X-Message-Number: 4283
From:  (Brian Wowk)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Re: The "Future Technology" Panacea
Date: 23 Apr 1995 07:02:52 GMT
Message-ID: <3ncu2s$>

References: <3n6b3u$> 
<3n9h4h$>

In <3n9h4h$>  (Jim0123) writes:

>From:  (Brian Wowk)

>     Von Braun had his math and chemistry down pat before he began
>      to sell himself as a rocket maker ... in short, he could prove
>      that what he proposed was indeed possible using conventional
>      technology.

	Check out Eric Drexler's book "Nanosystems" (Wiley, 1992)
for the math, physics, and chemistry of molecular nanotechnology.
Technology capable of general analysis and reconstruction on a
molecular level IS theoreticalliy possible, and there are enormous
incentives to develop it in practice.

>      Cloning technology is also quite well developed, indeed clones
>      are a common research tool, ergo the logic behind funding
>      gene banks is on solid ground.

	Oh really?  Why is it then that gene bank scientists say it
will be decades before the technology becomes available to recreate
some of the species whose genes they have banked?
 
>	 There is no theory, or practice
>      nor experimental research - medical,  biochemical or physical - 
>      suggesting that freeze-damaged biomembranes and cellular 
>      organelles can be repaired en-masse at some later date.

	This is absolutely untrue.  The emerging science of molecular
nanotechnology (not to mention biotechnology in general) provides
a firm theoretical foundation for the forseeable development of devices
and organisms capable of sophisticated repairs on the molecular level.

>      All I hear are assertions that "in the future" they OUGHT TO be 
>      able to do such things, just because. 

	"Just because?"  Just because of what?  Blind optimism in the
future?  I had hoped I was presenting the case for cryonics with a bit
more detail than that! 

>     As to whether offering such services should be *legal* ...
>     and remember that we are talking about the dying and
>     desperate and their free cash ... I think it *should* be
>     legal (suprise!). 

	No, we are not talking about the "dying and desperate" (at
least not exculsively).  About 600 people currently have advance
arrangments in place for cryopreservation.  Most of them are young
and healthy.  Offhand, I would say about 75% of the people being
cryopreserved today are people who have such arragments made years
in advance.  The remaining 25% of "last minute" cases are examined
*very* carefully by cryonics organizations, with attention to issues
such as informed consent and the feelings of the family.  If we
didn't do this, we would have been out of business years ago for
all the legal and ethical reasons you cite.     

>     Secondly one must ask if it is ethical to allow a person
>     desperate and perhaps extremely selfish to spend the
>     family fortune on such things ... depriving their survivors
>     of the benifits inheritance and/or insurance money
>     would offer.

	Oh, please.  Give me a break.  Haven't you ever seen
the bumper stickers that read "Having Fun Spending my Kids'
Inheritance."  By your ethical standards, spending money
on expensive restaurants, world travel, or ANY personal indulgence 
not benefiting my relatives (read: Scavenging Vultures)
is unethical!  Well EXCUUUUUSE ME! 

	Seriously, though, my own Mother was cryopreserved (largely
at my own expense), my wife has cryopreservation arrangments,
and so will my children when they come along.  For most people
involved in cryonics, the practice is part of a well-thought-out
VALUE SYSTEM, not an impulsive desperate act.  I am really beginning
to resent your characterization of cryonics providers as
money-grubbing ambulance chasers.  Sorry to disappoint you, but
that is simply not the way cryonics works in the real world.

>     Bottom line ... are suspension providers *regulated* ?
>     If not, maybe they should be - at least for the present.
>     The exploitation potential is far too high at the moment,
>     and the technical know-how is far too undeveloped. 
>     Should *I* be allowed to open a 'cyronics' business and
>     take peoples money ... while getting them to believe that
>     they will be well preserved in my kitchen deep-freeze ?

	I agree with all this.  Cryonics is minimally regulated
at present.  This has its pluses and minuses.  The biggest minus
is that with no formal written regulations, the government
basically "regulates" you capriciously and arbitrarily at its
own whim.

>     Obviously, you believe that things are pretty clear-cut on
>     this issue. They aren't. Would your last letter have survived
>     detailed examination by any of the O.J. lawyers ? Eventually,
>     some disgruntled person is going to hire competant attourneys
>     to recover their familys money. On the technology issue alone
>     they can tear the industry to shreds ... screaming 'fraud' and
>     'exploitation' all the way to the bank. Then come state 
>     investigators and grand-juries. Either the suspension industry 
>     had better *demand* that the state issue regs and guidelines 
>     now, or it will be extremely vulnerable later. 

	You forget that cryonics is already 30 years old.
Virtually every scenario above (and others you can
barely imagine) have already played out in reality.  Yet we are still
here.  We are still going, with many more battles to come.

---Brian Wowk


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