X-Message-Number: 2677
From:  (Thomas Donaldson)
Subject: CRYONICS Re: Foreign Research
Date: Sun, 3 Apr 1994 21:27:07 -0700 (PDT)

Hi!

I was extremely gratified by Bob Ettinger's message. The possibility of using
Ukrainian scientists was one I wasn't aware of and is a very good one.

As Bob knows, I would be very happy to publish any papers which result from
this work. This includes negative results (we learn not just from positive
results but negative ones too). I would especially like to learn of the 
technical details in the work Ettinger cites as already performed: the
cryopreservation of sheep's brains, for instance. In itself this may constitute
a paper whether or not Ukrainians were involved!

I hope very much that one way or another Bob can see fit to make this work
public; it may answer a major question I've had about Alcor's procedures. As
for technical detail, I would like a good deal more than he will likely 
publish in THE IMMORTALIST: after all, if I understand THE IMMORTALIST, it
is not aimed solely at a technical audience.

Furthermore I personally, and I assume many other cryonicists on cryonet,
would like to hear the opinions of others about this work, if they have had
an opportunity to learn about it in detail.

As many readers on Cryonet may have noticed, a good deal of factional
disputation both within and between cryonics societies has gone on for at
least 2 years. As an individual, I've tried to keep out of it, but that 
sometimes felt like trying to pretend I wasn't in prison. Nor can I really
claim that I kept out of it all completely.

And any failure of cooperation in working out better suspension methods 
resembles, to my thinking, a group of people in a leaking lifeboat who
decide to squabble about who gets the best seat rather than try to plug
the leaks. Preservation methods are central to everything we aim for;
if the cryonics societies themselves cannot cooperate on this issue, even
if on this issue alone, then they are far worse enemies of cryonics than
any number of members of the Society for Cryobiology.

		Best wishes, and long long life,
			Thomas Donaldson

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=2677