HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: tsf@CS.CMU.EDU (Timothy Freeman)
Subject: Re: Cryonics, etc
Originator: tsf@U.ERGO.CS.CMU.EDU
Organization: Carnegie Mellon University
	<722035009snx@eris.demon.co.uk>
	<1992Nov18.172315.4561@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 17:50:34 GMT

In article <1992Nov18.172315.4561@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> wk5w@brain.med.virginia.edu (William Katz) writes:

   I would have a problem with freezing individuals before death.
   The reason is the destruction of the grieving process for the patient and 
   his/her loved ones. If the freezee has no loved ones that would require
   a grieving process, see the problems mentioned below.

Sounds like you value the emotions of those still living more than
improving the chances of successfully resuscitating the dying.  That
would be okay if you were the one that was dying, but it sounds like
you wish you had authority over others.  You also have a very concrete
model of how these emotions work; I claim that there will be enough
individual variation that coercion to accomodate one model oppresses
the majority of people whose emotions don't work that way.

   Beyond the technical issues though, what makes people think that the people
   of the future will *want* to spend the energy and resources to revive some
   relic from the past (unless they are your descendents)?  

That's my biggest question as well.  I don't expect to predict the
motives of those who may be reviving me, but I intend to to give them
the option.

   We really shouldn't freeze before legal death.  Why bother?  

Because the processes leading up to legal death may destroy the brain.
For instance, consider a person who dies from a brain tumor.  Instead
of letting the person lay there in a coma while we wait for the tumor
to eat up enough of his brain for legal death to occur, it would be
better to do the suspension once the person enters a coma that it's
reasonably sure they won't recover from, assuming we got consent
before the person went into the coma, of course.

Another reason is that legal death is a bureaucratic criterion that
may be achieved hours after clinical death.

But, of course, it is illegal to do it the ideal way, so the cryonics
organizations wait for clinical death.



--
Tim Freeman <tsf@cs.cmu.edu>    CompuServe ID 71045,2267 checked occasionally.
When they took the fourth amendment, I was silent because I don't deal drugs.
When they took the sixth amendment, I kept quiet because I know I'm innocent.
When they took the second amendment, I said nothing because I don't own a gun.
Now they've come for the first amendment, and I can't say anything at all.
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger)
Subject: Re: What's the Deal?
Organization: /usr/local/lib/news/organization
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 21:29:40 GMT

JPS127@psuvm.psu.edu writes:

>I just don't get it, is this line a support group for you people?
>I'm gener- ally very open minded but I just don't see how you people
>can fall for such a pie in the sky idea.  Honestly, I don't believe
>in cryonics and technology be damned I don't think revival is
>possible.

Well, you can always stop reading the newsgroup. No one forces you to
stick around here. However, you make some substantive, and false,
claims, so I thought I'd bring them up.

>I understand your arguement that people will only be revived when the
>proper advances have been made to insure a cure for the cause of
>death has been found, and in most cases I believe that cures will
>(someday) be found.  However, I do not believe that any technology
>(nanotechnology included) will ever be able to reconstruct the damage
>a body will sustain during the freezing and storage pro- cesses.
>Certainly efforts can be made to reduce the amount of freezing
>damage, but as for storing, and I hate to be the first one to point
>this out to you, we are highly ordered beings.  Entropy always wins!
>Certainly it is possible to freeze tissue to a level where
>biodegradation is a minimum, but chemical change will have to occur -
>or are you frozen to 0K?  Yes low temperature will slow any chemical
>process but not enough over time.

Sorry, but this is a claim one can check. It turns out that even using
pessimistic models, at liquid nitrogen temperatures we have centuries
before reactions in the patient will have advanced as far as they
would go in mere minutes at room temperature. You'd be suprised at how
slow things can actually get. If you want, I will dig out an article
on precisely how slow things get.

>No technology will be able to repare molecular structures.

This is also provably false -- your own body contains systems for
repairing molecular structures, and does so every day.


>Macroscopically it is possible to freeze and thaw tissue, I've got a
>steak in my freezer that's been there for a year and I'm sure that
>when I thaw and cook it the taste will be fine.  But microscopically,
>I just don't think so!

Well, consider that there are lots of children alive today that
spent some part of their lives frozen -- as embryos kept at liquid
nitrogen temperatures. Small enough organisms handle being frozen just
fine if properly prepared. The question is, I will grant you, whether
large organisms can do the same. However, there is good evidence for
our position.

