X-Message-Number: 22214
From: "mike99" <>
Subject: Denial of Life
Date: Wed, 16 Jul 2003 15:59:16 -0600

I think the problem with our debate on Cryonet over the psychological
theories of Ernest Becker, the nature of religion, and the reality death, is
that the participants are arguing from different premises. The Beckerians
seem to be oblivious to the sociobiological foundation of living beings,
including homo sapiens. I have no doubt that Becker was a compelling writer.
Like Freud, however, he seems to be writing from the perspective of one who
assumes that psychology is determined primarily by the influences of society
and family upon an otherwise independent ego. Biology gets lost.

Such a perspective seems quite naive in view of the more compelling
arguments of evolutionary psychology that we are primarily evolved, genetic
robots controlled by a combination of selfish genes and social information
mechanisms (or memes) with, at best, a rational mind of relatively minor
influence for most individuals. Now I do not blame Becker for being unaware
of sociobiology, which was a theory barely known outside of E. O. Wilson's
Harvard offices at the time that Becker died of cancer. Perhaps, had he
lived, Becker might have integrated Wilson's insights into his own theories.
That, we cannot know.

We can be fairly certain, though, that most people lack a constant,
pessimistic, terrorized fear of death because such a state of being would be
contrary to the survival program of the genes. Remember, individual human
beings are the mechanisms by which genes reproduce themselves. Individuals
are expendable tools of the (would be) immortal genes. The same can be said
of memes, which also use us as the instrumentality of their replication.
Terror of death is not managed by some psychological delusion created
(unconsciously) by individuals, but rather by psychological tricks created
(unconsciously) by sociobiological replicators (genes and memes). In other
words, we are not fooling ourselves in some weak-willed fashion;  rather, we
are being fooled by the underlying systems that comprise us.

The reproductive imperative of genes and memes does cloud our rational
consideration of our own mortality. It certainly works against the greater
awareness of mortality upon which the attraction of cryonics depends. This
is a fundamental problem for us as cryonicists. Yet, so far as I understand
Becker's approach, it does not help us any better. Becker seems to be saying
that we must accept our mortality, embrace it, and move on. No cryonicist
wants to do that! We struggle against our mortality, and like the poet Dylan
Thomas, "Rage, rage, against the dying of the light. Do not go gentle into
that good night."

As for religion, I agree with Mike Perry that the term can and should be
expanded beyond the type of animism that Boyer describes. While Boyer's
concern with spirits and gods and the mental structures that give rise to
such beliefs is, I think, accurate, it is not complete. Certain types of
religion, such as original Buddhism (which was devoid of concern with gods
and spirits, whether or not they existed) took a rational approach to
suffering, its causes and cessation. The Buddha did not preach soul survival
in an afterlife, but rather the non-existence of any permanent self or soul.
Cessation of suffering came with the realization that there was no one to
suffer. As soon as an individual realized this, then fear and suffering
abated.

Cryonics is not Buddhist in this original sense, but these two belief
systems do not clash to the same degree that other religious systems do.
Buddha claimed that the individual is composed of material elements in a
certain arrangement, not immaterial soul. Cryonics would agree. Although
Buddha would probably not have advocated trying to achieve physical
immortality (or extreme life extension) even were the technology available
to him, there is nothing in his teaching that would contradict the
scientific premises underlying our hope that cryonics will ultimately work.

I think that Venturism, as a rational religion of universal resurrection and
unlimited life, is only one step removed from the Buddhist understanding, if
not from the Buddhist agenda. I enjoyed reading Mike Perry's first book on
immortalism, FOREVER FOR ALL, and look forward to his next book on
Venturism. I hope to see more details for the implementation of the ideas he
outlined in his earlier work. And I must say that I find great value in such
books that honestly acknowledge the reality of death and propose practical
(if long term) means for its elimination. Isn't such a practical, realistic
hope for eternal life superior to both the myths of traditional religion and
the resigned hopelessness of the Beckerians?

Regards,

Michael LaTorra




Member:
Extropy Institute: www.extropy.org
World Transhumanist Association: www.transhumanism.org
Alcor Life Extension Foundation: www.alcor.org
Society for Technical Communication: www.stc.org

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