X-Message-Number: 28402
References: <>
From: Kennita Watson <>
Subject: Re: Artificial heart
Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2006 08:40:00 -0700

On Sep 6, 2006, at 2:00 AM, CryoNet wrote:

> From: "Basie" <>
>
> The artificial heart has been approved by the FDA. Eventually  
> everyone will
> get this heart sooner or later.  The consequences for cryonics is  
> probably
> not good because your heart could go on beating long after your  
> brain is
> dead.

1) This sounds like a reason to make brain function the
criterion for death, e.g., to develop a portable EEG.
Question:  does the heart use signals from the brain to
regulate its function in any way?  Perhaps a refinement
on this heart could cause it to operate only while it
receives such signals, reducing it to the function of
pump rather than also acting as the regulator.

2) "Everyone" sounds alarmist.  An artificial heart will
not be as cheap or easy to get as a vaccination, at least
in the foreseeable future (when nanobots can go into your
body and replace the natural heart with an artificial one
one atom at a time, all bets are off).  Everyone is
supposed to get vaccinated -- it doesn't happen.

3) I don't think the government will be able to force
you to get such a heart if you don't want one.  A clause
in cryonics contracts could stipulate that along with no
autopsy, there should be no artificial heart used.  Then
again, if the person could be declared dead by the
brain-death criterion while the artificial heart was
still pumping, this could allow a cryonics team to work
without a thumper (I think).

Live long and prosper,
Kennita
--
Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
none but ourselves can free our minds.
           -- Bob Marley, "Redemption Song"

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=28402