--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
"They can have my RSA key when they pry it from my cold dead fingers."
Libertarian Party info: Phone 1-800-682-1776, E-Mail 345-5647@mcimail.com
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: starnaud@INRS-Telecom.UQuebec.CA (Nicolas St.Arnaud)
Subject: suggested reading
Organization: INRS Telecommunications
Distribution: all
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 20:37:11 GMT

  A very interesting reading for those interested in cryonics:
"The Defensless Dead", which is the second story in "The Long ARM of Gil
Hamilton",  by Larry Niven, Del Ray books, 1976.


Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: dedmunds@selkirk.sfu.ca (Darran Edmundson)
Subject: Re: What's the Deal?
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 23:42:50 GMT

<JPS127@psuvm.psu.edu> writes:

>  I just don't get it, is this line a support group for you people?  I'm gener-
>ally very open minded but I just don't see how you people can fall for such a
>pie in the sky idea.  Honestly, I don't believe in cryonics and technology be
>damned I don't think revival is possible.

Do you think that revival is impossible (i.e. probability zero) or just highly
unlikely?  I think a "generally very open minded" person would be hesitant
to suggest that the probability is identically zero.  Thus, what do you
have to lose?  (What other plans did you have for your life insurance?)
 
>Certainly efforts can be made to reduce the amount of freezing damage,
>but as for storing, and I hate to be the first one to point this out to you, we
>are highly ordered beings.  Entropy always wins!  

Oh no, a lay physicist.  They aren't going to freeze you indefinitely so
liquid NO2 should be sufficient. 

>No technology will be able to
>repare molecular structures.

This is an open minded statement?  I went to a seminar several weeks ago
where an IBM researcher presented results showing the manipulation of 
individual atoms with a scanning tunnelling microscope.  

Who could possibly predict what is and isn't possible further
down the road?

-- 

Darran Edmundson
darran@chaos.phys.sfu.ca
From: hkhenson@cup.portal.com (H Keith Henson)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Re: Answering inquiries
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 92 14:12:58 PST
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Distribution: world

Re this thread, I was wearing my Alcor "Time Traveler" T shirt wene
someone asked me if I were going forward or backwards :).  A long
conversations ensued where they took down the Alcor number with the
intent of getting more information.  I will look for them at our
local meetings.  Keith Henson
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger)
Subject: Re: Convincing others of cryonics?
Organization: /usr/local/lib/news/organization
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 22:00:26 GMT

wk5w@brain.med.virginia.edu (William Katz) writes:
>Huh?  How do you figure you get "extra" life by cryonics?  You assume there
>would be no wear and tear on the body due to any cryonic process, but you
>also assume that life expectency and quality of life will continue to
>increase in the future.  What about new viruses (like a super-AIDS) or
>ozone destruction or ....
>
>Any increase in life expectency would be due to advances at the time of
>reawakening.  This assumes alot.

No, it does not. Any technology capable of repairing the damage caused
by the freezing process would, almost trivially, be able to repair any
other damage you could imagine and restore people to youth and
vitality. To fix the freezing damage, you need to be able to go in and
repair individual cells at the molecular level. Given that, you can do
almost anything, biologically speaking.

>I am not aware of
>ANY use of cryonics on human subjects (even the legal implications are
>severe).

There are a couple dozen patients on ice at Alcor in California right
now -- I think your awareness is limited.

>How can you describe unknown "odds" of cryonics then, and even
>compare them with proven medical methods like cancer therapy.

Well, so far as we know, rotting and being eaten by worms has zero
recovery rate. Cryonics likely has a substantially higher capacity for
survival than that. As happens with many medical treatments of unknown
but likely efficacy, terminal patients tend to use them before all the
variables are known, given that there is no better treatment available.

--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
"They can have my RSA key when they pry it from my cold dead fingers."
Libertarian Party info: Phone 1-800-682-1776, E-Mail 345-5647@mcimail.com
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: wk5w@brain.med.virginia.edu (William Katz)
Subject: Re: Cryonics, etc
Organization: Neuroclinical Trials Center, University of Virginia
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 19:34:21 GMT

>   We really shouldn't freeze before legal death.  Why bother?  
>
>Because the processes leading up to legal death may destroy the brain.
>For instance, consider a person who dies from a brain tumor.  Instead
>of letting the person lay there in a coma while we wait for the tumor
>to eat up enough of his brain for legal death to occur, it would be
>better to do the suspension once the person enters a coma that it's
>reasonably sure they won't recover from, assuming we got consent
>before the person went into the coma, of course.
>
Death by processes that actually destroy the brain is some minute
percentage of total deaths (probably less than 1 in 100,000).
You'd have to look at the insurance stats for that.  I wouldn't be
against suspension upon "coma", since the patient loses all cognitive
skills.
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: wk5w@brain.med.virginia.edu (William Katz)
Subject: Re: Convincing others of cryonics?
Organization: Medical Scientist Training Program, Univ of Virginia
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 15:19:21 GMT

This is the first article I have read in this newsgroup.  So if there
has been prior discussion of subjects, I am unaware of it.

