X-Message-Number: 6954
From: Peter Merel <>
Subject: Hooray for TimeCat! + An Alcor/CC Option?
Date: Sun, 22 Sep 1996 01:19:47 +1000 (EST)

TimeCat writes,


>[...] they will freely distribute and make freely available and for public use
>without fees of any kind all information they may come into posession of 
>regarding methods and research pertaining to cryonics.
>
>Whoever does this proves that they have their subscribers best interests at 
>heart, not their organization. Whoever doesn't, well, they prove the 
>opposite.

Indeed. TimeCat's message is the first in this unfortunate thread to
make any damn sense to me. I did not pledge to PP because I wanted to
turn a buck; I pledged because I wanted suspension technology to improve
to the point where real live humans could rely on it. I have no sympathy
for anyone who tries to turn a buck by controlling such technology,
because to do so neither encourages the growth of cryonics as a movement
nor improves its accessibility as a medical technique - quite the opposite.

So I agree entirely with TimeCat: if you want my donation, forget
patents, profiteering, and secrecy, and just post your methods and
results for everyone's benefit. If you don't intend to do this, then you
don't deserve a dime of donations - no matter whether your methods are
real or just another parlour trick.

Now I imagine TimeCat's post may be rewarded with a flood of vitriol
from certain quarters, probably thud and blunder about missing the
boat, losing the nerve, failing the test, courageous scientific pioneers
and parents of cryonics, etc, etc, blah blah blah. Such rhetoric is not
the hallmark of trustworthy businessmen or reputable scientists, and I
encourage TimeCat to disregard it should it occur.

--

On The Missing Option:

I've said before that my choice of provider will have much less to do
with technological perfection and much more to do with trustworthiness,
temper and rationality. After all, should I be suspended, it may be
decades or even centuries before I am revived, if ever - therefore, if
the management of an org cannot instill faith in me that the org is
likely to be stable for this period, technological excellence or no, I
cannot feel I will be likely to survive.

Now, being based in Australia, I have had the luxury of procrastinating
about my choice of provider for years. Should I decease on this
continent, my successful suspension seems unlikely. However, this luxury
is about to be lost to me; I will be moving my home and business to San
Diego within the next year, and then I will have no more excuse.

So, for the record, having spent several years on this forum trying to
size up the various correspondants, at this point I see Alcor and
CryoCare as neck and neck in my estimation. I am most impressed with
CC's corporate structures; I am likewise impressed with Alcor's size and
the quality of its leadership. So I would like to ask Steve Bridge and
Brian Wowk to do me a favour - and I think this may be a favour that
others here would also appreciate:

Could you make it possible for me to use a CC/Alcor combination? I
really would see this as the best of the available choices.  I know that
there's a lot of politics in this, but isn't there some way that you
could work it? It wouldn't harm either organisation, and in fact it
might do both a lot of good. 

It might also encourage the people involved here to stop tearing
eachother up, and to start thinking about how to unite against the
common and implacable foes cryonics faces outside the movement ...

Peter Merel.


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