X-Message-Number: 5736 Date: Thu, 15 Feb 96 10:33:24 From: dave <> Subject: Reply to Ben Best Reply to Ben >From Dave Pizer Since I don't want to start any flames I will *briefly* state that I disagree with some of Ben Best's opinions of Mike Darwin (although I do agree that Mike can be a captivating speaker, especially to persons new to cryonics, and he is one of the best salesmen I have ever seen). Hugh Hixon recently has been involved in many human suspensions, and in addition, Hugh is trained as a biochemist. Jerry Leaf certainly deserves much credit for his work in cryonics, and particularly with Alcor during the 1980s and early '90s, when Mike was also involved with Alcor. And Bob Ettinger has been involved in many suspensions and other activities going back to the earliest days. These are minor points. Certainly Mike has been involved in a lot of suspensions. But the rub I take with Ben's posting is that it implies that Mike gets most of the credit for advancing cryonics and advancing Alcor during a certain period of time. In my opinion, Mike is not the major person responsible for the advancement of cryonics or Alcor. I, along with many others, have been dissappointed that cryonics has taken so many decades to move forward-- and I just wanted to not let Ben's (over-zealous, in my opinion) posting go unanswered. In my opinion, the greatest public acceptance of cryonics is due to the early efforts of Bob Ettinger and the recent efforts of Steve Bridge, who is the best "media engineer"/spokesman for Alcor and cryonics. Steve's strong suit is that he is accepted as very credible by the media. A misconception that some cryonicists still seem to hold is that just because someone was there at the time they caused cryonics to move forward. I believe some cryonics pioneers caused cryonics to move forward and some caused a lot of delays. I prefer to give credit for success and to deduct for shortcomings. Speaking for myself, only Dave Pizer Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5736