X-Message-Number: 9372
Date: Mon, 30 Mar 1998 13:26:32 -0500 (EST)
From: Charles Platt <>
Subject: Dave Pizer and Growth

On Mon, 30 Mar 1998, Dave Pizer wrote:

> I think growth is the key to our survival.  And growth
> can be a priority without hurting in any other areas like research or
> storage.  In fact, with growth come the resources to enlarge other areas.

Dave, you're a successful businessman, so you are undoubtedly aware of 
the problems that a small business faces when it wants to grow, and 
attempts to do so without proper capitalization. It's very easy to say 
"growth will bring in more money." But you need more money (and more 
people) in order to achieve growth. It's not a trivial problem, 
especially since the growth will impose a larger potential burden on 
services, and cryonicists get very touchy if the services are not 
reliable because they are overburdened. Your letter does not address 
these points.

> It is very sad to see the current drop in growth rate of *net* members in
> the world wide movement. 

I disagree. I am very heartened to see that Alcor may be terminating
memberships where people have shown insufficient commitment (e.g. they
haven't paid their membership dues). CryoCare is following a similar
policy: we cannot continue to be "on call" for people who don't pay their
dues, or do not provide adequate proof of insurance. We do not want to
risk a situation where a standby team goes out and finds that the member
has lost interest in being frozen, or is not properly funded. The people 
who run cryonics organizations or provide standby service are making a 
huge commitment of time and effort; the least we should expect in return, 
from our members, is that they maintain proper financial arrangements, 
which are not onerous for most people.

> It just doesn't make sense that a person would do all the
> work of filling out the paper work, getting funding in place, and the other
> work, and then change their minds several years later.

First, some people may have been persuaded to sign up by friends or 
relatives. After a while they get tired of paying for membership, because 
they didn't really want it anyway.

Second, I believe many people become more reconciled to the idea of 
permanent death as they grow older. Plus, they may feel "I'm not worth 
being preserved, I'm too old." I sympathize with this point of view 
because I have limited faith in the ability of future doctors to reverse 
the deterioration in the brain that occurs through age.

Of course, I would like to see cryonics increase in popularity. But if we 
acquire new members, I hope they will be people who show some interest in 
helping to provide services, rather than merely receiving services. That, 
I think, is the highest priority right now.

--Charles Platt, CryoCare

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