X-Message-Number: 7799
Date: Mon, 03 Mar 1997 09:35:26 -0800
From: (Olaf Henny)
Subject: Re: CryoNet #7791 - #7798
Below is a copy of an enquiry I sent to:
Canadian Offshore Financial Services - Offshore Trusts, Corporations, Bank
Accounts, Citizenship <http://www.ccinet.ab.ca/cdn-offshore/>. Their reply
is attached beneath.
Dear Sirs:
********
Note: If you wonder, what the first section of this mail has
to do with the services your company provides, please skip to
below the "--------" line and read that section first.
********
I have recently become interested in cryonics, mainly
through the UseNet <sci.cryonics> and later through a
subscription to CryoNet at <>.
The idea of cryonics is based on the following assumptions:
- The decease which kills you will some day be curable
- A substantial number of gerontologists view aging as a
curable decease.
- Many people who are walking around these days would have
been given up for dead only 30 years ago. I.e., the
boundaries of death have been pushed back over the years
and will further retreat as medical knowledge progresses
- Future nanotechnolgy appears at this time to be the most
promising means for revival --> repair of ischemic and
freezing damage --> and --> restoration of the body
toward youthfulness, but also for other avenues for
accomplishing an indefinite life span.
The whole field of cryonics, the cryo-preservation of
legally dead (by today's standards), and longevity is much
too complex to discuss here in depth and any assurances on
my part, that it is not a subject for fools is easily
dismissed with the assumption, that I am one of them.
The only way to judge the validity of cryo-preservation
is to investigate the scientific research to date with an
open mind and to form your own opinion about its results
and the caliber of scientists participating in it and
to keep in mind, that a little over a century ago couple
of "fools" were running up and down the pasture with a
tricycle with wings on it, trying to get airborne, when
anybody could see, that this contraption was heavier than
air. Just think of the laughable concept, to lift
something as heavy as a horse carriage clear off the ground,
without support. Well, the Wright Brothers did it.
There are now approximately 200 persons cryo-preserved and
lots more individuals signed up for the procedure. Very
recent breakthroughs in perfusion technology and any success
in new research will no doubt swell these ranks
considerably.
-----------------------------------------------------------
One problem that has been discussed in the past is, that if
cryo-preservation is successful and *we all know*, that at
this stage of the technology the chances of success are still
extremely slim, how can I take "it" with me. I.e. how can I
retain ownership of my investments or part of them even after
I am declared legally dead. One possibility would be to set
up a trust fund in favor of a person with the following DNA:
".......". in a sovereign jurisdiction, which permits this
type of an arrangement.
Another would be to place your investment into a sovereign
jurisdiction, which permits continued ownership of assets
after death. I have heard claims, that The Principality Of
Liechtenstein may permit that.
In any case, the arrangements would have to remain valid over
an indefinite time span. Even if you judge cryonics to be the
province of eccentrics, the demand for the above described
arrangements will be real and, when large enough, be satisfied
at some time somewhere by somebody.
I trust that officers of your company will accept the challenge
of finding a solution to the above stated problem and post it
on <sci.cryonics>, of course with the approbriate disclaimers,
that "Offshore, by advising on possible investment instruments
for retaining assets after death states categorically, that
this may be by no means construed as an opinion concerning
the validity of the concept of cryonics", ...or some such. ;-)
At least this problem should be academically challenging for
a company such as yours.
Yours very truly,
Olaf Henny
****************************************************************************
**********
Reply:
-----------
Full subject and sender of this message: How Can I Take It With Me?|
Olaf Henny <>
Dear Sir:
The challenge you present is, in actual fact, one that already has a
solution. Trust law, as developed in several offshore jurisdictions,
permit one's estate to be held ad infinitum for persons "born",
categories of individuals "yet unborn", and others defined in such a
way that they "may or may not eventually satisfy the conditions of
being named beneficiaries to the trust". In theory, such trusts could
be drafted in Canada as well, but most of the English Common Law-based
countries had an expiration date on the trust (usually 21 years after
the death of a "life in being") which limited the utility of such an
instrument past a "life plus 21 years". Other common law principles
restricted a person being named as a beneficiary if the law determined
they were no linger a "life in being".
These two restriction have been removed in Turks & Caicos Islands, and
Anguilla among a few select other countries. Trusts there can now
name "undetermined" classes of persons who MAY be a "life in being" at
some future date (eg. "John Smith, pending his resurrection from a
cryogenic state"), and trusts in those countries have no limitation
imposed on them by a perpetuity period which causes expiration after a
fixed number of years. I do not agree Liechtenstein's present trust
law would make this arrangement possible, although a Liechtenstein
Foundation (a type of quasi-corporation and trust combined) may do the
trick.
Michael P. Ritter
Chief Legal Officer
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Ridicule and derision are weapons often employed
by those who are intellectually outmatched
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