X-Message-Number: 9612
Date: Mon, 4 May 1998 01:28:42 -0400
From: Saul Kent <>
Subject: Reply To Ettinger
In Bob Ettinger's last post (9590), he repeats
his charge that: "Saul and others have struck not only
an unreasonable and irresponsible note, but also a
counterproductive one, in effectively labeling cryonics
as a fraud."
Bob, I've never labeled cryonics as a fraud,
I've never suggested that cryonics is a fraud, I've never
hinted that cryonics is a fraud, and I do not remotely
consider cryonics to be a fraud. I believe cryonics
*can* work, although I'm far from anxious to bet my life on
today's damaging methods and aging cryonics societies.
In pointing out what I see as deficiencies in the cryonics
movement, I've done so solely to make things better. I'm
very frustrated by the lack of progress we've made in the
last 33 years in improving cryonics methods, and in building
a vital growing movement, and I want to see things improve.
Bob, you've again stated that I "danced around"
your main question about alleged "disparate aims" in 21st
Century Medicine's research program. I disagree with your
assessment, but since you wish it, I'll do some more
"dancing".
What you see as "disparate aims" leading to
"potential conflict" and "potential lawsuits", I see as an
integrated, comprehensive research program, whose
aims are stated in a clearcut, upfront manner. Let me
repeat.
Yes, I and Bill Faloon, and every other investor in
21st Century Medicine (21CM), is interested in saving their lives
through the achievement of suspended animation. I presume
that millions of other people are interested in this as well, which
is why I expect the company to be highly successful if we can
made steady advances towards this goal.
Every aspect of 21CM's program is designed to
make advances that will be useful to medicine in the (relatively)
short run and to further the goal of achieving suspended animation.
Every advance the company has made (and expects to make)
will bring us closer to suspended animation.
For example, we've already set what we believe to
be a world record in bringing dogs back to normal, healthy life,
after 17 minutes of ischemia at normal body temperature, although
we still have much work to do to improve this ability, to make it
more practical, and to have our findings published in peer-reviewed
medical journals. The advances we've made (and expect to make)
in cerebral resuscitation have enormous potential in saving the lives
of people who would otherwise die from lack of oxygen to the brain.
They also can reduce the brain damage of cryonics patients, for
whom maintaining the integrity of the brain is essential for survival.
We've also made significant advances in the rate at
which mammals can be cooled, and the length of time they can
be cooled to below normal body temperature. These advances
have great potential for surgery and emergency medicine, and
are of critical importance for cryonics. We believe that the use
of liquid ventilation to greatly enhance whole-body cooling will
enable us to apply vitrification to human patients in the foreseeable
future. Again, we have a good deal of research to do to achieve
these goals, but we've already made significant progress.
21CM has significant evidence for the efficacy of a new
class of cryoprotectants for which it has submitted a patent appli-
cation. One member of the class of agents penetrates mammalian
brains extremely well to provide substantial untrastructural protec-
tion. Recent work indicates that 21CM's cryoprectants form stable
glassy states, and that they can be used in combination with more
conventional agents, with encouraging results in terms of toxicity
to kidney slices and red blood cells. 21CM also has evidence of
novel ways to reduce the concentration needed to vitrify and to
prevent devitrification.
Parallel research is underway at 21CM to use other,
still more novel agents to reduce the toxicity of vitrification and
freezing solutions. The likely benefits of these agents is supported
by papers in scientific journals such as Science, Nature, Nature
Biotechnology, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
etc. We're just starting to test these agents for possible use in the
cryopreservation of organs.
All the knowledge referred to above, as well as other
recent findings, have never before been applied to organ cryo-
preservation. We believe they provide great promise for success
in cryopreserving kidneys, hearts, brains, other organs, and other
types of biological and engineered tissues.
If 21CM is successful in applying its proprietary agents
and knowledge to the cyopreservation of tissues, it will provide
signficant financial opportunities for the company, as well as
significant progress towards suspended animation.
In his posting, Ettinger says the following:
One of Saul's main contentions "is that cryonics has a
terrible or non-existent product, which accounts for the allegedly
moribund state of the program. This rotten product includes the
advances (whatever their degree of merit) in previous years by
Alcor and BioPreservation (BP). So mere advances that fall
short of suspended animation, according to Saul's essay, will
NOT have any significantf impact on growth of cryonics. Yet
now he says, 'improved cryonics methods will lead to major
growth in cryonics [if accompanied by research published in
professional journals and a well funded suspended animation
program]'".
