X-Message-Number: 8878
Date: Mon, 01 Dec 1997 03:05:05 +0000 (GMT)
From:  (Randy)
Subject: Cryonics fodder for Hollywood yet again
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics

Just got through watching an episode of the Outer Limits TV show where
cryonicists got ahold of a man who donated his body to science. They
freeze him and then revive him. Unfortunately the process gives him
only a short. tortured existence. The cryonicist doctor (Faust/Dr
Frankenstein embodied)  basically keeps this poor guy alive against
his wishes and in return gets his just desserts ( the scriptwriter
moralized thusly: "what dark angels we conjure when we try to beat
death...we fail to realize the value of life... yadda yadda.")

The script was surprisingly well-informed, tossing off cryo-jargon
like "cryoprotectant...perfusion...glycerol" etc. Sounds like they
snooped around on the net as research.

I thought it raised an interesting point, however. The Outer Limit
cryonicists got their research subject from the morgue, a man who
donated his body to research. (From what I have heard it is not
particularly easy to donate your body for the purpose of scientific
research.) I don't know how to approach this diplomatically, so here
goes: As I understand it, one of the big problems in cryo-research is
the lack of human subjects that can be cryopreserved and then examined
to test protocol efficacies.
Could cryonicists not find a few subjects willing  to  donate their
bodies for this purpose (assuming of  course that thr body/brain
donors received  promises that a proper cremation would  follow  the
freezing process and none of that evil  Frankenstein stuff, either
:-)?
I realize that the vast majority would never go for this, but surely
there would be a few....
Randy   
Cryonics: Gateway to the Future?
http://members.wbs.net/homepages/c/r/y/cryofan1.html             
***********************************

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=8878