X-Message-Number: 5167 Date: Sun, 12 Nov 95 17:57:51 From: Steve Bridge <> Subject: Survey on World without Death To CryoNet >From Steve Bridge November 12, 1995 In response to: Message #5156 From: (David Stodolsky) Subject: World without death not wanted Date: Sat, 11 Nov 95 17:56:20 +0100 Very interesting post about the survey on attitudes toward the abolition of death. Of course the results are severely skewed by the narrow make-up of the respondents, "600 persons attending conferences, workshops, or courses focusing on death." I have given many talks to "Death and Dying" classes, and it is apparent that the focus of the course is usually to make the class members *comfortable* with the idea of death. In addition, on average, I suspect that students taking these courses, the professors teaching them, and surely people attending *conferences* on death start out being prepared to accept death -- or they wouldn't be attending at all. And whether they consciously appreciate it or not, many professors and professional "death counselors" may defend death because it is the concept upon which their profession centers. They cannot imagine a world without death any more than a parasitologist could imagine a world without parasites. It would be much more interesting and valid to perform this survey on more random groups of people. Now, I assure you that, while I think that the precise *percentages* are invalid in the survey quoted, I am positive that the same variety of responses does occur in the general population. I would certainly agree that the majority of Americans would conclude that the end of death would be generally bad for the human race. Stodolsky's suggestion that cryonics literature is much too narrow and neglects to take this negativity into account is quite correct. We'll have to look at that ourselves. >The second edition of this book is a complete rewrite, and is well worth >a read. The author works in Arizona as do Greenberg, et al, authors of an >earlier cited article on terror management theory. Maybe ALCOR could >attempt to involve these people. Several of us know Kastenbaum, and I have spoken at his Death and Dying class class at Arizona State University. Somehow we have missed this particular book, however. We'll look for it. But he is NOT a fellow who will become interested in cryonics. He's definitely one of the "be comfortable with death" folks. I have attempted to contact Greenberg in the past but have had no response. Steve Bridge, Alcor Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5167