X-Message-Number: 14296
From: 
Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2000 23:01:22 EDT
Subject: more on INC etc.

Last night I decided I would personally contribute $10k to the INC 
immediately, if that were needed to prevent collapse of the hippocampal 
project. 

This may seem strange to some people, in view of my frequent questioning and 
criticism, but there is nothing inconsistent. I still have large reservations 
and deep misgivings about the INC, but there is also a possible upside, and 
as usual the information is incomplete and any decision chancy. One answer is 
to compromise, as most of us do in most cases. Spread a little here and a 
little there.

One who has done the most recently to keep the project in business is Ben 
Best. Ben is a CI member (as well as a CryoCare member, CC being now 
inactive), and he stands to gain nothing in immediate personal payoff, 
because 21CM has contractual rights to the marketing and 21CM is apparently 
working now mainly with Alcor and BioTransport. But Ben is convinced the 
project is important for the longer term and in the larger picture, and this 
outweighs any quibbling about who gets the profits etc. I have already said 
repeatedly that this is one respectable approach.

There will be a much longer discussion of these matters in the next issue of 
THE IMMORTALIST. I am MUCH less sanguine about the INC and the hippocampal 
project than Best and Wakfer and others, for several very specific reasons 
which I will detail. I may also make further comments on Cryonet.

Fortunately, according to a recent message from Wakfer, there is no urgency 
to rescue the project, which is (probably, depending on certain 
contingencies) funded through the end of this year 2000. If and when there is 
an urgent need, then, in the absence of any important new information, I will 
make a personal donation and ask the CI directors about a CI and IS donation.

Robert Ettinger
Cryonics Institute
Immortalist Society
http://www.cryonics.org

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