X-Message-Number: 6150 Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 01:52:07 -0400 (EDT) From: Charles Platt <> Subject: Interesting Perspective Yesterday I sent Arel Lucas a piece of mail in which I expressed regret that she wasn't able to help us a week ago at Timothy Leary's house. This mail was addressed to her alone, and I considered it strictly personal. So far as I know, no one else saw it. Subsequently I sent an entirely separate message to CryoNet and other distribution lists formally announcing TL's decision not to pursue cryonics. Arel has now replied to my personal letter, but has sent her reply to the wide distribution lists of my general announcement. This is very unfortunate, since it turns a mild private disagreement into a public flame war. (Just another hazard of email, I guess.) For the record: On Mon, 6 May 1996, Arel Lucas wrote: > You and Mike are the reason Timothy has renounced cryonics, In what way did I achieve this miraculous conversion? I visited TL four times, total, during which I clearly promoted cryonics. Others, who clearly dislike the idea of cryonics, have been living with TL for months. Does it not seem more likely that their influence would have been greater than mine? > Now you and Mike have your scapegoat--me of course--since I > couldn't bend Timothy to your will, throw everybody else out of his > house, and smuggle you in. What we begged you to do, Arel, was to create a bridge between the people in the house and the cryonicists. Since you are a one-time assistant to TL, and you are also a cryonicist, we hoped you could bring both sides together at a time when we sensed (correctly) that TL was being advised against cryonics. Instead, as you told me yourself, you hung out at the house and "had a good time." So far as I could tell, you didn't try to act on our behalf. I asked you, twice, if you could bring me with you to the house, so that I could have a chance to talk to the people there. This you did not attempt to do. After your third visit you said that "Tim needs a Mom" to encourage him to eat and take his medicines. Then, having delivered your verdict, you went home to San Francisco. Frankly, Mike and I were very disappointed. We had hoped that your visit might open up the possibility of getting 24-hour nursing care and installing monitoring equipment that would have enabled early warning of TL's death. This would have facilitated a proper cryonics standby where we would have had an excellent chance of acting swiftly. Mike and I concluded that this was not going to be possible, which was one reason why we pulled the standby equipment out of the house. I don't blame you for the way things worked out, because I think TL and his associates were following a path that led inexorably to rejection of cryonics. But please don't blame US for it. Mike in particular tried repeatedly over many months to improve TL's quality of care and quality of life, and to insure a good cryopreservation. Steve Harris made similar attempts. All these attempts (with the exception of the Fentanyl analgeic patches that Steve persuaded the primary care physician to allow) were rejected by TL. > if you do go back there, you'd better > have some respect for him and his friends, and I wish you could see the > love there. But I doubt you will. To be frank, I saw some hero worship but not love as I understand the word. If people around TL love him so much, why do they not take proper care of him instead of allowing him to go away to Malibu for the weekend without pain medication, fall out of bed and cut his forehead, set fire to his bedroom, and starve to death (literally)? > PLEASE TAKE ME OFF THIS LIST. I'm deleting any further messages I > receive from any of you. I can see you have a certain perception of the Leary home that's precious to you. I regret that other well-informed perceptions trouble you so much, you refuse even to read them. --Charles Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=6150