X-Message-Number: 5308 Date: Thu, 30 Nov 95 12:10:21 From: mike <> Subject: Revival of cryonics patients Brad Templeton, #5302, writes, regarding the possible posthumans that the human race might develop into: >... the worry is that since we know almost nothing of the motives of >these transcendent intelligences, if they rule the world (and how can they >not rule it, unless they don't care to) we have no idea if they would care >to revive cryo-suspended normal intelligences. My feeling is that, while there is much about "transcendent intelligence" that we can't anticipate, we can have "some idea" about the interests that even advanced beings might have. They would presumably be interested in survival. (Otherwise they won't exist very long, so the world should come to be dominated by those that *do* want to survive--a simple form of natural selection.) They would be interested in *some* form of activity, and arguably not something simple such as mere existence in a static state of pleasure, without much thought. Instead one can speculate that some nontrivial processing of information will be involved. The "nontrivial processing" could take many forms, not all of which might involve information from the past, yet I submit that information about historical events will be important too. One source of historical information is the memories and experiences of other beings, some of which should be captured in the minds of cryonics patients. This then is one possible reason that posthumans will take an interest in such individuals. If this were the only reason, it could be argued that posthumans might simply retrieve the information and abandon the patients--so that no revivals would take place. But I see another reason, which is to answer the (to me fascinating) question of, given a particular human mind as a starting point and reasonable conditions for advancement, what sort of advanced intelligence would develop? One way to answer that question, in the case of a cryonics patient, would be simply to revive that patient and send them on their way--presumably with some preselection of conditions, etc. Although there might be other ways of obtaining an answer without really "running the person" I think the best way would be to let the person develop and see what transpires--and I feel confident that at least some posthumans would agree. Apparently much of the worry over revival results from the fear that posthumans will be so far beyond our level they will have "no interest" in the beings we are. I highly doubt this however; that is, while they may be advanced, I doubt they will have no interest. People are interested in beings less intelligent than themselves, e.g. dogs and cats, some of which have been frozen by cryonicists with eventual revival in mind. This raises another possibility--that posthumans would want to revive us as their pets or "children." Well, it would be revival at least, and such a life might not seem at all bad. On the other hand, I'm hoping for the possibility of unlimited advancement, and optimistic that I'll have the chance. It may even be abetted if I start out as someone's "child"--which is how I started the first time anyway. Mike Perry Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5308