X-Message-Number: 19868 From: "Brook Norton" <> Subject: philosophy of the cryonics probability spreadsheet Date: Thu, 22 Aug 2002 06:25:17 -0700 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_0007_01C249A4.AFAE5FE0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="Windows-1252" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In Message #19862, Steve Harris addresses Ralph Merkle regarding estimating the odds of cryonics working. I'm in agreement regarding being able to define your inputs so that they are independent. Also, Thomas Donaldson also often points out that you can not do a prediction because you can affect the future, to which I reply, estimate the odds of a future event "given" you will try to promote cryonics. As further encouragement for cryonicists to try the spreadsheet, consider the following. Regarding the odds of society developing advanced nanotechnology as required for recovery.... The spreadsheet allows you to input, for example, in 25 years there is a 5% chance the technology will be here, in 50 years a 25% chance , in 75 years a 50% chance, in 100 years a 75% chance and in 150 years a 90% chance ("given" mankind does not destroy itself, which accounted for elsewhere). So you see in this example, even in 25 years there is some chance that you can be recovered. The spreadsheet calculates, based on your inputs, the odds that you will still be frozen in 25, 50, 75, 100, 200 years (or whatever time intervals you choose). The odds of remaining frozen in 25 years are very good, falling off over the decades as the odds of fire, bankruptcy, etc, whittle away your odds of remaining frozen for a very long time. So as the odds of developing the technology rises over the years, and the odds of remaining frozen decrease. The spreadsheet takes these trends and calculates the odds of being recovered in each time interval. Then the integral of revival over all time intervals is taken to show the overall odds of ever being recovered. The spreadsheet is designed to be user friendly for inputting data and viewing the plotted results. If any others are interested in getting a copy of the spreadsheet, email me at <mailto:> Brook ------=_NextPart_000_0007_01C249A4.AFAE5FE0 Content-Type: text/html; [ AUTOMATICALLY SKIPPING HTML ENCODING! ] Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=19868