In article <1992Nov15.202437.13829@hellgate.utah.edu> tolman%asylum.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Kenneth Tolman) writes:
>
>2) Cryonics makes good gambling sense.  (I posted a long note about this
>months ago)  You are basically gambling, with an investment and with
>a possible return.  Therefore figure out how much (100 years or so) extra life
>is worth, and what your investment return is.  For anyone who is not an
>idiot, it makes good economic sense as an investment.
>
Huh?  How do you figure you get "extra" life by cryonics?  You assume there
would be no wear and tear on the body due to any cryonic process, but you
also assume that life expectency and quality of life will continue to
increase in the future.  What about new viruses (like a super-AIDS) or
ozone destruction or ....

Any increase in life expectency would be due to advances at the time of
reawakening.  This assumes alot.

>3) Cryonics is merely another medical procedure, and a lot less costly than 
>many other medical procedures.  For instance, the entire cost of cancer 
>therapy, or of any major disease.  These procedures most reasonable people 
>undertake, with perhaps the same (or less) odds than cryonics.  (How about 
>the cost of AIDS... which is certainly terminal, odds are even worse here)
>
Are you only talking about cryonics for terminally ill patients?  Because if
you are not talking about terminally ill patients, I'd like to hear what
sort of system (besides vaporware) you are describing.  I am not aware of
ANY use of cryonics on human subjects (even the legal implications are
severe).  How can you describe unknown "odds" of cryonics then, and even
compare them with proven medical methods like cancer therapy.  By the way,
"cancer therapy" is a very broad label which lumps together methods
with 90+% success rates to sub 20% success rates. There are many forms of
cancer, all with different therapies and prognoses.

-Bill
From: bradbury@sftwks.UUCP (Robert Bradbury)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Reviving frozen people is a cost issue not a technology issue
Date: 19 Nov 92 03:52:41 GMT
Organization: Softworks Ltd, Seattle, WA

In article <722036072snx@eris.demon.co.uk> bgrahame@eris.demon.co.uk (Robert D Grahame) writes:
>Quite so, the odds are 'better' (IMHO) than they were a few years back, but
>there are still too many unknowns to put figures on them. Give me
>chemotherapy over an ice-bath any day!
>

There is no doubt in my mind that so long as we have an accurate copy of
your DNA we will be able to regenerate your body and so long as we
have the neural interconnections in your brain intact we will be
able to reanimate your mind.  To regenerate your body one simply
has to read those genes which are unique to an individual (probably
only a few thousand out of 10^5) and replace them in a "generic"
embryo and let it grow.  There is a sticky ethical issue that
one has to remove the brain of the developing body or suppress
the genes that cause normal brain development (this is going to
make some people really crazy...).  The interesting thing here
is that you can probably get back a better body than the one
you left behind.  The downside is that when the brain is
transplanted into the body it will be in for a "rude" re-education
period while all the sensory input connections get rewired.
Given the pace of molecular biology today I suspect we could
do this between 2010-2020.  The real *sticky* point becomes
how do you "reanimate" the brain without a great loss of
information.  People always cite nanotechnology, but it is
going to take either a *very* large number of little robots
and perhaps a *very* big computer to coordinate them to keep
the connections valid during reanimation.  I don't see this
as being very likely.  Also, nobody seems to point out that
this will be a *very* expensive treatment.  I suspect that
if people have not planned their "sleeps" so that their
capital grows during that period they may find their
reanimation postponed because the bill can't be paid.
Unless society becomes very wealthy and decides to pay
for these treatments you will have an ever increasing
supply of "dead" people.


-- 
Robert Bradbury			uunet!sftwks!bradbury

Death is an imposition on the human race, and no longer acceptable
				Alan Harrington, The Immortalist (1969)
From: tsf@CS.CMU.EDU (Timothy Freeman)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Re: Convincing others of cryonics?
Date: 16 Nov 92 19:47:25 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.BxtqzD.FFD.1
	<1992Nov16.151921.17649@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>
Organization: Carnegie Mellon University
Originator: tsf@U.ERGO.CS.CMU.EDU

In article <1992Nov16.151921.17649@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> wk5w@brain.med.virginia.edu (William Katz) writes:

   This is the first article I have read in this newsgroup.  So if there
   has been prior discussion of subjects, I am unaware of it.

