X-Message-Number: 7570
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 1997 09:22:24 -0500 (EST)
From: Ben Best <benbest@benbest.com>
Subject: 1997 Canadian Cryonics Dinner -- Comments

    Five people attended the Toronto viewing of the "Immortality on Ice" 
video, and 8 people attended the Cryonics Dinner -- both held on Sunday,
26 January 1997. Although reservations had been made at Aida's Falafel
Restaurant at 553 Bloor Street West, the establishment was unexpectedly
closed, and we held the dinner at the adjacent East Indian Restaurant
at 551 Bloor Street West. Apologies to any who may have shown-up at
the wrong address and not found us.

   Everyone was impressed with the "Immortality on Ice" video, along 
with the video of my Friday-the-13th bungee jump just prior to the
1996 A4M conference in Las Vegas.

  One fellow brought a copy of an article in NATURE (Vol 384 - 21Nov96 -
page 285-288) and asked whether antifreeze proteins were being used in
cryonics research. There was discussion of the Vissar method, DMF, VS4,
and the current research being done at 21st Century Medicine. One person
asked why, if $50,000 per month is being spent on cryoprotectant research
at 21st Century Medicine, the Prometheus Project is still necessary. I
wasn't able to give a very good answer.

   Not all of the conversation was this focused, however. Much of it had
a starry-eyed far-future orientation, of little immediate, practical
value. There was an animated and lengthy discussion of the possibilities 
of "uploading". At one point the question was raised as to whether the
intellectually-superior beings of the future would have an interest in
re-animating 20th-century corpsicles. Doug Quinn suggested that these
superior beings might also have superior compassion, but another person
compared it to the ludicrousness of finding an ant or mosquito with a
broken leg and taking it to a veterinarian. Doug's girlfriend asked why
an injured ant should be less deserving of compassion than an injured
squirrel, simply because it is smaller. There was discussion as to how
much value intelligence or a large brain added to the value of life.

   There was also discussion of various life-extension topics 
including specific supplements, legal prohibitions of supplements,
Caloric Restriction with Adequate Nutrition (CRAN) and the value
of exercise for life extension. 

   I have been criticized for doing "marketing" rather than research,
but the people who criticize me for organizing these events do not 
appreciate the value that culturally isolated people can gain from
socializing from others of like mind. And this applies not only to
those who attend my meetings, but to those I speak to on the phone
who are unable to attend. Moreover, I only organize these social
events a few times each year, so I can't see that it is a major 
drain on my ability to continue my scientific researches (as
readers of CANADIAN CRYONICS NEWS or my CRSOCIETY postings can attest).	


                -- Ben Best (benbest@benbest.com)


Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=7570