"That qualification in brackets above hedges Saul's
previous statements a bit. He had said that until the product works,
forget it. Now he says, well it doesn't have to work to be beneficial,
it just has to impress the right people by pushing the right buttons.
There could be some merit in this revised position, certainly--but
how much, no one know. It isn't money in the bank by a long shot."
Whether there's merit in my position or not, there's
certainly *no* merit whatsoever in Bob mischaracterization of
my position.
First of all, I have *not* revised my position about the
merits of selling cryonics. I have never said that today's product
won't work, only that it is a very poor product based upon evidence
of the damage it does to the brain, and the fact that hardly anyone
*thinks* it will work. When you have a product that is objectively
poor by today's scientific standards, and which almost no one
(among the millions of people who know about it) wants to buy,
it makes sense to try to improve that product, and to expect
that, by improving it, you're likely to increase sales.
Further, I've held the position for years that major im-
provements in cryonics methods documented in scientific journals
will help to sell cryonics, and that we should have only a low-key
effort to sell cryonics until we have scientific proof that we have
a better product, and a well-funded research program to further
improve our product. Hard evidence of improved ultrastructure
in the brain published in a medical journal, and recognized by
neurobiologists, would increase the credibility of cryonics and
make it more likely that dying patients would opt for cryonics.
Such evidence, combined with a solid research program, would
also make it easier to convince healthy people to sign up for a
product that they could expect to be significantly better...perhaps
even perfected...by the time they need it.
Bob, your statement that advances in cryonics methods
will NOT (according to my essay) "have any significant impact on
the growth of cryonics suggests that you have not read an important
part of my essay. I made it *very* clear in my essay that the era of
greatest growth in cryonics (during the '80s and early '90s) was in
large part an outgrowth of the research program at Alcor during
this period. In my analysis, I offered evidence that four of the key
people involved in stimulating growth at Alcor during this period
--Jerry Leaf, Brenda Peters, Mike Darwin and myself--would *not*
have been active at the time if it was not for the research program,
and that, without our collective participation, it's quite likely that a
great many people who became cryonicists during this period
would *not* have done so.
I think this is persuasive evidence that a research
program to improve cryonics methods will be a spur to growth, as
well as a means of increasing our chances of revival.
The reason I think the 21CM medicine program has the
potential to dwarf the progress made at Alcor in the '80s is because
we now have a much larger, much better financed, much better staffed,
research program (at far superior facilities) than ever before in the
history of the movement.
We now have well-equipped laboratories in two separate
buildings, devoted entirely to suspended animation research. We now
have seven full-time staff members, with four of them working full-time on
cryopreservation reseach at our new building, as well as several part-time
staff members, and plans for major links with top-flight cryobiologists,
neurobiologists, surgeons, biochemists, and other specialists. We now
have two M.D.'s on staff; a surgeon/cryobiologist (Yasumitsu Okouchi)
and a clinician/cryobiologist (Steve Harris) and two Ph.Ds; a medical
physicist/cryobiologist (Brian Wowk), and the world's foremost expert
on organ cryopreservation (Greg Fahy). We now have a million dollars
a year in funding, with ongoing plans to raise substantially more money
in the near future.
Moreover, we have already made signifiant advances in
cerebral resuscitation, profound hypothermia, cooling and warming
rates, and have access to new technologies, which have great
promise for organ cryopreservation (as described above).
Bob raises a question about anticipated revenues for
21CM from advanced cryonics services and asks how these
services will be delivered and what they will cost. It's too early to
answer either of these questions, except to say that advanced
cryonics methods will be made available to the entire cryonics
community.
Bob asks that "if Saul and Bill have the deciding voice" (in 21CM),
will any potential profits be plouged back into the research," And "are
they
going to reveal this clearly to prospective investors?" The answers are
"yes" and "yes". Bill and I would prefer to plough potential profits back
into
the business for a good while, and yes, we will reveal this to prospective =
investors.
Which gets me to the questions of potential stockholder lawsuits
and SEC regulation, which Bob seems so concerned about. The SEC
demands that any company that seeks to sell stock to investors produce a
prospectus which includes full disclosures about the company and its plans,
including all risks faced by investors. Bob, I can assure you, and all
other
potential investors that, under the guidance of 21CM attorneys, all the
disclosures required by law will be in the prospectus we send to
potential investors.
---Saul Kent, CEO
21st Century Medicine
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