X-Message-Number: 6230
From:  (Thomas Donaldson)
Subject: answers.to.2.questions
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 23:03:10 -0700 (PDT)

Hi!

I've just read through all the Cryonet messages which accumulated while I
wasn't reading them. I have a couple of points to make on some questions 
and statements which were made.

1. Ensuring members excellent medical care up until they deanimate.

Because of my brain tumor I had to think this issue out personally. It's not
so clear as some people on Cryonet seem to think. The problem is that good
medical care, even palliative care, costs MONEY. Even if it fails, treatment
of cancer (or any other such condition) just is not cheap. Sure I would like
to hang on for as long as I could: BUT I must also somehow ensure that enough
money is available to pay for standby(s) and my eventual suspension.

It is not so clear just where to decide to put the dividing line. At one 
extreme we might all be thought of as terminal --- but getting frozen right
now would be very foolish. So just how hopeless must our situation be to
justify abandoning all attempts to prolong our lives in favor of suspension?
I don't see this as a question with any general answers: it depends on our
finances, our particular condition, and what we hope to get done before 
we are suspended. In my case, I am a member of a special California-funded
medical plan with Kaiser. There is a limit (which I have not touched at all,
basically because I've been reasonably well ever since I joined) to the 
amount that Kaiser will pay for my further medical care --- say, if I were
to have a relapse of my tumor. After that limit, I must either pay for
my treatment myself, or have no treatment.

When I recovered from radiation treatment enough to think about this question,
two things mattered most: first, I did not want my brain to turn to mush, or 
even to START turning to mush. And second, given the funding constraints, I
decided that if I ran out of insurance money with no signs of likely recovery
that would be time to devote my resources to cryonic suspension rather than
normal medicine. Sure, I might want to take something which might help the

pain --- if it did not dull my ability to think out my situation (and 
ultimatelyI would probably end up dulled by drugs --- at which time I should be 
frozen).
ASSUMING THAT ALL NORMAL TREATMENT LOOKED LIKE IT WOULD FAIL, yes, then it 
would be time for my cryonic suspension.

One thing I did notice all through my illness was the way in which my doctors
(at least to my face) were more cheerful than the medical literature seemed
to support. No one wants to fail, of course, and I don't hold it against 
them. But that taught me something, too: it's hard, even if you beg for 
plain truth rather than cheerful nothings, even to find out the truth. I 
would hope that any doctor associated with a cryonics group is willing to 
tell me openly and plainly how well my treatment is doing. And I would urge
any cryonicist to take this particular lesson to their own heart, too. Even
if it may be clear to others that you have not got many months or weeks of
life remaining, many of those others will never tell you that. You must
work out such things for yourself, not an easy problem at all when you are
sick in the first place. And providing help to do that is one thing your
cryonics group might usefully do --- and if that causes legal problems,
then it's easy to see ways around them.

So NO, it's not just a matter of good care until your suspension.

2. This is a point for Jean-Yves Sireau, if he's still listening:
I have a PhD myself (mathematics) although I don't normally wear it. And as
someone with a PhD, I will say that anyone who believes that research (into
cryonics or anything else) takes years of study and expertise (separate from
the years of study and learning that you do to ACTUALLY DO THE RESEARCH) has
basically accepted a load of B. At ANU, where I taught and did research 
as a mathematician for 16 years, there was one fellow who had a BS and nothing
else --- in the Australian Institute of Advanced Studies, doing research on
ODE's and (for fun) number theory. He'd published lots of papers, etc,
and done so for years. By then it had become a point of honor with him 
NOT to accept a PhD (he could have gotten one 10 times over), not even if
it were an honorary degree.

It does not take any special titles or parchment to do research. What it does
take is funding (of course), hard work (of course), and the humility to see
that no matter how much you know and how intelligent you are, there are other
people who have ALSO had very good ideas and worked them out years before 
you began. (That is, you must understand about reading the literature first
before you try something which seems new to you but was really done, better
than you could do it now, 30 years ago--- and also the humility to learn from
what those people have done).

Of course, funding is key. The possession of a PhD is very important nowadays
if you are to have any hope at all of funding. And if that PhD comes from
some prestigious school, much better. Right now, in fact, for many research
fields there is a glut of people with PhDs (it is a union, in fact though
not in name). And while I was at ANU (I had tenure) I could see this happen:
at one time ordinary students could get jobs marking papers... but by the
time I left, you needed a PhD to do that. I'm sure that there are people who
would willingly hire PhDs to sweep the floor and clean the windows... and
yes, some would accept such a job, if only to have to possibility of 
someday doing research. 

The main thing to understand about PhDs is that they let you into an 
exclusive club. And clubs may be very exclusive even if their members spend 
their time staring into space and blowing bubbles with their saliva. 

Of course, if you want to judge someone for what they know about a subject,
really judge them rather than just accept their union card, you have to
see what they've done and what they know. Ignore the parchment and look at
the person. And naturally references from other people whose expertise you
do respect would help --- but ultimately it all falls on you.

And so to Mr. Sireau or anyone else, I would point out that if anything the
lack of Authorities doing cryonics research may even be a Good Thing. If you
want to decide how many experts there are in cryonics, you will have to 
look at the people rather than their degrees. 

			Best and long long life,

				Thomas Donaldson


Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=6230