X-Message-Number: 7174
Date: Tue, 19 Nov 1996 23:32:21 -0500
From: Garret Smyth <>
Subject: "technology" - as stock market investment

I (Garret Smyth) once said:

>> Also, "technology" today is like saying
>> "industry" 150 years ago. An expanding sector indeed, but non the less
>> prone to crashes, and other sectors have done very well too.

John de Rivaz replied:

>But technology growth is essential to cryonic revivals. If it isn't there, 
>then we won't be there to observe it. 


Here we agree. We are both waiting for "our friends in the future" to bail us 
out.

[As an aside, it would be nice if we didn't need to wait for "our friends in the

future" and could be sure that cryonics was a from of suspended animation rather
than
suspended de-animation, wouldn't it?]

>If in stock market terms technology grows at the expense of other areas, eg 
>hospitality and travel, then an overall index with be the total of growth 
>and decline, and not do that well. 


Well, yes. *If* one sector grows with respect to another, then the others won't 
do

as well, by definition. It doesn't mean that the total will decline. One thing 
can
do well, and others can do less well, but they can all grow. A common error 

amongst socialists is that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, when 
quite

often the rich get much richer whilst the poor only a bit richer (ie still 
better 
off than they were). Be careful with both your "if"s and your "then"s.

>Much turnover is at present centred on services, eg Financial Service 
>companies have over the past few years been growing at the rate of 
>electronics companies. However expanding technology will mean that people 
>will be able to perform these services for themselves and the role of the 
>intermediary will be reduced. 

There have been "execution only" companies for many years. Advancing 
technology has very little to do with it.

>Travel, leisure and hospitality cannot benefit that much from technology...

Well, no, you probably have me here. Mind you, are you familiar with the works
of Mr Wells? He has written several scientifically oriented romances with 

suggestions that many may pour scorn upon, but that I feel have more than a 
modicum
of verissimilitude about them.


That which is not ruled impossible by science will one day be achieved, I feel 
sure.


We have already seen the invention of the horseless carriage. Whilst I would not
be 

so bold as to suggest that even the common man could afford one, surely there 
will

come a day when Britain has maybe a hundred thousand of the machines. Ignore 
that

silly doctor that said that a human wouldn't survive at speeds above thirty 
miles
an hour. Train travel has proved this wrong. And I know that naysayers mock the

horseless carriage at its inability to deal with rough roads. Parliament passed 
acts

to allow the railways to buy the land needed to build their metal roads. It is 
no

less likely that Parliament will create the rights of way needed for a network 
of
Mr Macadam's new technology, the surfaced road.



That great engineer Isembard Kindom Brunel has done so well with his Great 
Western

Railway and his iron bridges that I feel sure that his latest venture of iron 
ships

will be successful. I know that iron is heavier than water but remember that it 
is

the total displacement that counts, as that greek bloke who leapt out of his 
bath
shouting "eureka", showed.

I have heard that those wicked Finians are testing a boat that actually travels
under the surface of the sea.


Mr Wells has even suggested heavier than air flying machines. Clearly these 
could

never be of use for the average pleb to nip off on hols to Disney World Florida,

but Leonardo da Vinci showed that they are possible, although he had no idea of 
the
internal combustion engine. For Monarchs' and Presidents' envoys this must 
surely be the way to control empires.

Now don't assume that I take all of Mr Wells's fantasies as being serious 

predicitions - obviously his suggestion that around the turn of the century 
there
would be evidence of life on Mars is unutterable twaddle!


In terms of leisure I feel I must point to the invention of Mr Bell. His 
"telephone"

- quite a financial success in the USA thanks to Mr Edison, I believe - allows 
one 

to hear events from many miles away. I understand that it is planned that 
concerts
in the Royal Albert Hall will be heard as far away as Hampstead!


>I say again, technology growth is essential to cryonic revivals. If it 
>isn't there, then we won't be there to observe it.

Yes we need an improvement in medical technology (and medical science which is 
similar but not quite the same) for those frozen by today's poor techniques to 

even have a chance to be revived. Yes we need advances to have better suspension

techniques so that those of us still alive can be sure of a good suspension. Yes

it is pretty likely (almost inevitable) that technology in all fields will have
moved a long way before anyone is revived. This doesn't mean that you can just 
leave your money in a trust with the instructions "invest in technology" and do
well. *Most managed trusts do worse than tracker funds.* For example, from the

way you describe technology you seem to feel that manufacture is where it is at.

This may not be so but it comes over to me and so could do so to your trust 
managers.

That might mean that they avoid investment in software. It would have been a 
shame

to have missed investing in Microsoft. Also, take into account that if one 
sector 
goes up others do too - eg land in the Eighties.


I'm not saying that you, whilst alive (ie now) aren't good at picking technology

shares to invest in - you are indubitably intelligent and well informed and 
trained
in the field, it is just that when you are in suspension you will have to leave
it to someone else and the average cryonicist will have less skill at picking
a fund manager than you. 


Over the long run economies are not a zero sum game. The market is made by 
*living*
traders which puts the frozen at a disadvantage. Trying to beat the market is 

only good advice for those who can compete. The frozen can't, but they can play 
safe

which luckily means that over the long term they are still likely to have a good
growth rate.

TTFN

Garret

PS Forgive me, John, for the tone of some of this. It was more aimed the general
reader who should note:

*Investment for revival is pointless unless you are going to be revived. So...

your money is more likely to benefit you if you spend it now on cryonics 
research 
and if you spend it on gettting signed up.*


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