X-Message-Number: 9605 Date: Sat, 02 May 98 22:57:31 From: Mike Perry <> Subject: "Failure of Cryonics" Saul Kent's posting, "The Failure of the Cryonics Movement" (#9556-7) says at the end, "I invite comment, criticism and discussion of the ideas in this piece." Here are some thoughts on some of the issues raised: The movement certainly hasn't grown as fast as some predicted and many hoped; however, the present picture is a bit more optimistic, I think, than is argued based on membership in CryoCare. Some recent stats from Alcor, gotten from the *Phoenix*, Feb. issue of each year except that for 1998 it is the Feb.-Mar. combined issue, show the following membership totals: 1995: 360 1996: 376 1997: 408 1998: 431 i.e. a modest but steady growth rather than decline or stagnation. I think this is true for CI too (Bob Ettinger can judge this), and these organizations together make up a large majority of the signed-up cryonicists. Unfortunately I don't have age-distributions; as far as I know there is no drastic shortage of young people among new Alcor members, however. As for the reasons for the non-signups, along with some others I think these are complex and involve deep-seated attitudes people have about their "place" in the scheme of things. Most people seem resigned to their demise and not particularly interested in doing anything about it. The advent of reversible suspended animation would change this perception, but, I think, not gigantically overnight. It would, though, consititue a new and powerful weapon in our arsenal, to promote cryonics over alternatives, and I think our rate of signups would dramatically increase. For that reason I strongly advocate research leading up to this important breakthrough, and also for the reason that we don't know how damaging present procedures really are and whether and how well they will work. Yet I don't think all eggs should be in this one basket either. I am cautiously optimistic that suspensions performed under good conditions today will allow resuscitations eventually, so I think we have something to go on already. People who are dying today (and who desire to live) should be frozen rather than cremated or buried; clearly the preservation is much better no matter what its problems may be. If suspended animation were perfected, on the other hand, it could be very expensive. Cryonics already isn't cheap, despite the fact that it is usually affordable through life insurance, etc. Thus I would like to see some effort devoted to alternative preservation strategies, e.g. chemopreservation or combinations of chemo and moderate low-temperature. A possibility not yet ruled out is that such methods could be better than current cryonic suspension, or can be developed to be better, and they should generally be cheaper too. Another possibility, as some have suggested, is that suspended animation may be very long and hard in coming, despite the effort poured into it. It may be too late to be of use to you or me. Before that, we can hope that at least substantially better cryopreservation methods will come out of suspended animation research. I think such research deserves strong support, but again would not put all effort in this one direction alone. I think that recruitment attempts should continue: we need more signups--the more the better. And some of us, at least a small contingent, should be working in the "philosophy department"-- trying to address the metaphysical and world-view issues, social issues, etc. Those too are important in their own way, and I think, will not entirely take care of themselves, whatever other advances we or others may make. Mike Perry Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=9605