X-Message-Number: 25004 From: Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 06:44:17 EST Subject: Additional insight regarding optimizing chance of good suspension In a message dated 11/9/2004 5:01:12 AM Eastern Standard Time, writes: Tim Freeman/others wrote: > Of the last 4 cases mentioned on Cryonet (2 CI and 2 Alcor) are were >difficult cases, featuring several days of ischemia. I don't know what the >long term batting average is for these two organizations, but I do agree >with David it could use a little improvement. Any ideas out there? Good question. One obvious one is, if you're rich, don't arrange your will so your relatives have a financial incentive to defeat your cryonics. (Rudi Hoffman writing): Profound observation, Tim and others! I think that most realists among us would agree that economics and finance are a strong driver of human behavior. One important added insight to Tim Freeman's comment above related to cryonics is this. Make sure the secondary or contingent beneficiary of your cryonics life insurance policy does not have a BUILT IN financial DISINCENTIVE to your cryonics wishes! Most of us automatically put our spouse or relatives or friends down as contingent or secondary beneficiaries. While this may be fine if we really trust these people to carry out our cryonics wishes, it DOES, as recent cases have pointed out, carry a built in "conflict of interest." Which is why I am currently encouraging people to consider naming their cryonics vendor as beneficiary REGARDLESS of whether a suspension is possible or not. Another KEY point is this, and this is fairly easily accomplished. It is silly, small thinking, short sighted, and...well...selfish to only have a minimum amount of life insurance. You need to have a BUNCH to leave to your family and loved ones, and they are much less likely to scramble over the amount going to fund your cryonics arrangements. BTW, I don't use "selfish" as a perjorative term very often, being in part on Ayn Rand Objectivist who of course wrote a book entitled "The Virture of Selfishness." But to be paltry and petty in obtaining adequate amounts of coverage to take care of the people and organizations you care about more than anything in the world is just plain old fashioned dumb. And we cryonicists may be a bunch of things, but most of us don't think we are "plain, old fashioned, or dumb!" Life insurance allows you to have a huge estate at PENNIES on the dollar. It is affordable in incremental payments on an annual or monthly basis. And you can be damn sure that a properly named beneficiary or beneficiaries will GET the money without delays or unknown risks associated with probate. We all hope to be "richer" someday. But you can leave a legacy of a huge contribution to organizations and people you care about TODAY through the affordable leverage of a modern miracle called life insurance. Have a bunch of it, (millions are good!) spread it around with carefully thought out beneficiaries, and the odds of your successful suspension and saving your most PRECIOUS possession, YOUR life, go up dramatically? So, to the Google corporate slogan, "Don't be evil." We can add another foundational piece of wisdom, "Don't be petty with your insurance amounts!" Yours for Centuries, Rudi Content-Type: text/html; charset="US-ASCII" [ AUTOMATICALLY SKIPPING HTML ENCODING! ] Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=25004