X-Message-Number: 32388
Date: Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:46:07 -0800 (PST)
From: Luke Parrish <>
Subject: Re: cryonics terminology

In order to prove that CI is making fraudulent claims, it
would be necessary to first prove that people stand a real
chance of being deceived by their use of the given
terminology.

In other words, the context would have to be such that
people are likely to seriously and erroneously believe that
they will no longer be legally dead when they are
cryopreserved.

It is painfully obvious to all concerned that nobody who is
cryopreserved is alive by the traditional, much less legal,
definition of death. Because of this, use of the term
"patient" is not and cannot be misleading in the manner your
argument implies.

In the cryonics context, the term "patient" is being used
quite deliberately to convey the less-than-obvious fact that
such legal and traditional definitions of death are utterly
irrelevant as far as the premises of cryonics (i.e.
information-theoretic death) are concerned.

Over and over, cryonics advocates deal with the arguments of
people who miss this point entirely. I can see how such
people might be uncomfortable with our terminology, but that
is the entire point of using it. The presumption that legal
death removes all ethical obligations towards an individual
has gone unquestioned in our culture for far too long now.

From a constitutional standpoint, simply consider that there
is no more deception involved here than there is when
"pro-life" groups portray human fetuses as "unborn babies".
It is a case of a group with a particular definition of life
using that definition as a rhetorical device to advance
their position. There is nothing fraudulent or illegal about
them taking this position, it is simply a natural way to
convey their honest and heartfelt opinion. To attempt to
censor them over it would be a clear violation of the first
amendment.

There is no intent nor realistic possibility to deceive 
anyone regarding the reality of the situation. "Patient" is 
the only term that adequately conveys the proper attitude 
with which cryonics organizations view the so-called 
corpses under their care, and is thus entirely appropriate 
in this context.

You are of course free to use whatever term you like.
Suspendee, cryonaut, and preservee may be appropriate in
certain contexts. But inventing new non-dictionary words
means creating new jargon, and risks creating a separate
set of cryonics "elites" who "get cryonics". This is the
opposite of what we should be trying to do, which is to
mainstream the idea so that more lives will be saved by it
(assuming that they can be, which I do) and more research
will get done on making it more effective (i.e. likely to 

work). Honestly I think cryonics has had enough elitism and counterculturalism 
over the past 40 years.

Opting out of information-theoretic death is, as far as we 
can tell, entirely possible. We shouldn't try to dilute 
this message. Desiring to continue one's own existence is 
an entirely normal concept, and more and more normal people 
are getting involved. Making it seem more esoteric and 
bizarre would be unfair to them, and is fortunately (and 
for good reason) not something the government has the 
authority to force us to do.


> Message #32384
> Date: Sat, 13 Feb 2010 13:29:27 -0800 (PST)
> From: 
> Subject: cryonics terminology
> 
> I received one "non-supportive" email from an influencial
> cryonics proponent regarding my proposed change in cryonics
> terminology to delete all mention of fraudulent terms such
> as patient or person in reference to stored corpses. The
> sender stated that the "eyes of the law are irrelevant".
> 
> Below is an extract from my reply, which I hope will serve
> as a warning to cryonics organizations that are still using
> such potentially dangerous terminology.
> 
> "It was the law which shut down CI for awhile. CI is
> regulated as a respository only for corpses, yet CI
> continues to use terms that imply it is violating the law.
> CI has been shut down by the law in the past, and will again
> when at some point in the future when the local law is more
> strictly enforced. Using terms that are not in the
> dictionary elminates some of this risk. Terms like
> "suspendee", my own proposed "cryonaut", and "preservee" as
> suggested elsewhere all possess the advantage of being low
> risk terms because they are not in the dictionary. They
> would mean the same to members of the cryonics movement, as
> "patient" would, but are not in technical violation of the
> law. As you know, the dictionary states that "patient" can
> only refer to live human bodies and not to corpses. This
> dictionary reference can be used by any unsympathetic
> bureaucrat to shut down both CI and Alcor at any time. For
> institutions that may have to survive hundreds or even
> thousands of years to fulfill their purpose, taking needless
> risks such as using words like "patient" is imprudent."
> 
> >From CI's website:
> [Cryonicists make best efforts to minimize tissue
> deterioration to maximize the future potential for life. For
> this reason, cryonicists refer to people who have been
> cryopreserved as patients, rather than as corpses.]
> 
> >From Alcor's website:
> [The cryopreservation phase of cryonics will not be
> reversible for a very long time. But this still does not
> mean cryonics patients are dead.]
> 
> According to a court ruling in the state of Michigan a
> patient can not be a corpse, and thus technically CI is
> guiltly of making a fraudulent claim. Any unsympathetic
> bureaucrat could take CI to court and win the lawsuit.
> Snipped from the web>
> [A ruling however by the Michigan Court of Appeals
> determined that "because a dead body is not a person, it is
> not protected under a statute that protects patient abuse in
> nursing homes."]
> 

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