X-Message-Number: 1433 Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 14:12 EST From: LEVY% Subject: CRYONICS: RE: Charles Platt on recruitment I feel obliged to address Charle's Platt's recent posting about recruiting non-libertarians (or anti-libertarians) as suspension members. First, I agree with both of the sentiments I detected in Carlos' posting: (1) Environmentalists, despite their claims about the sanctity of _all_ life, seem driven by a fundamental guilt about human progress, seeing mankind as an unnatural blight on an otherwise pristine ecosystem. I believe that there are environmentalists who have a more rational attitude, but the media have given me no reason to think that such persons form a majority, or even a poweful minority. (2) There is no reason to recruit people with whom we disagree about fundamental issues when we (especially, the pioneers of the cryonics movement) have sacrificed a goodly portion of our lives because of our stance on those issues. In following Voltaire's dictum that "I may disagree with you, but I will defend unto the death your right to say it," we should avoid adding a codicil to the effect that "I must also associate with and support you." Our government lost sight of this truth long ago, and we are now paying the price as citizens. I hope that we as cryonicists will not suffer the same demise. -- Simon D. Levy Extropy Institute Director Alcor Suspension Member Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=1433