X-Message-Number: 8071
Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:40:09 -0400 (EDT)
From: Charles Platt <>
Subject: CRYONICS Science Fiction Wish Fulfilment

To Mike Perry and others who show such enthusiasm for the future: I'm
sorry, but a lot of your text reads like science-fiction wish fulfilment
to me. I can enjoy this kind of thing (indeed, I have read a lot and
written some); but only if we all understand that it IS FICTION. When I
read about our need to "shape and govern" the world of the future by
transforming ourselves into some kind of Extropianized super beings, I
find this very hard to take seriously. Most of us have trouble merely
shaping and governing our personal lives on a daily basis, let alone the
world of the future. Kevin Brown's recent comment (quoted below) seems to
be a polite reminder (perhaps too polite to attract anyone's attention)
that there are some more serious, practical matters requiring our
immediate attention as cryonicists. I tend to agree. 

--CP

Kevin Q. Brown, #8054, wrote:

>It's important to improve our cryopreservation technology 
>today so that we can be revived _before_ we no longer 
>are interesting as people.

And Mike Perry responded, in part:

Reanimation by such beings, though, could be different from what we think.
We might be made into advanced continuers from the beginning, for
instance, or uploaded into a "nursery school" in which we'll have to spend
a few subjective centuries to "grow up" and get "adjusted." In all, I
think we're better off to get into our more-advanced existence as soon as
possble, and be among those who'll shape and govern the world we'll
inhabit, rather than having to "catch up" even with superhuman help. 

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