X-Message-Number: 27657
From: "Kitty Antonik Wakfer" <>
Subject: RE: Cryobiologist shuts down Belgian cryonics website
Date: Tue, 28 Feb 2006 00:31:21 -0700

> Message #27654
> From: "David Verbeke" <>
> Subject: Cryobiologist shuts down Belgian cryonics website
> Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2006 17:25:27 +0000
>
> Cryobiologist mr. Bram Criel has shut down the msn supported 'Cryonics
> Belgium' website.

I interpret this as meaning that MSN (Microsoft) closed the group "Cryonics
Belgium" after getting a complaint from Bram Criel. Currently when going to
the group's site, a MSN Group message appears, "This Group is Unavailable
This group has been disabled for administrative purposes."
http://groups.msn.com/cryonicsbelgium

>  Mr. Criel contacted me by mail, stating that cryonics
> organisations exploit people for financial profit and that a cryonic
> suspension would be very painful.  I was shocked that somebody
> working on a
> phd in cryobiology thinks that nerve activity (and pain) is possible at a
> temperature of -196 C.

Is it possible that Criel was referring to *psychological* pain? However,
those who arrange cryopreservation are doing so to hopefully *avoid* such
"pain" that often  accompanies dying, both for the one doing the dying and
for family and close friends. But if you both were writing in Dutch(?), I
would expect that language differences would not cause such a
misunderstanding.

> So I decided to post his mail on our website to show
> that even scientists make accusations and statements concerning cryonics
> based on ignorance and wrong information.

A search on PubMed for papers authored by "Criel B" yields 26 between 1992
and 2005. All but one are written in the general area of health
policy/insurance regarding tropical medical practice and where abstracts are
available all are related to Belgian institutions or the World Health
Organization. The one subject exception is the most recent,
"Cryopreservation and abiotic stress tolerance in potato: a proteomic
approach" (Laboratory of Tropical Crop Improvement, Leuven, Belgium). Of the
12 hits at Scirus using string: "Criel AND (cryobiology OR cryobiologist OR
cryopreservation)", only the same article on cryopreservation of potato
connects a B Criel and cryobiology. Possibly Criel is a common last name in
Belgium and this one paper is not authored by the same individual as all the
others listed in PubMed (many under the auspices of Department of Public
Health, Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp, Belgium). Maybe Bram Criel
has changed his field of interest. Or maybe this is a son or other male
relative of the more prolific B Criel.

I don't know what the process is that precedes MSN closing down one of its
groups. I hope that you have made a strong complaint and referred MSN Group
administrators to one or more of the well written items explaining
cryonics - possibly by Brian Wowk or Ben Best.

>
> It is only a matter of days before a new site will be online.
> Mr. Criel has
> threatened to take the matter to court if his mails are published
> on the new website.

You don't mention if publication by you of emails received by you is illegal
in Belgium. Did you agree ahead of time that what he wrote to you would not
be shared with anyone else? If not, then you reasonably are entitled to let
that information be known - and best that it be done verbatim so that each
reader can judge for hirself (translation being necessary of course for
non-Dutch readers if this was the language you both used).  If your new
website is not going to contain this email exchange between you and Bram
Criel because you are truly concerned about a law suit by this individual,
Paul and I offer to publish these emails (native language and English
translation) in the Preserving section of MoreLife so that anyone can read
what the both of you wrote to each other on the subject of cryopreservation.
We would also add our own comments to the exchange.

>
> David Verbeke
> Cryonics Belgium
>

**Kitty Antonik Wakfer

MoreLife for the rational - http://morelife.org
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