X-Message-Number: 9111
Date:  Wed, 04 Feb 98 13:15:51 
From: Fred Chamberlain <>
Subject: (Fwd) Cryonics; Act of Faith?  Or Something Else?

From: Fred Chamberlain <>
Subject: Cryonics; Act of Faith?  Or Something Else?

The discussions of whether or not cryonics is an "act of faith" or a
"survival strategy with a realistic scientific foundation" seem to
revolve around a wide spectrum of attitudes and risk perceptions.

In support of the "scientific foundation" argument, one can point to
the clear evidence of preservation of at least some important
landmarks of cellular ultrastructure, and suggest that our current
ability to perceive the actual distribution of molecules in a
compromised freezing is about as good as Percival Lowell's ability to
"see the surface of Mars".

A few decades from now, we should be able to see a great deal more. 
Will the subtle distributions of this debris, even if it should appear
to be "noise" at present, permit the inference of the original
biological machinery sufficient to repair brain tissue and recover
"identity"?  Or will we find (as Mike Darwin might put it) that, "We
may not only have burned the papers; we may have stirred the ashes as
well!"

At present, we are certainly "hoping the ashes haven't been stirred,"
but there is another way of thinking of this.  On a scale of
preservation quality from perfected suspended animation (which is not
"here" yet) down to remains with decidedly no structure (ashes from
cremation), we can expect to find a piecewise continuous relationship
of less and less structure, (corresponding) to less and less
recoverable identity.

We cannot presently even define the important parameters of such
structural degradation, much less infer the corresponding loss of
identity, but we *can* expect that with time this "transfer function"
will be well determined.  We can expect that up to some point of
structural loss (probably bounded in terms of ischemic time and the
preservation procedure followed) very little loss of identity on a
practical (that is, measurable) level will occur.

With greater structural loss, there will be measurable deficits of
memory and losses of identity, until (finally) the combination of
ischemic time and the limitations of procedures will leave us only
"statistical" identity (you look at two sets of matched, highly
similar photographs, one set actual photos from your past, and see to
what extent your selection of the "real" photos is improbable, due to
factors other than chance alone (the same standard by which causal
relationships are established in most scientific studies.)

While no one will be satisfied with such a threadbare, intangible
recovery of identity, at some point along the sliding scale of
compromise and poor quality of entry procedure we have to expect these
type outcomes.  Will such a doleful result be the consequence of the
best of today's methods?  Or will we find that even 12 hours of
ischemia and straight freezing permit the eventual recovery of a high
degree of memory and identity?  At present, this is mostly guesswork,
in my opinion.

An excellent portrayal of this perspective is given in James
Halperin's new book, "The First Immortal".  Given some hours of
ischemia and poor entry, he projects pretty severe losses of identity.
 Some present day cryonicists may feel he's a bit hard on the chances.
 Others may think he makes it look "too good".  I think he's taken the
middle of the road, in terms of present day cryonicists' ways of
thinking about these issues.

People in the future, even after suspended animation is perfected,
will no doubt sometimes be frozen under severely compromised
conditions.  This will be done in the same spirit that presently
causes us to begin CPR on people we find dead, without trying to
evaluate their chances, in the first few moments after we come upon
them.  We leave that up the doctors in the emergency room.

In similar fashion, even after the advent of perfected suspended
animation, it will a common practice in emergencies to "freeze first
and evaluate later".  The difference will likely be that in those
future cases, it may be known pretty quickly what the chances are, for
someone in a compromised entry condition.

Today, we are still guessing, all the way to liquid nitrogen and for
many years afterward.  Perhaps we will later be seen as those who
hoped for too much.  For those of us with parents and partners in
suspension, perhaps we are better able to live with the idea that we
may be hoping for too much, than the idea that we might be letting
people go who might have been saved.

When I'm asked how I see the viewpoint of cryonics people, I try to
use examples which will leave no doubt as to why we feel the way we
do.  One of these examples requires a bit of imagination, but I find
that almost every time I use it, the listener gets the point:

"Let's imagine that all of us, every last one of us, is flying due
north in a single passenger airplane!" I begin.  "This is almost a
silly example, but bear with me!"  I try to make it very specific.

"We are all flying directly toward the North Pole, about 2000 feet
above the ground, every last person in the world, at the same speed,
at the same altitude, a giant cloud of billions of persons to the east
and west, all going toward the North Pole, over rolling hills beneath
us, each of us in a little plane of our own."

"Now, slightly to the north, perhaps 50 to 100 miles away, we see a
giant cliff.  It rises miles into the sky, and if we look at all those
other people in the sky around us, we see that eventually they run
into that cliff!"

"Boom!  -  Boom!  One by one, they *all* blow up in flames when they
hit the cliff.  Sometimes the cliff juts out close to us, and people
our own age go smashing into it.  More usually, the planes run into
the cliff when the persons grows old.  But sooner or later, Ka-Wham!!!
 Each of us goes crunching into that cliff and blows up, right???"  I
want to be sure this picture is clear.

