X-Message-Number: 21527
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2003 04:17:51 -0500 (EST)
From: Charles Platt <>
Subject: vitrification

Bob Ettinger's previous post stated that as of early this year (date
unspecified), no vitrified organ has been recovered from a temperature as
low as dry ice. I requested a reference for this statement. Here's his
response:

"Strange! As one of the head honchos of Alcor (the number two man now,
apparently), with presumably close ties to the researchers, he ought to
KNOW what the facts are. In any case, I have authoritative letters on
file, and while confidentiality was not stipulated, it is obvious that
public copying was not desired in the context of a Cryonet squabble. Aside
from that, the information is NOT private or confidential, but was
publicly disclosed at an Alcor meeting last fall, although it missed my
notice at the time and apparently Platt's too."

Points:

1. My knowledge of the facts is irrelevant, since I made no statement of
fact. I simply asked Ettinger to substantiate his categorical statements,
because historically he has posted numerous messages here which contain
"facts" that are not backed up with citations or elementary error
checking, even though he could accomplish this in most cases with a single
phone call. I asked if he had bothered to make such a phone call in this
instance. Apparently the answer is "no."

2. Apparently in this case his sources consisted of letters, from persons
he refuses to name. He does not state a date when he received the letters.
I am willing to bet they were received some time in 2002.

3. He refers to a meeting "last fall" which I assume was the Alcor
conference that occurred about six months ago.

4. Since his original post on this topic claimed that the information he
was citing was correct as of early this year, I have to conclude a) he
didn't bother to check whether his months-old data was still accurate and
therefore b) his statements should be disregarded.

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