X-Message-Number: 7574
From:  (Thomas Donaldson)
Subject: Re: CryoNet #7565 - #7569
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 1997 11:18:32 -0800 (PST)

Hi again!

I second parts of Mr. Benater's message, though not all of it. Visser should
certainly get to tell her side of this story. We've already seen how the FDA
behaves with new drugs and I would not be surprised at all if the total 
effect of getting an experiment approved by South African authorities,
especially if you don't have the holy credentials, would be years of delay.

That does NOT make her treatment necessarily a good one. If we could get
good ideas simply by opposing the establishment, the world would be flooded
with creativity.

As for her cryoprotectant, no amount of publicity will answer the questions
we want answered. I think the Alcor people were strongly influenced by her
experiment freezing rat hearts; that should influence anyone, regardless
of her background. 

I can come to you and the MIT Faculty of Physics with tons of theory 
suggesting that I've found a way to control gravity, and after reading it
they may (quite rightly) dismiss me and my ideas. BUT if I came to them
with little theory, but an antigravity machine which I demonstrated 
would actually WORK, and passed their own rigorous tests, then my ideas
and claims become something else entirely. And if they decided to believe
me, they would have the best of reasons.

Unfortunately it looks more and more that Visser's cryoprotectant simply
won't work with the large organs, especially brains, we wish to preserve.
Frankly our chemical understanding of it makes that unlikely enough that
it's probably not worth a test. Naturally I want to hear what Olga Visser
says about this too, of course.

And in the worst case, deliberate fraud, magicians (who of course never
claim they know any magic) such as Uri Geller have fooled established
scientists in the past and will probably do so again. Visser should be
watched very carefully by her audience (the usual magical technique is
to distract the audience from what you're really doing).

And if Steve Harris had witnessed her experiments at Alcor, fraudulent or
not, I'd bet that he too would believe her.

			Best and long long life to all,

				Thomas Donaldson


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