X-Message-Number: 16362 From: "George Smith" <> References: <> Subject: Survival through cryonics - My personal plan Date: Sun, 27 May 2001 15:01:32 -0700 Every once in a while I like to remind especially the new readers of Cryonet that trying to evaluate the chances or success of cryonics is still completely a guessing game. You will read the OPINIONS of people here in the present about what will be possible in the future. Never forget that fact! I especially liked a recent description of cryonics by Thomas Donaldson in message #16346: "... cryonics involves preserving ANYONE FOUND ANYWHERE as well as we can, in the hope that someday we'll know enough to revive them." If you have ever been trained in survival tactics by professionals (as I was in the military, for example) you know that survival is dependent upon your choosing and following a plan with specific priorities. FIRST and foremost among these priorities is to ALWAYS ASSUME YOU WILL SURVIVE. Optimism can lead to effective decision making and action. Pessimism leads toward apathy and death. You must fight to live. You must never surrender. Hope is critical to survival in this very real sense. SECOND is to ESTABLISH THE IMMEDIATE NEEDS FOR SURVIVAL in a hierarchy and to ACT ON THE MOST CRITICAL NEEDS FIRST. Depending upon the specific circumstances, shelter may be more important than water in a snowstorm and water may be more important than shelter in a hot desert. Correct assessment is crucial. Following these time tested proven survival principles, my personal priorities for survival through cryonics are as follows: (1) A chosen attitude of optimism. Since no one CAN know what will be possible in the future, I choose to assume it will work. The alternative leads to apathy and certain death. (2) If I die, I want to preserve any aspect of my body in any manner possible. Period. Since I CANNOT know what will prove to be possible in an indefinite future to revive me, NEITHER will I choose to limit what might work through assuming any limiting assumptions in the present. Therefore my DNA is already stored in liquid nitrogen at the Cryonics Institute as well as those of my family members and pets. That means that regardless of the degree of damage to my dead body I wish to have all of that which is found preserved. That means that a "straight freeze" with NO cryoprotectants at all is better than no freeze. That means ANY form of preservation is better than no preservation. That mean SOMETHING saved for the future is better than nothing saved. (3) Choose to set up some means to achieve the above as a bare minimum program for survival. That means having a membership in place with a cryonics organization and taking the necessary steps to maintain that membership (insurance, trust, pre pay, etc.). This means wearing at all times a wrist bracelet which instructs what to do and who to contact in an emergency. This means being certain that all of my friends, relatives, my doctor, my insurance agent, etc., know what my intentions are in regard to cryonics with no equivocation. ("I will come back and haunt you if you don't abide by by wishes by means of my attorney through lawsuits!"). All of the above I see as my basic cryonics survival program. It may not work but the alternative is totally unworkable. So if you are a new reader on this forum and are wondering what makes sense for you personally to do, I recommend following my personal priorities: (1) ASSUME cryonics can work. Pessimism is anti survival. (2) DECIDE to give up second guessing the future and choose to preserve whatever you can under any circumstances possible. (3) TAKE ACTION. Sign up with a cryonics provider now. Too late is 100% too late for you. That's how I see it. George Smith CI member Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=16362