X-Message-Number: 18140
From: 
Date: Tue, 11 Dec 2001 14:49:32 EST
Subject: Re: CryoNet #18124 - #18132

In a message dated 12/10/01 5:01:11 AM,  writes:

<< Olaf Henny >>

Dear Olaf, I am very sorry that your aunt had to lose her son on the eastern 
front but I take the strongest exception to your interpretation of her story. 
 The fact is that hundreds of thousands of German soldiers were dying on the 
eastern front at the time and as many mothers worried for the worst.  How 
many would have had similar quasi-hallucinatory experiences on any given day? 
 How many of these would later find that their sons died on that very same 
day? I would suggest hundreds if not thousands.  There is absolutely no 
evidence for telepathic communication in your anecdote.  Think about Occam's 
razor: let the simplest expanation with the fewest intervening variable stand 
as the probable truth unless the contrary can be proved by acceptable 
scientific standards.  This point is not 'off topic' in the sense that it is 
important for all of us advocating cryonic suspension to adhere to a strictly 
scientific view of our world, understanding and accepting the sometimes harsh 
rules of scientific evidence.  As yet there is no more evidence for 
telepathic communication than there is for the coutless "miracles" that fill 
the Bible and other religious texts.  Even when anecdotes are carefully 
documented, they cannot stand as evidence unless and until they can be 
repeated and redocumented under the watchful gaze of multiple objective 
observers, preferably observers who have no personal stake in the outcome.  
As the years go by and our numbers grow, we will come under increasing attack 
from many quarters.  There will be many in the scientific community who will 
join this negative chorus, but when they do, we should be in a position to 
come right back at them: cryonics is not religion, and its not supestition or 
magic.  It is simple logic founded in what is already firmly established in 
science and science-derived technolog and medicine.  We must stick to this 
base to retain our credibility with the few who might be persuaded.  Ron 
Havelock, CI signed up.

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