X-Message-Number: 13320
From: 
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 11:53:11 +1000
Subject: Molecular Nanotechnology BITES BACK!!!!!


So the fashion has come about that it is cool to bash Nanotechnology. It is much
more believeable that we just need U$10 million and we will have reversible
Cryonics within 10 years - yeah sure!!! If everyone wants to sit and play
nodding dog with the "authorities" on this then that is their business but I am
still going to stick with what I believe in and defend it. I am not going to
fall for the Religion claims since it clearly works both ways.

I am not against research in Cryonic suspensions but I am against the
representation of this being something that will result in anything other than
small incremental improvements in quality of suspensions. The idea that we will
have reversible suspensions in the next 10 to 15 years if only some money (U$10

to U$20 Million) were to be thrown at the problem is not any more valid than the
arguments for Nanotechnology. I have seen researchers using any way they can
think of to get funding and I am not biting unless I personally feel the goals
and objectives are realistic and actually achievable all the while being worth
while.
I am not claiming any sort of Nanotechnology in the next 10 to 15 years like
some, I would be surprised to see something worthwhile in 60 years and more
realistically see it as 100 to 200 years away from achieving the level required
to do a reversal of an existing suspended patient. By this time, I think most
existing projections made now will be pretty much meaningless. The only things
that are valid will be the absolute laws of science and even these are
occasionally subject to revision.

Irreversible loss of information may occur at present but there is no way to

confirm or deny this. To look at micrographs and see a scrambled result and then

run around like a headless chicken panicking is not constructive and certainly a
VERY long way from conclusive. We do not know if this will be reversible -
certainly todays "authorities" believe it will be difficult and most seem to
believe it impossible. That does not mean that they are correct - it is just
subjective opinion. They cannot claim the high ground UNLESS they can PROVE
INDISPUTABLY that they are correct.

I have seen way too many examples of supposed absolutes in science washed away
by real facts. Two examples related to human physiology come to mind, the
existence of bacteria in the stomach of humans was considered impossible and

anyone suggesting otherwise was ridiculed - now we regularly cure stomach ulcers
with antibiotics. New research has also overturned the belief that no new cells

grow in the human brain after maturity - this was another non disputable that so
called "authorities" were touting and G_d forbid anyone suggest otherwise.

Yes there is a lot of quack medicine out there but truth seems to concentrate
somewhere in the middle ground. The scientists are not always right and neither
are the quacks but somewhere in the middle you will find a lot of answers. The
best way to know where to look is to think for yourself and only take others
opinions at face value  and use them towards forming your OWN opinion.

Another issue that has been bothering me is the idea that a person will be
warmed up and then nanotechnology will get to work. This has never been an

assumption of mine, why take the body out of the liquid nitrogen when it is in a
completely stable state and when nanomachines are likely to work better (even

optimally) in such an environment. Repairs can be completed and time will not be
the issue, if computing power or repairs take a bit longer, no problem because
there is no hurry this body isn't going anywhere. Nanomachines can even put in
place protection mechanisms to help protect the body during warming which can
also be done more quickly and uniformly with the help of nanotech.

Further comments below.

Regards

Chris Benatar



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Message #13301
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2000 11:30:35 -0500 (EST)
From: Charles Platt <>
Subject: Quick Reply to Steve Jackson

Steve Jackson is a very reasonable guy, and he's right that I may have
overstated my feelings in response to the "Don't worry, be happy"
*I certainly think you did! In the interest of uniformity, I will return the
same.

Extropian mindset. The trouble is, Steve, one feels a bit desperate after
a while. If this were the first or even the tenth time I had seen someone
proclaim with a voice of authority that "nanotechnology will take care of
it," I'm sure I would reply in a very calm and measured manner. If the
*Perhaps the persistence of such attitudes should tell you something after all
an open scientific mind should be interested in finding the cause of this
persistence

nanotechnology true-believers would show any familiarity with the evidence
which is easily available in the form of photographs of damaged brain
tissue, and would concoct some kind of explanation as to the processes by
which such tissue might be reconstructed, I would be placated. (I refer
interested parties to Photo 8, for instance, at

**This is where you start to become unrealistic, so you want someone to devise a
technique for returning the tissue in the micrographs to their original state.
Hang on ten minutes and I'll post it!!!! It is not argued that this can be done
today OR that the techniques to achieve this are presently known. It will take
years of research and probably hundreds of billions of dollars (if not more) to

get near to such a technique, but you want someone to post it to this list!!! It
is likely to be extremely complex and involve a large number of disciplines
working together. It is a worn and tatty old phrase but "absence of evidence is
not evidence of absence" but many very reasonable people have drawn the
conclusion that there is a finite and possibly even reasonable possibility of
nanotechnology being up to the job. You may not have any evidence of nanotech
being able to fix this but you also don't have evidence that new protocols and
perfusates are going to do any better than those already discovered or for that

matter that they will eventually lead to reversible suspension without nanotech.

http://www.jps.net/cryonics/21cm/p3.htm --the web site maintained by the
American Cryonics Society.) Note that while nanotechnology assumes
progress in the ability to build very small devices, it does not, so far
as I am aware, assume a very high level of onboard computing power in
these devices;
*According to my interpretation of Drexlers books, we should see onboard
computing considerably more than todays average desktop. This is not
unreasonable considering that computing power goes up the smaller the component
sizes are.

and while remote computing power presumably will be very
powerful indeed, it will be forced to communicate with the assemblers via
relatively low-bandwidth connections. Therefore, the

