X-Message-Number: 4945
Date:  Fri, 06 Oct 95 00:33:15 
From: mike <>
Subject: re *Death to Dust*

Kevin Q, Brown, in #4942, asks about the book *Death to Dust* by 
Kenneth  V. Iserson, M.D. (Galen Press, Tucson, AZ, 709pp),
which has a chapter on cryonics. I reviewed this chapter before publication,
and suggested some changes which were made.

Iserson is not a proponent of cryonics, but his cryonics chapter, 
"Souls on Ice," is not simply a hatchet job either. The 
information (circa 1993) is now somewhat dated as to organizations; however, 
the basics of cryonics are presented more-or-less accurately.  
Critics of cryonics, including cryobiologists, are given their say, 
but also some scientific proponents such as Ralph Merkle. In all 

there is the strong  impression that the author sees cryonics as simply another,
interesting way to treat a dead body, not a possible means of 
overcoming death.

There are many other "ways to treat a dead body" described in the book,
plus you can find out what will happen, under the various options,
if you *aren't* frozen, including the decay process and burning. Much
historical material is included. A partial list of illustrations will 
give some further idea of the contents: La Danse Macabre, 1493;
Two devices designed to summon help for premature burials; Mouth
formers, trocar buttons, eyecaps, and trocar; Cremating plague victims
in Bombay, India; Stylized interpretation of cryonic preservation (head);
The hall of mummies, Guanajuato, Mexico; A Dakhma, the Parsee Tower
of Silence; Drawing and quartering a body; Saints' reliquaries: finger, jaw
and foot; Corpse cooler; Exhumation of Union Civil War dead; Anatomical
dissection, 1345.

Mike Perry 


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