X-Message-Number: 16601
Date: Wed, 20 Jun 2001 10:09:18 -0400
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: various

Hi everyone!

Mike Darwin, in the right mood, can say many sensible things. Yes, he
was in the right mood in this Cryonet and the near past ones.

James Swayze also asked me about my comment about "accidental freezings".
I was not doubting the stories at all; some of the ideas behind such
stories have been the subject of important research in cryobiology and
even cryonics. I was unhappy with the repetition once more of the story
of an event which has happened many times, and which has been thought
about many times in the past. If I had written the news account I would
have almost ignored the story and gone on to discuss what
particular scientists had done with it recently. There were some new
points in the article, though many were not new at all, and I would
have tried to emphasize those new points. I would even say that the
author may have been ignorant of various developments, but that does
not mean that he cannot have made some new observations, still... I
refer here to the Doctor who was described, not the person who wrote
the article itself.

For Deathist Lurker Girl, I'll have to say that the preparations
for suspension just aren't easy to do if the person doing them is
already dying. Perhaps oddly, the main issues become LEGAL ones,
which almost always take a long time and patience. Actually doing
a suspension (forgetting, theoretically only, the legal issues
involved, though realistically that would be hard) isn't nearly as
hard as making the preparations to be suspended. Among major differences,
if a team could simply suspend someone the time for preparation
could be much shorter.

Legal issues? First, the relatives must either consent or agree not
to interfere. Second, the money for the suspension must become
clearly available soon afterwards; this is one reason insurance
plays such a large role. (And if you are dying it's difficult to
change the beneficiary and owner of the insurance you may already
have, and impossible to get insurance). Third, the Coroner may wish
to become involved, and even autopsy the patient. To put the problem
mildly, an autopsy makes revival of the patient several orders of
magnitude harder than one which wasn't autopsied. (Coroners may
even try to do this if you've made preparations, but you will have
left those caring for you more ability to deal with him or her).
Fourth, as I've suggested above, you will not be in the best 
mental position to consider suspension at all, and your consent
is virtually inevitably necessary. Fifth, there must usually be
arrangements made not only to pay for the suspension but for 
other things, too, such as the cost of bringing a suspension team
to you and housing etc them. 

It is possible that someday, if cryonics becomes much bigger, some
of these problems won't cause such difficulties. That's fine but
it says nothing about the CURRENT problems. For that matter, if 
you ever decide to care about cryonics for yourself, then you 
should join immediately... whether or not it's become easier. Even
if you can only contribute money, these difficulties will only 
be lessened because CRYONICISTS are lessening them. If you wait
until everything is beautiful and simple, you'll probably still
be waiting when you're dying.

		Best wishes and long long life for all,

			Thomas Donaldson

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