X-Message-Number: 9724 Date: Sun, 17 May 1998 09:48:21 -0400 From: Thomas Donaldson <> Subject: CryoNet #9719 - #9721 To Charles Platt: Admittedly we can promise nothing with present suspension methods. BUT if we argue for suspension as a means to cure a presently incurable disease, especially a disease which AT THAT TIME no one has a clue as to how to cure, then we can still promise nothing. And if the suspension method is reversible, then we raise the possibility that they might be awakened in a far future by strangers who STILL cannot help them. I'm NOT arguing against improving our suspension methods. We should do that for exactly the same reasons we should try to cure diseases and other conditions... and since no one else has come forward to do such research, it bears on CRYONICISTS to do it. Yet when I consider the logic of cryonics (as distinct from suspended animation) it's not clear that the basic situation will really be changed. Sure, many may decide that it has changed, and so sign up ... but that's not the same. And here is a serious question. Suppose that we DO find a reversible suspension method. Just when do you think people will use it? (I'm assuming, for the sake of the question, that it is not so easily reversible that people would willingly use it for space travel or other such adventures). My guess is that they would use it about the time they would otherwise die (except in cases such as mine, in which "death" would have happened after my brain was destroyed). Very few people would simply decide to throw themselves into an unknown future while in good health. To Scott Badger: I'd be happy if you did such a survey, and if well done it might tell us something. I will say, though, that most of my donations to cryonics are going towards research to improve the process. This isn't because I disapprove of surveys at all, but because cryonics has existed, now, for over 30 years, and while I've been a cryonicist I've consistently wanted more research. So go about your survey, and you may find something interesting. Any means to recruit more cryonicists would have value. Best to all, and long long life, Thomas Donaldson Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=9724