X-Message-Number: 18967 Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 09:57:01 -0400 From: Thomas Donaldson <> Subject: CryoNet #18960 - #18965 To Bob Ettinger on his comments about "immortality": As readers may guess, I disagree strongly. The very first point to be remembered is that the diseases we get depend not only on the structure and behavior of our bodies, but also on OUTSIDE effects which change that structure and behavior. When we get a cold it does not happen solely because of the structure of our body: a virus, specially adapted to deal with our PRESENT defenses, enters our body and happily multiplies. While it does so our nose runs, we don't feel good, etc etc. To become free of ALL diseases we must not only understand the entire Universe but be able to use that understanding. I find that a very unlikely event. Sure, we can learn more and more, and thus deal with any fixed disease in a relatively short time (say a few hundred years is short?). But diseases do not remain fixed. I do believe that we'll have such problems less and less and we work on them, but that is not the same as total freedom from all diseases. Of course the diseases most likely to attack us are those we've not yet even heard of... say, defects of our means to deal with some breakdowns of our body, which don't usually show up but only show up under special circumstances (if you do any professional programming you'll know exactly what I mean by such bugs). But cheer up. As I said above, as we learn more we can expect such problems to occur less often, and become less serious when they do occur (ON AVERAGE). We may even conquer colds relatively soon. Best wishes and long long life, Thomas Donaldson Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=18967