X-Message-Number: 10393 From: Ralph Merkle <> Subject: Metaphor considered harmful Date: Mon, 7 Sep 1998 08:54:37 PDT In the ongoing discussion of freezing damage there has been a tendency to use metaphorical images. For example: freezing injury is like a million tiny blowtorches, it is like a knife, it is like grinding hamburger, it is like ice on a window; viewing frozen tissue is like viewing an aerial photograph of a city where there have been riots; etc. While this metaphorical approach rapidly conveys the speaker's opinion, it is difficult to use it as the basis for further informed discussion as the metaphorical statements are, literally speaking, either false or uninterpretable. It might therefore be useful to describe freezing injury with statements that are literally true, or are intended to be literally true. Subsequent claims that a statement was not literally true would, if correct, result in the rejection of the original statement (and hopefully its replacement with a more accurate statement). Adopting this rule would result in the rejection of Rowe's "hamburger" statement out of hand. Further, we must remain focused on the critical issues: while there is excellent reason to believe that existing suspension methods (even with high concentrations of cryoprotectant) cause "damage," we do not have good reasons to believe that this "damage" results in loss of fundamental information relevant to long term memory and personality. "Damage" is meaningless unless we have some reason to believe that it results in such extensive obliteration of relevant structures that it will be impossible for any future technology to infer them. Skepticism about claims of "damage" is warranted given the frequency of ill founded claims that are, from an information theoretic viewpoint, clearly marginal or irrelevant. My experience with cryobiologists critical of cryonics is that they are uniformly ignorant of basic issues and often display behavior which can only be described as grossly unscientific. It is entirely appropriate to point out the errors and weaknesses in their arguments, and it is further appropriate to argue that members of a scientific society should behave in accordance with basic rules of scientific inquiry. The Society for Cryobiology has bylaws that include the following: 2.04. Denial of Membership and Discipline of Members Upon a two-thirds vote of the Governors in office, the Board of Governors may refuse membership to applicants, or suspend or expel members (including both individual and institutional members), whose conduct is deemed detrimental to the Society, including applicants or members engaged in or who promote any practice or application which the Board of Governors deems incompatible with the ethical and scientific standards of the Society or as misrepresenting the science of cryobiology, including any practice or application of freezing deceased persons in the anticipation of their reanimation. I received a letter (and other material, including the bylaws given above) from Jerry Leaf in June of 1989. His letter said in part: Enclosed is material concerning the Society for Cryobiology and its Board of Governors trying to deal cryonicists out of the Society. They have succeeded in denying membership to anyone known to have an association with cryonics. I have sponsored three people for membership and all have been turned away unapproved. How these men can consider themselves honest scientists is beyond me. These people do not have integrity, only fear of legal action. It is entirely reasonable to criticize both the society and individual members when there is evidence that they have violated accepted scientific norms. Indeed, it is an essential part of the process of change. That said, different people have different views on how best to change entrenched positions. There is no reason why multiple different approaches cannot be used at the same time (the "good cop / bad cop" approach). Vigorous criticism by some and simultaneous friendly encouragement by others is likely more effective than either approach alone. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=10393