X-Message-Number: 11344
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 1999 17:28:06 -0500 (EST)
From: "B. F. Shelton" <>
Subject: Re: Charles Platt, Cryonet # 11337

On Mon., Mar. 1, 1999, the President of CryoCare wrote:

> At this point I am unsubscribing from CryoNet since it serves no useful 
> purpose whatsoever. Those who wish to discuss quantum states, machine 
> intelligence, and all the rest of it have been politely encouraged to use 
> a more appropriate forum, but have shown no interest in doing so. This 
> philosophical waffle has driven away any meaningful material about human 
> cryopreservation. I suspect I am not the first person to unsubscribe in 
> disgust.
> ...
> I consider it one of the greatest ironies, and the most telling 
> indictments of human attitudes toward mortality, that a group of people 
> who are supposedly more concerned with staying alive than 99.999 percent 
> of the population should spend their time in this way--in a forum that 
> is supposedly dedicated to cryonics.
> 
> Certainly anyone who becomes interested in cryonics for the first time, 
> and discovers CryoNet, will receive a VERY strange impression of our 
> priorities. This forum could serve as a recruitment tool; instead, it 
> seems designed to have the opposite effect.

I am totally puzzled as to why the President of CryoCare thinks that
CryoNet should be a "recruitment tool," when indeed CryoCare, last I
heard, does not accept new members except under privileged circumstances,
and actively discourages such activity.

The latter further leads me to ask: Exactly what does Mr. Platt think
cryonicists should "spend their time" doing?  Are we supposed to "recruit"
people for an organization that will turn down their application?  Or
perhaps we are supposed to work hard and send in $$$ to the non-profit
hippocampal slice project [formerly: Prometheus] so that 21CM will benefit 
from the research without having to lay out the expense (more $$$ in the
pockets of the elite group of 21CM shareholders - or say it isn't so, Mr.
Kent, and we can all buy in before the price goes up?)?

As for the newbie that ferrets out CryoNet, I would expect that such a
person has enough native intelligence to deserve a *real* look at
everything that goes on in the world of cryonics, including messages from
Mr. Platt.  We aren't exactly at the "market it to the masses" stage yet,
but even if we get there, IMO truth is better than pizzazz.

As to the content of many recent messages which seem to disturb Mr. Platt, 
it is clear that they do not disturb many other cryonicists, who are
clearly doing at least as much for cryonics as Mr. Platt does.  So who is
he to complain?  Personally, I find at least an indirect relationship with
cryonics in most of this technobabble, and occasionally something of
interest to read.  Censorship at this point is not recommended.  And we
all have that magic DELETE button.

B.F.

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=11344