X-Message-Number: 5092
Date:  Wed, 01 Nov 95 23:02:29 
From: mike <>
Subject: knowing you to resuscitate you

>From #5068 (Robin Helweg-Larsen):
>>
>> And.... maybe you want people to go through your mind and reconstruct
>> your personality?  Guess what!  They're going to know more about you
>> than you even know yourself - they'll have to, to be able to do a
>> good job!  They'll know your conscious, subconscious, unconscious,
>> preconscious, reflexes, predilections, crimes and misdemeanors.
>>
>From #5075 (Keith Lynch):
>
>I doubt it.  In general it's easier to repair individual parts than to
>fully understand the interrelationships of those parts (e.g. you can
>recognize a crack, or a loose wire, or eroded gear teeth, or crosslinked
>proteins, or a burned out light bulb, or a brittle parchment, or a
>dead battery, and take the appropriate corrective actions without
>understanding the system into which whatever you fixed fits).
>
My feeling is that, under *good enough* conditions of 
suspension/preservation, yes, it may not be necessary to know much 
about the personality you are resuscitating, much as you can shake 
someone awake without knowing much about them. BUT, I can easily 
imagine situations where this would not hold. Suppose the suspension is 
not so good, yet there is still enough information, scattered within 
and without the frozen remains (some stored in the form of 
videotapes, diaries, etc., say, or even in the memories of other 
individuals), for a good reconstruction if the information is used in 
full. Then a very considerable picking apart/reassembly of 
the patient (in more senses than one) may pay dividends in 
a better reconstruction, and thus may  be carried out. (I for one 
would much rather have that done, than get a lousy 
reanimation.) And I've heard a lot about the damage caused by
present freezing methods and/or pre-freezing protocols,
so it seems entirely possible that 
reanimation could involve an invasion of privacy beyond anything we 
can imagine, even for the best cases of today and the near future.
But I'm also optimistic that the extracted information 
will not be used against us in some petty way; hopefully those who 
resurrect us will have gotten beyond that sort of thing. Perhaps the 
recovered information will simply be handed over to us--i.e. we will 
assume sole ownership, to dispose of as we wish.

Another thought, to build on the idea of using the memories of 
others, is that someone who gets a bad suspension could be assisted 
by someone else who got a good suspension, i.e. the memories of the 
second person would be tapped to aid in reconstructing the first. I 
know of a family, one member of whom (the only one to date) was 
suspended, but under very bad conditions. This patient was a last minute 
case, not signed up, a girl about 20 years old who died very suddenly
and unexpectedly. By the time we (at Alcor) got her, she had been
stored many days at only a little below water ice temperature. Then,
to our horror, we found she had also been autopsied and her brain 
removed! (It was said to have been put in the abdominal cavity, which
is fairly standard procedure; but an attempt to verify this with a CT scan was 
inconclusive at best.) By now her closest relatives including both parents are 
signed up and, if all goes well, will get far better suspensions than 
she did (or perhaps be lucky enough not to need suspension at all). It seems 
likely that much personality information will be contained in the memories
of those closest to this patient that will not be inferable from the frozen 
remains. A reasonable reconstruction, then, would draw on those 
memories to the fullest. So privacy invasion could occur even if you, 
the patient, don't need it for YOUR reanimation.

Another need for privacy invasion may occur with neuropatients, who 
will need new bodies. It seems likely to me that a new body could be 
created, complete with the correct wiring diagram, etc., so, for 
instance, you wouldn't have to learn to walk, swim or sign your name 
all over again, but would just wake up with these skills programmed 
in, and seeming perfectly natural to you. The catch, though, may 
be that you would have to be pretty thoroughly analyzed, on 
appropriate levels, so all this could be done before you awaken. The 
"appropriate levels" might not require delving into the more sensitive
areas. On the other hand, they certainly might--depending on your
previous habits and preferences. 

So, I think we shouldn't dismiss the possibility that a very 
thorough expose of your inner secrets will
be necessary, either to optimize your own reanimation or that of 
someone else you care about.

Mike Perry


Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5092