X-Message-Number: 15556 From: "Brian Phillips" <> References: <> Subject: military triage Date: Sun, 4 Feb 2001 22:24:50 -0500 Good analogy George, But getting you to the helicopter is definitely a triage decison. Granted we need the bloody chopper..it's obvious we need the chopper, but that still leaves the question of how shall we keep Erny from bleeding out while we wait in the LZ. We call the choper first though..then worry about the bleeder.... On another note...can some one on the list point me in the direction of a medic alert type bracelet that is keeped to bio-telemetry? I had this neat conversation with some dudes in Virginia this afternoon about this... Does anyone happen to know where I can find a top ten list of schools with a grad program in cryobiology? cheers, brian From: "George Smith" <> References: <> Subject: Re: Military Triage? Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2001 12:37:44 -0800 I would suggest that cryonics better parallels the use of medivac - loading the hopefully recoverable bodies on board the helicopter to be ferried to the future hospital where they can be hopefully healed. I actually think that the concept of triage is not really appropriate here as we are only bickering over how to best to "treat" (prepare) the bodies before loading them on the cryonics "helicopter" OR which kind of cryonics "helicopter" to use to ferry the bodies to that future hospital. These cryonics choppers fly through TIME not space. The hospital we fly to is in the FUTURE, not Saigon. My personal view has always been to first decide to get the bodies to that future hospital PERIOD. I personally suspect that when we get to that future hospital the doctors there will shake their heads at the beliefs we harbored here about what was important. Hindsight is always 100%. There is simply too much reliance on present day scientific assumptions in my opinion. These guesses should be viewed as just that - extrapolations based on our current limited understanding and assumptions about the future. Those who claim that this is "waiting for the future to save us" are exactly right. The PRESENT science is entirely incapable of saving anyone who dies now (let us say dead for more than 6 hours to rule out the children who drown in ice water and recover after about an hour). So we cool our bodies down to liquid nitrogen levels in the calculated hope that in the FUTURE there WILL be ways to reverse all the damages. All the rest is supposition in my opinion. So if you are trying to understand what cryonics is all about - DON'T. You can read right here the clashing opinions of people who have spent years doing so and obviously THEY don't agree! If you wait for that degree of agreement you may miss the chopper entirely! (Some of these folks are so certain they are right they refuse to believe that ANY of the choppers today CAN reach the future. They believe they KNOW what CAN'T work in the future. Think about that! Please don't base your decision for cryonics on those claiming they possess a perfect knowledge of the future. I consider that like drinking KoolAid at a Jim Jones memorial reunion - it may look good but what are the possible consequences if you're wrong?). First arrange to get your OWN body and the bodies of those you love signed up for that helicopter ride to a hospital in the future. Then, if you are so inclined argue yourself blue in the face about which procedures may or may not be better for loading the bodies on board the chopper. But if you don't sign up for cryonics medivac because of your beliefs, you may be dead right or dead wrong but the important word to attract your attention here should be "DEAD". Choose life first. Then argue. It's cheaper. George Smith CI member former US Army 10th Med Lab, Pathology, Landstuhl, Germany in technical consultation with Ruth Smith, RN (retired) CI member former US Army 2nd General Hospital, Landstuhl, Germany Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=15556