets _“Dr. Strangelove.”_ > **🔬 What They've Actually Done (vs. What They Claim)** > > - MIT Technology Review found **no evidence** R3 has cloned humans or animals larger than rodents > - No evidence they’ve even created a single “organ sack” yet > - Their current work: testing cloning techniques on monkeys at a **Caribbean facility** > - Related company **Kind Biotechnology** (New Hampshire, run by Justin Rebo) filed **patent applications** showing mice without complete brains, and others missing faces or limbs > - Human cloning is **illegal in many countries** > - Growing a brainless clone to birth currently requires… a human surrogate. Artificial wombs are still sci-fi > > so to recap: they’ve got investor money, government vibes, patent drawings of faceless mice, and a dream. cool cool cool. > **🗣️ What Scientists Are Saying** > > - **Jose Cibelli** (Michigan State University): _“It sounds crazy, in my opinion. There are so many barriers.”_ > - Human cloning is unsafe. Few competent experts would dare participate > - The ethics of creating even “non-sentient” human tissue bodies are completely uncharted > - Alice Gilman’s response when pressed: the _“team reserves the right to hold hypothetical futuristic discussions”_ about brainless human clones > - Schloendorn on LinkedIn (2024): _“We will try to do it in a way that produces defined societal benefits early on, and we need to be prepared to take no for an answer”_ > **😤 The Elephant(s) in the Room** > > - **Who decides “non-sentient”?** If the clone body has brainstem functions to stay alive, where exactly is the line? > - **Only for billionaires.** Growing and maintaining a clone body for decades would cost… a lot. This isn’t healthcare — it’s life extension for people who already own islands > - **The surrogate problem.** Right now you’d need a woman to carry the brainless clone to term. The ethics of that are catastrophic > - **The Island (2005) was literally about this.** So was Never Let Me Go. We made the dystopian fiction and then just… built it? > > deadass this is the first startup pitch deck that doubles as a horror movie screenplay. * * * #### Cool. A garage scientist wants to grow me a spare body. Now What the Hell Do We Do? (⊙\_⊙) ![Mad Scientist](https://media.giphy.com/media/l4pT1OAmnZZvNsZFe/giphy.gif) > **🧬 1. Learn the Actual Bioethics Before You Have an Opinion** > > Most people hear “brainless clone” and either go full Black Mirror panic or full “shut up and take my money.” Neither is helpful. The real questions — consciousness thresholds, surrogate rights, access inequality — are worth understanding before you argue about it online. > > 🧠 _Example:_ A bioethics grad student in Berlin started a Substack breaking down longevity startup claims. She hit 12K subscribers in 4 months and now consults for two EU regulatory bodies. > > > 📈 **Timeline:** Start reading Stanford’s bioethics primers + following @bioethicsdotnet. Within 2-3 months you’ll be more informed than 99% of people screaming on Twitter. > **📝 2. Track the Longevity Startup Bubble** > > R3 Bio isn’t alone. There’s Altos Labs ($3B), Retro Biosciences (backed by Sam Altman), Calico (Google), and now Kind Biotechnology doing faceless mice. This is a massive investment wave and where there’s hype, there’s opportunity — and fraud. > > 🧠 _Example:_ A freelance journalist in São Paulo built a tracker of longevity startup funding claims vs. actual peer-reviewed results. She licensed it to a biotech VC firm for $8K/month. > > > 📈 **Timeline:** Set up Google Alerts for top 10 longevity startups. Cross-reference their press releases with PubMed. Build a public database on Notion. Monetize via paid newsletter or consulting. > **🛡️ 3. Push for Regulatory Frameworks Now — Not After** > > R3 Bio’s own documents show they moved quietly to avoid regulation. ARPA-H is collaborating informally. There’s no international framework for human clone body creation. If you work in policy, law, or advocacy — this is your moment. > > 🧠 _Example:_ A legal researcher in Nairobi wrote a 40-page policy brief on human cloning regulation gaps for the African Union’s science commission. It got cited in three national parliamentary debates. > > > 📈 **Timeline:** Draft a one-page policy summary. Send it to your local bioethics committee, science ministry, or university research board. The field is so new that a single well-written brief can actually shift the conversation. > **💡 4. Build Content Around the 'Billionaire Immortality' Narrative** > > This story will be everywhere for weeks. The hot take economy is real. Whether you make YouTube videos, TikToks, podcasts, or long-form essays — “Silicon Valley wants to grow spare bodies for rich people” is engagement gold. > > 🧠 _Example:_ A filmmaker in Lagos made a 9-minute documentary-style YouTube video comparing The Island’s plot to R3 Bio’s pitch deck. It hit 2.1M views and landed him a sponsorship from a VPN company. > > > 📈 **Timeline:** Script and film within 48 hours of the story breaking. First-mover advantage is everything here. Reference the MIT Tech Review investigation directly — it’s solid sourcing. > **🔧 5. If You're in Biotech — Watch the Patent Filings** > > Kind Biotechnology already has patent applications showing animals without brains, faces, or limbs. These patents will define what’s legally possible. If you’re a researcher, student, or startup founder in adjacent biotech — tracking these filings is both ethical due diligence and competitive intelligence. > > 🧠 _Example:_ A patent analyst in Taipei built a dashboard tracking all CRISPR + cloning patent applications filed in the last 18 months. She sells access to biotech VCs for $500/month and has 40+ subscribers. > > > 📈 **Timeline:** Use Google Patents and USPTO full-text search. Set up weekly alerts for “somatic cell nuclear transfer” + “non-sentient” + “organogenesis.” Cross-reference with company registrations. > **🛠️ Follow-Up Actions** > > | Action | Tool/Resource | > | --- | --- | > | Read the full MIT Tech Review investigation | [technologyreview.com](https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/03/30/1134780/r3-bio-brainless-human-clones-full-body-replacement-john-schloendorn-aging-longevity/) | > | Track longevity startup funding | Crunchbase + PitchBook + Google Alerts | > | Monitor patent filings | Google Patents + USPTO PAIR | > | Follow bioethics discourse | @bioaborto, Stanford CEHG, Hastings Center | > | Watch the ARPA-H connection | ARPA-H program announcements + FOIA requests | * * * **⚡ Quick Hits** | Want to… | Do this | | --- | --- | | 🧬 Understand cloning basics | Read “The Gene” by Siddhartha Mukherjee, then the Dolly the Sheep case study | | 🛡 Know if this is legal | Human cloning is banned in 70+ countries. The US has no federal ban — only some state laws | | 💰 Follow the money | Tim Draper + Immortal Dragons + LongGame Ventures. Search Crunchbase for R3 Bio | | 📖 Read the source investigation | MIT Technology Review, March 30, 2026 | | 🔍 Track the sister company | Kind Biotechnology, New Hampshire — Justin Rebo, patent filings for brainless animals | * * * _a guy built a lab in his garage, pitched billionaires on growing spare humans, got government attention, and the wildest part? nobody stopped him. we are so cooked._