X-Message-Number: 27706
References: <>
From: Peter Merel <>
Subject: SR replies
Date: Mon, 13 Mar 2006 22:57:21 +1100

Marta Sandberg writes,

> I enjoyed reading the whole posting.  I learnt a few things and I  
> always
> appreciate a quiet laugh.

If it's good for nothing else, it's certainly worth a grin. I don't  
pretend it takes Doug's amazing dedication with his flies, but I like  
to think that, in my own little way, I'm doing my part for longevity  
research :-)

> On a more serious note.  When/if we wake up a century or so into  
> the future
> it is unlikely that our mores will be applicable.  As a cryonicsist  
> you have
> to be prepared that the future will force you to adjust to their  
> moral and
> social standards.

Who here didn't grow up reading Heinlein novels and now finds  
themselves by turns shocked and saddened by the sheer inhumane idiocy  
of what laughingly passes for mores today? Where are my robot  
manservants? Where is my talking flying car? My bevy of strawberry  
blonde kung fu genii? My door into summer?

Ah, but I have my wife and son. You can keep the rest and I'll die  
happy. On the flip side, long life can't be harder than losing the  
people you love best. I'll gladly learn Latin and dance the Hula for  
a living if I can just stop that.

> On an even more serious note, I have found that it is the though of  
> having
> to cope with all this change that is stopping a lot of people from  
> wanting
> the cryonics option.

I have been flying from Tweed to Sydney and back every week for the  
last 6 months. I fly a cattle-class-only airline that deserves no  
free publicity here. Point is they have no seat numbers - you sit  
wherever you like. Two things consistently amaze me.

First is how much people enjoy lining up. I mean they'll line up an  
hour in advance for their choice of seats. Me, I just wait for the  
cattle-call and strike up a conversation with someone not far from  
the start of the line. If they're surly I check my phone is off and  
get in line a couple places back.

I do this ritual so I can get an emergency row seat. I don't really  
imagine in the event that such a seat would improve my chances. But  
it has more leg room, which suits me very well.

 From conversation with fellow passengers I can say that most of them  
buy the whole life-preserver-whistle-light schadenfreude. Which  
brings me to the second amazing thing. When the steward comes and  
informs the lucky ones that they personally are sitting in an  
Emergency Row and will be expected to help their fellows get out in  
the event of a survivable crash, most of those without long legs  
stand up and ask to be reseated some place else.

So I think what stops people wanting cryonics is they can't conceive  
of ever needing it; if they're alive they don't need it, and if  
they're dead they don't need it. They'd rather just be reseated some  
place else.

----

Dave Stodolsky writes,

> The only scientific study in this area that I know of shows that
> cancer is reduced by regular ejaculation (in young men). This is
> apparently traceable to the highly active chemicals in sperm.

I imagine a young man would die of elephantitis before the cancer got  
him.

But the idea isn't that you never ejaculate; it's that you do so less  
and less as you age. At least that's what the old taoists seem to  
recommend. On the other hand these same fakirs would dose up a noble  
with so much heavy metal his corpse wouldn't rot, and then cart the  
thing around as proof they'd magiced the old bloke into his "jade  
body". YMMV.

Peter Merel.

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