X-Message-Number: 3233 Date: 10 Oct 94 00:59:26 EDT From: David S Pizer <> Subject: CRYONICS Uncovering History By: Dave Pizer First this note: Although I don't always agree with David Codenza I do feel that his opinions are his own. I don't think a good way to try to defeat him is to continue to call him names, or assert that Carlos is talking through David. Those people who want to defeat David in a debate should attack his statements, not him. I know both David and Carlos, and I feel that at least some of the statements that David posts are not the beliefs held by Carlos. I have even heard David talking on several occassions when Carlos was either out of town or taking a drink of water. As far as the job of trying to uncover history, I feel I must agree with Charles Platt to some degree on this. Like Charles, I also have personally intervied Nelson at his home. I also have reviewed some of the records and I believe that Mr. Nelson and Mr. Kent both went out of the cryonics business for the same reason, lack of relatives desire or ability to keep paying the storage costs of their loved ones. It might appear that when Mr. Kent could see that he was going to have to close down, (perhaps for reasons beyond his control - perhaps not- who knows?) he relieved himself of some of his patients (perhaps under honorable circumstances -- who knows?). I have found out that Mr. Kent turned some of his patients over to Mr. Nelson; I don't know why. To some, Mr. Nelson might be viewed as a hero for taking patients from Mr. Kent and trying to keep them frozen -- Mr. Nelson sees himself that way. To others, Mr. Nelson may be viewed as a rouge who got in trouble. I know that the Chamberlains view him as a rouge. The problem in trying to determine what really happened is compounded by the fact that Mr. Kent refuses to discuss any of the events that occured when he was helping run CSNY and CryoSpan, so we don't have the facts. Mr. Nelson, on the other hand, is willing to discuss his side of the story but we don't know if he is telling the truth, so we don't know the facts there, either. Why is it important to know what went on back in those days? There are a couple of reasons: What is that damn quote? "Those who don't know/remember the mistakes of history are likely to repeat those mistakes again and go out of business again" or something like that. One thing to the credit of Mike Darwin is that when he was helping to form the early policy of Alcor, (after Mr. Kent and Mr. Nelson went out of business) is that Mike insisted that Alcor only take patients who had paid in full, in advance. I can't tell you how surprized I was to hear that CryoCare was going to take patients and allow the relatives to make payments like in the old days. It appears that both Mr. Kent and Mr. Nelson are said to have claimed that this is the reason they both went our of business. Another thing that intrigues me is how Mr. Metzger, who I belive is an intelligent man, can say that he is "damned certain" about why Mr. Kent went out of business and then in the same posting say that he barely knows Mr. Kent. It appears that Mr. Metzger is assuming to know the facts about Mr. Kent's history only because Mr. Metzger does not trust David Codenza and is willing to assume anything that is opposite to what Codenza says. I don't know him, but I will give Perry Metzger the benefit of the doubt because most of my friends trust his judgement, but I would ask Perry how he "knows" the reasons Mr. Kent went out of business and Mr. Nelson went out of business, or is he just guessing. I honestly do not ask this in a manner to hurt anyone (although some people will probably make that false assumption) but because I want to know what happened back then. Soon, I will be helpless in one of those damn tanks (like the rest of you) and I want to know what happened NOW so I can see if I can make any changes to the way we do cryonics to improve my chances of not getting thawed out like all those other people did. The bottom line is that all I really "know" is that both Mr. Nelson and Mr. Kent both closed up. I don't know why. Does anyone? Dave Pizer Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=3233