X-Message-Number: 10473
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 1998 09:01:50 -0400
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: CryoNet #10468 - #10472

To George Smith:

I would prefer that cryonics increase through rational argument with 
individuals. Moreover, cryonics is NOT a form of religion. Our central
point is not that we can revive the "dead" (whatever that word may
mean) but that we think that a high proportion of those now declared
"dead" according to current criteria actually are not "dead", retaining
some possibility of eventual revival. By cryonic suspension we are 
trying to keep that possibility of eventual revival alive, while 
burial or cremation (the two most common treatments of those declared
"dead") take someone WRONGLY CONSIDERED "dead" and turn them into
someone who is genuinely dead, by our criteria as well as the comon
one.

However the possibility always exists that cryonics will face 
legal discrimination and attack. A "theology of cryonics" has merit
as a backup in such a case. And it may very well help to develop
that theology in advance, at least in skeleton form.

			Best and long long life to all,

				Thomas Donaldson

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