X-Message-Number: 24026
From: 
Subject: Re: funding issues -- reply to Rudi Hoffman
Date: Sat, 1 May 2004 13:40:47 US/Eastern

    (Reply to:   http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/dsp.cgi?msg=24021 )

      Thank you for your gracious response, Rudi. I feared I may
have overreacted to your use of the word "travesty". I certainly
don't fault your passion for ALCOR. My reference to "partisanism"
was to what I regarded as an *unfair* criticism of CI. We do make
mistakes, but the cremation of the CI Member was not related to
the fact that he belonged to CI nor was it because of the means
of funding. 

    The CI Member was, in fact, prepaid -- a more secure means
of funding than insurance. But even if it had been insurance funding
we would still have had to return the money to the estate because
this was the stipulatioin in the Member's paperwork concerning the
contingency of a failure to cryopreserve. (Similar to Timothy Leary's
insurance proceeds to CryoCare which I returned to the estate.) 

   Yes, insurance is superior to funding through a Will and an Estate
because it avoids probate. But these facts are irrelevant to the case
of the cremated CI Member. 

    I want to be on good terms with you and other Alcor Members,
and I do like you Rudi. I hope we can remain friends. I hope that 
you and other Alcor Members can appreciate the danger of 
cryonicists having all of their eggs in one basket (one organization)
and can appreciate that the work I do to make the Cryonics Institute
better and stronger is a benefit to all cryonicists. 

            -- Ben Best, President
               Cryonics Institute

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