X-Message-Number: 473
Date: Thu, 26 Sep 1991 12:13 EST
From: LEVY%
Subject: Re CRYONICS #471: Cryonics/Christianity

I would like to add to Thomas Donaldson's comments about the conflict between 
cryonics and Christianity.

Many cryonicists see religion, especially Christianity, as being in 
"complementary distribution" with cryonics; that is, each is trying to
satisfy the same fundamental need to overcome our mortality.  In my 
opinion, this view takes account only of one component of religion.  For
many people, this component seems subordinate to the other things that
religion provides (ritual, social contact, etc.)  Even among people who
profess to believe in some sort of deity, the prevailing attitude seems to
be "Oh well, you die, and maybe you go to heaven, but if not you're not
conscious anyway, so who cares?"  I do not consider this answer to be
evidence that religion has provided these people with some clear alternative
to what cryonics offers, or that such people even care enough to think
about the question.

For this reason, I don't think cryonics is in a very good position to 
compete with resurrectionist thinking.  Essentially, people stay religious
because they like the other things that religion gives them, and
they buy the answers to the big issues as part of the package.  

There are, of course, religious intellectuals.  Like most intellectuals,
they are not a majority.

--Simon Levy  

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=473