X-Message-Number: 19501 Date: Sun, 14 Jul 2002 12:03:28 +1000 From: Damien Broderick <> Subject: `Recovery' (was: Re: Cryonics \"Meme-bites\) On another list, someone suggested (in this context of searching for optimal memes): >I thought you might like the idea of equating "resurrection" with "reanimation." [I replied:] It's exactly the wrong approach, in my view. `Resurrection' is a theological term from a particular faith-based mythos, and must be allow to remain there. Attempting to appropriate it clearly verges (for believers) on the blasphemous. `Reanimation' worries me nearly as much. The argument for cryonics proper (although not for, say, destructive uploading to another computational substrate) is that in a very real sense the frozen corpse is *not truly dead*. The person's (patient's) life processes have been arrested, cellular decay halted as soon as possible. Despite brutal damage to organs and tissues the fundamental information is merely `on hold'. That makes cryonic suspension a more startling and extended version of what is done by cooling an unconscious patient during heart surgery while replacing an organ with a transplant. When a cardiac transplant patient's new heart is restarted, nobody refers to this (rather creepily, as in a horror movie) as *reanimation*. Let's not go there if we can possibly avoid it. [I now add for general consideration:] I think I have a quite effective word we might apply to the condition we hope will be attained by the cryonically preserved: Recovery. Although I haven't done a literature search on prior use of this term in this context, it does strike me as rather appropriate in a number of dimensions. It avoids affronting the religious and the non-religious alike. It evades Gothic connotations. Better still, it captures the desperate but hopeful ambiance of the emergency ward rather than the morgue. In a last extremity we face dangerous surgery with trepidation but hope of recovery: partial recovery at worst, complete at best. Bruise a muscle, fracture a limb, or contract an infection, and we await recovery in a state of withdrawal, perhaps attended by physicians and the prayers or supportive good wishes of our friends. Is there a downside? Consider the connotations of `in recovery', `recovering from addiction'. Unfortunate overtones? Maybe so, but then I'd happily embrace a 12-Step Program that could save me from my body's long term and intractable addiction to death. `My name is Damien, and I'm a mortal.' Six billion voices roar encouragingly: `Hello, Damien!' Recovery. I could use some of that. Damien Broderick Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=19501