X-Message-Number: 13447 Date: Sat, 01 Apr 2000 11:08:16 -0800 From: Peter Merel <> Subject: Which cryonics org? For new chums, the best place to start investigating which org is for you is http://www.cryonet.org/orgs.html . Factors to consider include * Geographic proximity: if they can't get to you quickly, they can't help you. some orgs have an extensive network of mortuaries to help. Others try to make it easy to move near them when you get ill. Uncooperative doctors, hospitals and coroners can make all of this irrelevant. To be blunt, if you don't have a crack team of cryonicists working you over from the moment you make that rattling sound, you're probably out of luck. * Freezing technology: if ice crystals scramble your brains, preservation won't do you a whole lot of good. Nanotech might help with this ... but more likely it won't. If you're going to get froze, get froze quick and glassy. * Economic viablity: if they go out of business, you're screwed. At least one of the orgs mentioned in the link above will move your body from org to org if an org starts looking risky. On the other hand this org doesn't have access to all the other orgs, more's the pity. * Political stability: not just the country, but the org itself. Cryonics attracts more than its fair share of ... eccentrics ... and a troubled org might work so badly that its ability to freeze you and keep you froze could become questionable during the squabbling. So far as I know, this hasn't happened ... but if you hang out on cryonet for a while you'll see it's easily possible. Remember that most humans (including me) are either so apathetic that they won't make arrangements until it's very late in the day, or so screwed up they'd rather not live long. So no one is going to help make this any easier. Make your enquiries quietly, carefully, and deliberately. No one can tell you what the right way is. You have to decide for yourself. Peter Merel. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=13447