X-Message-Number: 2905
From: 
Date: Sun, 17 Jul 94 23:15:25 EDT
Subject: CRYONICS sheep & court

I.  In light of Thomas Donaldson's recent remarks (#2903) I remind him and
Mike Darwin, and anyone else who may be confused or off target, of the
following:

We have never made any false or misleading or undocumented claims about the
Cryonics Institute research with sheep heads.

Our combination of procedures was different than any other, as far as we
know, and results were better than those reported elsewhere in that there was
no visible cracking and no leakage in the vasculature. Mike and Alcor
apparently got cracking at all levels, from naked eye down to fine structure,
and have acknowledged this to be a major problem. 

We take 7 days or more for humans to get down to dry ice temperature, and
another 7 days or more to liquid nitrogen.  (5 days and 5 days for sheep
heads.) Our impression had been that others do it more quickly.  Mike Darwin
says that, at least in some cases, Alcor took even longer for the liquid
nitrogen phase, but  Alcor and CryoPreservation apparently still take only a
day or two for the dry ice phase. Of course they have their reasons--and Mike
will doubtless give us a ream or two--but whether those reasons are valid
remains to be seen. 

It is obvious, as we  explicitly acknowledged repeatedly, that one small set
of observations by one set of observers is not conclusive or definitive. For
this reason we asked Dr. Pichugin and Dr. Zhegunov to repeat and extend our
experiments, which they are doing. Dr. Soloviov and colleagues in St.
Petersburg will probably do so also, although not necessarily with sheep.
Alcor expressed interest in repeating the work too, but then found no fresh
sheep heads were available in their area. If anyone else, anywhere, wants to
try it we will give them the same information we have given the Ukrainians
and the Russians.

Of course, even if our observation of no cracking at the naked eye level is
confirmed, there still  might  be cracks at finer levels; or there might be
offsetting damage of some other kind. We shall see. The detailed reports and
photos will be available to anyone interested. (Initial phases are already.)

Meanwhile, if anyone objects to our posting partial or preliminary reports on
the Net, or  conjectures, let him. Such informal exchanges are common. If
they are carefully written and carefully read--and I have reason to believe
they are not always carefully read--no one will be misled. 

II.  Could we use the Net(s) for a Science Court?

Scientists opposing cryonics have always refused to meet us in formal or
extended debate or to submit themselves to cross examination. They just play
their one-liners for journalists and retreat into their holes. The Nets seem
to offer an opportunity to harass or even corner them.

I know nothing about the Nets, but have the impression that many forums and
bulletin boards are available, and we could make a great many scientists
aware of the availability of our postings. Perhaps we could keep up a barrage
of information and challenges through these channels. Then the detractors
would either have to suffer in silence, in effect taking the Fifth, or else
stand up and be knocked down.

Information about how to access the appropriate bulletin boards or forums
would be appreciated.

Robert Ettinger

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