"Now," I continue, "People around me take a look at my plane, and see
that I've got it on autopilot.  (You know, all these planes have
autopilots, right, so you don't have to spend your entire life sitting
in that one seat, holding on to the controls?)"

"And in the back of my plane, I'm putting together this strange
looking thing made of nylon cords and fabrics.  It's unlike anything
they've ever seen before. I'm not just watching sitcoms and sports
events like they are, or making astronomical observations, or studying
the geology of the ground passing underneath.  I seem to be
constructing something really weird, in the back of my airplane." 
[Already, the listener is "getting the idea".]

"What are you *doing* over there in the back of your airplane?" those
around me ask.  "What is that *thing* you're working on?"  I can see
them sticking their heads out of their little planes, trying to see
better what I'm doing.

"Well, it's not a proven thing at all," I say.  "You see, I've been
watching all those people go 'Ka-Boom!' and blow up in flames when
they eventually hit the cliff.  You know, we all hit it sooner or
later, right?"

People in other planes reply, "Yeah, but there's nothing you can do
about that, right?"

"I'm not so sure," I say.  "Here's what I've got in mind.  Just before
I hit the cliff, if I've got time, instead of just smashing into the
cliff?  I'm going to try 'jumping out'!"

Now, I get some pretty strange looks from those people in the other
planes.

"But.. But... How do you know that thing will *work*!" they exclaim. 
"I mean, nobody's every survived that kind of thing, right? - And, how
do you know where you're going to *land*!  The whole thing sounds
pretty crazy, to me!"

"Actually," I say, "I *don't* know whether or not it's going to work! 
And to make it worse, I don't have *know* where I might land!  The
main reason I'm doing this is I'm sick and tired of seeing everybody
in the whole world sit there and twiddle their fingers until they
finally smash into the cliff and blow up in flames!  If it *doesn't*
work, at least I've got the satisfaction I didn't just stare at the
cliff until I finally hit it, like a bug running into a windshield at
high speed!"

At this point, most of the people I explain cryonics to this way are
at least grinning.  They can see I haven't been deluded into thinking
cryonics is some kind of panacea, to "fool death for sure"!  They can
see there's a frustration about accepting the inevitability of life
ending after a short time - just when the most exciting part of human
drama evolution, toward something almost unimaginable, is about to
take place.

So, is cryonics an act of faith, or a "scientifically founded" pursuit
of survival?  In many cases, I think it's a combination of disdain for
"sitting back and accepting death," along with a compelling desire to
see what's going to unfold in the next hundred or years or so.

Whether we argue about it from the "no good alternative" aspect, or
say it's "logically the best thing to do", it comes down to a decision
to take a different road than the usual, or accept that until the rest
of the world is doing it, it's "too soon!"

These are individual decisions.  They have a lot to do with financial
priorities, level of family support, willingness to be thought of as
"different" to some extent, and may other factors than "technological
guarantees of workability!"

The same conceptual problems will be there, even after suspended
animation is perfected.  I can already hear the arguments:

"Yeah, sure, it sounds great!  If you can make to the hospital and
afford it, and nothing goes wrong either on the way down or during
storage, and the costs don't go up so much that your trust fund can't
reanimate you, and the world of the future is someplace you're willing
to live, well I guess this newfangled 'perfected suspended animation'
is something you might want to do, if you've got enough money and
you're willing to risk it on all those uncertainties."

[Continuing with what a lot of people will say, even after suspended
animation is perfected:]  "Most of those people have some kind of
problem going in, and they can't get them back right away anyway, plus
they still haven't got the aging thing totally licked, and who knows
if they'll ever have it fully solved.  Then, there are these crazy
people going into and out of computers, some of them getting serious
mental problems, all the worlds' governments are really going to hell,
the 'greenhouse' and ozone problems are still uncontrolled, and now
there's this group that claims to own both the South Pole and the
Moon!  I don't care if they *can* do 'perfected suspended animation'. 
I say what I've *always* said about 'freezing people':  Phooey!"

Meanwhile, we happy go lucky cryonicists will *still* be working on
our parachutes, for all those situations where parachutes *might* do
some good!

Boundless Life,

Fred Chamberlain, President ()
Alcor Life Extension Foundation
Non-profit cryonic suspension services since 1972.
7895 E. Acoma Dr., Suite 110, Scottsdale AZ 85260-6916
Phone (602) 922-9013  (800) 367-2228   FAX (602) 922-9027
 for general requests
http://www.alcor.org (Entry page; Alcor website)
http://www.alcor.org/phoenix.htm (Access to Alcor Phoenix Online)
http://www.alcor.org/lifeqst1.htm (LifeQuest - fiction about cryonics)
http://www.alcor.org/tfi1.htm (Re: "The First Immortal")

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=9111