*Just to make sure that the point is not missed, the remote computing power will
most likely be unimaginable to most people involved in computers today - the
further into the future you go, the more incredible it gets.
*As for the issue of relatively low bandwidth, please explain where you come to
this conclusion, bandwidth has been going up with computing power. What makes
you think this will change? Even if bandwidth is not all you would want, 100
bytes of data transferred to another computer, processed through 100 pentillion
iterations and returned as 200 bytes of data does not require high bandwidth.
Expand this to meet the realistic situation of a suspension repair and you can
see that the bandwidth will not be the issue.

nanotechnologists should be able to provide some ideas about
reconstruction techniques right now. I have never seen ANY serious attempt
in this direction, beyond vague statements that are not much different
from, "The knee bone's connected to the thigh bone, and that's what it's
all about." Of course we do have Ralph Merkle's rather wonderful paper
describing total disassembly and reassembly of the brain, but even he
admits that this would entail some formidable challenges; and even here
there is no attempt to discuss, for instance, the algorithms that will
guide 3D construction work. So far as I am aware, such algorithms do not
exist.
*See ** above

At the Institute for Robotics at Carnegie Mellon, Hans Moravec--for
whom I have immense respect--is still working on the relatively simple
problem of getting a robot to roll around a house cluttered with everyday
objects. Since Hans now feels that really significant onboard computer
power is needed to accomplish this basic task without error (which is the
functional equivalent of a single assembler moving through the body
without actually doing anything), I would be very interested to learn how
the assembler is supposed to recognize and reconnected randomly scattered
biological fragments, using less onboard computing power than our current
desktop systems. There is a serious credibility gap, here.
*A robot today that is remotely controlled by a human can do everything the
human wants it to do and will get by just fine with a typical desktop computers
power. The same can be applied to the nanomachines, they can have semi
autonomous systems that interact with and external computing source that does
the fine tuning control of the machine. The nanomachine also exists in a very
different environment that may be more flexible towards a less intelligent
nanomachine.

Consequently, when I read breezy assurances that nanotechnology will save
us if we get a "halfway decent suspension," which in turn is presented as
a fait-accompli; and when the writer shows little if any awareness of the
daily problems associated with maintaining a cryonics organization and its
capabilities using volunteer labor...well, I get a bit impatient.
*You seem to get impatient a lot...that is not a virtue. People are entitled to
their belief and if you are going to insist that everyone volunteer their time
and money and become actively involved in Cryonics in order to sign up, there
will be very slow growth in numbers. Most people don't spend more than a
minimalist amount of time related to their death - and now you are saying join
Cryonics and save yourself, think about your death every day, confront your

nightmares, put your life on hold and tackle cryonics....be actively involved. I

think it is reasonable to assume that some people may prefer to just sign up and
forget. In fact I would say that 99% of the population feel this way and you
trying to force them to become actively involved is only going to dissuade them
from cryonics all together.

And getting back to Steve's letter, I don't see any virtue in suffering. I
just feel that the people who pay annual dues and assume they have bought
a ticket to the future are fooling themselves--and anyone else who is
naive enough to believe them.
*If I did not believe in the possibility of a nanotech revival I would have

NO!!! interest in Cryonics until such time as a suspension had been reversed and
since I think it unlikely to happen in my lifetime (I'm 34) I would drop the
idea. Now if only you can convince me, you can get rid of me from the cryonics
scene:).


--Charles Platt

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Message #13313
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2000 12:34:06 +0000
From: Joshua Kane <>
Subject: Nanotech

You know what?  I'm sick of nanotechnology being a buzzword in
cryonics.
*It is a buzzword for good reason, instead of fighting it, try finding out more
about it, truely understanding it better and then you might see a reason why
existing Cryonics is very likely a waste of time without it.

Yes, maybe it can repair the freezing damage, but medical
science has saved people who have fallen in below-freezing water.

*Do some more research, these people did not freeze, it makes a huge difference,
their core body temperatures were well above freezing.

I'm sure it could also save brains that have been frozen in liquid
nitrogen.
*It does not come close - you are clearly new to the field, you need to do more
research before you try knock nanotech. Even CP will disagree with you on this
one.

We must not wait until nanotechnology is developed.  We must
try to do it without nanotechnology first!
*We should not consider only one approach, but we should try to get a bigger
group signed up as this can help increase the chance of government and private
industry funding.

And another thing.  Scientists seem to be forgetting to do what they
always do when there is a new medical branch: Try it on mice and rats
first!
*Mice and Rats are sometimes used but they are not a perfect match and this is
the reason that human trials are usually required by the FDA before a new drug
is released.

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Message #13314
From: 
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2000 19:49:54 EST
Subject: expert opinion

We keep hearing that we should pay attention to the gloomsters who understand
the details-the nature and degree of freezing and other damage to cryonics
patients, and the obstacles to repairing that damage.

Pay attention, yes. But accept their conclusions? Once more-enough is never
enough in this area-we remind all concerned about the frequent failures of
the best and brightest in their deprecatory roles. (Borrowed from Michael
Murphy.)
*I completely agree with you here, we have to think for ourselves if we are to
find the truth.

In 1943 someone said, "I think there is a world market for maybe five
computers." Guess who it was? Some ignoramus? It was Thomas Watson, Chairman
of IBM.

In 1949 someone said, "We have reached the limits of what is possible with
computers." Guess who? John von Neumann, one of the greatest mathematicians
of the century.

In 1981 someone said, "640,000 bytes of memory ought to be enough for
anybody." Guess who. Bill Gates, no less.

Don't let any majority vote you into the grave. And if any "experts" allow as
how freezing is a waste of money and effort, get another opinion. Yours.
*YEAH YEAH!!!!! Thank You!


Robert Ettinger
Cryonics Institute
Immortalist Society
http://www.cryonics.org

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