X-Message-Number: 15965 Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 17:35:52 -0500 From: James Swayze <> Subject: Aussie article critique, debate teams needed? References: <> CryoNet wrote: > Message #15958 > From: "john grigg" <> > Subject: an artistic spoof on cryonics > Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 08:01:35 > > At my local college there was an art show where someone did a painting which > in a surrealistic way spoofed what could be a technical diagram of a > cryonics patient in suspension. <required snipage> > I wonder where the artist was exposed to cryonics... I am going to try to > track this person down and possibly share a picture of the work online along > with a little background about the creator of it. Go get em John! This artists skewed view of cryonics reminds me of something I meant to critique and propose but got sidetracked. Edgar Swank recently posted an article about Aussies embracing immortality. It contained our very own Marta Sandberg. Bravo Marta for doing your best to show our movement in a positive light. What disturbed me though was the attitudes of the "mainsteam" scientists holding the opposing views. They one, seem to lack imagination and two, are not current with even "mainstream" science. It's one thing to hold an opposing view based on good science but quite another to hold one based on false science and false assumptions. I'm pasting the article here below and hoping the format is readable. I'm not removing all the format because this author doesn't seem to know the meaning of the word paragraph and if I reformat it the article will lose his original emphasis which I want taken note of here. Here and there in parenthesis I will highlight those scientists and pundits I think we should engage in debate. Maybe some minds can be changed. We can discuss issues here among ourselves till we are blue in the face but what effect does it have on changing the minds of those we need allied with us or at the very least not against us? Looking over it again I've decided to also point out the author's use of propaganda techniques like slanting and association and such. http://www.smh.com.au/news/0103/16/update/news03.html Aussies appear keen to embrace eternal life Australians appear to be embracing with gusto the scientific race for the Holy Grail of eternal life. Human cloning, and deep-freezing technology which one day might allow cadavers (cadavers--slanting, association evokes image of rotting corpse on ice or violation of sanctity of dead at rest) to come back to life, have captured the imagination of some 20 Australians wanting to be at the forefront of the procedures. At least two West Australians are among them, wanting desperately(desparate--slanting, evokes pitiful) to either live again through cryonics or leave a legacy through cloning. But their wishes have raised more than a few eyebrows, with traditionalists throwing up a plethora(plethora--slanting, untold numbers oppose it) of philosophical and theological questions on the complex issues. At 84, the childless and lonely(lonely--slanting, evokes pitiful) Frank Hansford-Miller wants to have a baby. The former mathematics academic is impotent(impotent--slanting, associative with powerless, meek pitful, unable to please women, author could have worded it differently to explain being childless) through prostate cancer, and would be refused reproductive technology because of his age, so he figures the next best thing is cloning himself. He says he has found a woman 60 years his junior(60 years his junior--slanting evokes image of dirty old man preying on young innocent) who is willing to incubate his clone, and he says a family history of longevity gives him a fair shot at being around long enough to see the clone grow up. Unsurprisingly(unsurprisingly--slanting, author is saying surely all you normal folk agree) , several approaches to world authorities have been rejected. A letter to Prime Minister John Howard(Let's all write the minister shall we?) has gone unanswered. But the desperate(desperate-slanting, ie. pitiful again and over used) British migrant wants to spark public debate to try to secure a procedure he says would combat his despondency at never having had children(Should the childless, perhaps last of a family line, not be able to utilize new technology to preserve a family line?), and the loneliness he has felt since his wife died seven years ago. Spousal loss is also what's driven another West Australian to embrace the advances in life sciences. Martha Sandberg, aged 44, has paid $50,000 to be stored indefinitely - at minus 196 degrees Celsius - after she dies. She cites her love for and desire to reunite with husband Helmer Fredrikkson, who was placed in suspension at a US cryonics facility after his death from a brain tumour in 1994. Ms Sandberg - like Dr Hansford-Miller, a mathematician - said she was not chasing immortality, but is excited by the prospect of falling in love with her husband again. Ms Sandberg is among 17 Australians signed up for snap freezing in cryonic chambers. Her late husband is one of two Australians already on ice in US facilities - the other is a 30-year-old Melbourne man who died in 1990, also from a brain tumour. Ethicists are reticent to speak to why people are seeking "spooky"(spooky--probably a real quote but very slanted and powerful) science to prolong or rejuvenate life. University of Western Australia professor of Philosophical Psychology, Michael Levine, says issues surrounding modern scientific technologies have "more to do with value judgments" and are therefore better tossed around by individuals than academics who may have "no particular insight". (In other words leave me out of it? But it's the acedemics not the individuals that the law makers will seek guidence from when the time for a law governing it comes up. the academics must become part of thedebate and so we must engage false notions and lacking imaginations.) "I would think it's sad to get to 84 and want to be cloned, but that's my view. I think it's better to go out dancing and doing other things," Professor Levine said. (Sad? This guy is clueless, someone debate him please!) "Do I think it's inherently unethical or shows he's horribly confused?(Yes that's exactly what you think Prof, we can read it in the wording of the question.) I don't think it shows any of those sorts of things because he may feel he's making a certain kind of judgment about his own life and place." Prof Levine said individuals would have "all sorts of psychological(I suppose it's all psychological at bottom but here the mention of it seems to invalidate it as if only the mentally unhealthy seek to do it as if no legitimate reason exists.) reasons" for wanting to be cloned, but he said most people would be against cloning because it was new and society did not know where it would lead. UWA senior lecturer in psychology, Jan Fletcher, said most people wanted some lasting impact from their life, and for many that was accomplished through having children. Cloning was a whole different ball game. (How so? They labor under false assumptions like a clone will be an exact copy getting nothing from nuture and environment.) "I don't know about nutty, but it certainly seems not to be very healthy having another you living on," Dr Fletcher said. (Another you? Did a Doctor really say this? Unbelievable!!) "You're dealing about very real human feelings and needs but I don't think having a clone child when you're 80 is going to stop you being lonely.(Her personal opinion best kept to herself.) "With cloning, you're taking into account the desire of the scientists to make a name in their field and the rights of a prospective parent to have children, but not the rights of the child."(So every parent-to-be is considering the childs rights before conception? Again they assume it to be so far from the old low tech way as to be mysterious. Are invitro children held apart? Are twins? Twins are for all intent and purpose clones of each other.) UWA associate professor of Philosophy of the Mind and Metaphysics, Stewart Candlish, said he believed Dr Hansford-Miller was "under a false idea of what cloning could achieve". "The person who wants to be cryonically frozen, well, it seems to me that it's actually a very good idea that human life is finite," Professor Candlish said. (WARNING WARNNG Beware Deathist Meme!! Someone please write this guy and take him on.) AAP _______________________________________________________________________________________________ I wish to put forth the idea of our community putting together a debate team. Does this seem useful to you all? The team might engage in teleconferenced debates to save costs. However, there might come a time for a need to actually travel so funding that is an issue to consider. Perhaps televised debates could be organized, maybe using the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) for the US. Any thoughts? James Swayze -- Some of our views are spacious some are merely space--RUSH Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=15965