X-Message-Number: 15855
Date: Tue, 13 Mar 2001 11:39:52 -0800 (PST)
From: Scott Badger <>
Subject: Re: Motivation?

In Message #15846 David King wrote:

> Hi, I was explaining my interest in cryonics to
> someone and they asked an interesting question 
> that I couldn't answer. They asked, "What would 
> be the motivation for future generations to re-
> animate me?"

and later

> If we, today, had the ability to reanimate people
> who had been frozen a hundred years ago, besides
> perhaps re-animating a few for scientific and
> historical research, what would be our motivation
> to reanimate everybody. I can't think of any.

David, c'mon. If the technology were around to
reanimate those currently frozen we would reanimate
every single person. Every single one. Why? Because
they're people and we value human life. Why do we
bother using CPR or defibrillators (sp?)to resuscitate
someone whose heart has stopped? Because we must do
whatever we can to save a human live. One mistake I
sense your friends are making is that they actually
regard cryonics patients to be dead in a way they
would not consider someone who just flat lined in a
hospital ER. We consider both patients to be on the
brink of irreversible death but not yet irretrievably
lost. The response I would use to the question you had
difficulty answering is this:

"It won't be up to the general public. I think we can
pretty safely assume that medical science will
continue to progress and that medical practitioners
will continue to consider saving human lives as their
most primary of goals. Once medical science develops
the ability to reanimate cryonics patients, the
medical community will be bound by their professional
ethics to bring cryonics patients back just as they
would save any other patient that was at the brink of
death."

Where the money comes from is another issue. If it's
too exorbitant at first, then those patients without
the funds to afford reanimation will have to wait
until the technology improves enough to make the
process cheap enough to justify reanimation. I'd be
happy to work after being reanimated to pay off the
expenses incurred. How about you?


And to Ruthanna:

Hmmm. The NPR interview was definitely focusing on the
positives. Sorry, but I doubt the interview was
archived on NPR's site. Thanks for the NYT link.

Best regards,

Scott

"Vita Perpetuem"

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