There is a monthly FAQ that should not have expired yet in your news
queue.  It is obviously not there for some reason.  Send me mail if
you want a copy; it's 9 parts, 50K total, largest part 11K.

   How do you figure you get "extra" life by cryonics?  You assume there
   would be no wear and tear on the body due to any cryonic process, but you
   also assume that life expectency and quality of life will continue to
   increase in the future.

You have it backwards.  The assumption is that freezing does so much
damage that anyone who could repair that much damage could easily cure
any currently existing disease or aging.

   Are you only talking about cryonics for terminally ill patients?  

Legally dead patients.  Depending on how you twist the words around,
legally dead plausibly implies terminally ill, so the answer to your
question could plausibly be "yes".

   I am not aware of
   ANY use of cryonics on human subjects (even the legal implications are
   severe).  

Well, it happens, but only after they are legally dead.  I agree that
legal complications are a nuisance, and that they are very severe if
it is done before legal death.

Unlike Tolman, I have given up on arguing for cryonics.  After someone
hears about the idea and has absorbed all the literature they are
interested in, they typically have a firm belief that either it may
work or it definitely won't work.  Someone who believes that it won't
work (after all of their questions have been answered) typically
believes this with such religious fervor that arguing with them is
pointless.  Furthermore, the rationalizations for their belief are so
bogus that asking them how they came to their conclusions is also
pointless.  I would like to believe that people who come to the
conclusion that it may work are more reasonable, but I'm not really in
a position to judge.
--
Tim Freeman <tsf@cs.cmu.edu>    CompuServe ID 71045,2267 checked occasionally.
When they took the fourth amendment, I was silent because I don't deal drugs.
When they took the sixth amendment, I kept quiet because I know I'm innocent.
When they took the second amendment, I said nothing because I don't own a gun.
Now they've come for the first amendment, and I can't say anything at all.
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: tolman%asylum.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Kenneth Tolman)
Subject: Re: Convincing others of cryonics?
Date: 16 Nov 92 13:13:14 MST
Organization: University of Utah, CompSci Dept


>>2) Cryonics makes good gambling sense.  (I posted a long note about this
>>months ago)  You are basically gambling, with an investment and with
>>a possible return.  Therefore figure out how much (100 years or so) extra 
>>life is worth, and what your investment return is. 

>Huh?  How do you figure you get "extra" life by cryonics?  You assume there
>would be no wear and tear on the body due to any cryonic process, but you
>also assume that life expectency and quality of life will continue to
>increase in the future.  What about new viruses (like a super-AIDS) or
>ozone destruction or ....
>
>Any increase in life expectency would be due to advances at the time of
>reawakening.  This assumes alot.

You are correct in many ways.  I take for granted that the aging process
will have been eliminated (already research is somewhat promising here).
Your future "life expectancy" may not be as long as I projected above due
to some natural cause death as well (accidental explosion, super AIDS).
Some of these will allow you to be frozen again though, so you would skip
through time...

The point though is to evaluate from the knowledge available what you
believe the probability is for return, and an estimated time of return.
Then figure out the cash value of these extra years, and determine if
the investment is worth the risk.. Do the calculation, I am not kidding!

>>3) Cryonics is merely another medical procedure, and a lot less costly than 
>>many other medical procedures.  For instance, the entire cost of cancer 
>>therapy, or of any major disease.  These procedures most reasonable people 
>>undertake, with perhaps the same (or less) odds than cryonics.  (How about 
>>the cost of AIDS... which is certainly terminal, odds are even worse here)

>Are you only talking about cryonics for terminally ill patients?  Because if
>you are not talking about terminally ill patients, I'd like to hear what
>sort of system (besides vaporware) you are describing. 

Every person walking on this planet is terminally ill with aging and disease.
They ALL are dying, including you and me.  If it were possible to cure this
disease (as cryonics + future medicine hopefully promises) then one would
pay for it... 

>How can you describe unknown "odds" of cryonics then, and even
>compare them with proven medical methods like cancer therapy. 

Good question.  I place the actual chance of revival at about 0.1% to 1%
as a low estimate.  Even with this percentage of success, it is worth it
(to me) financially.  Probably most cryonics patients place the odds much
higher, and people outside of cryonics would make it lower.  However, I have
some certain faith in advancing technology.  If one believes in fate and
other superstitous gobbly goo then your percentage of revival is already
determined.  You will not revive if you don't freeze, and you will revive if
you are fated to.

Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: tsf@CS.CMU.EDU (Timothy Freeman)
Subject: Re: Long term accountability
Originator: tsf@U.ERGO.CS.CMU.EDU
Organization: Carnegie Mellon University
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 16:39:30 GMT

In article <1992Nov20.123442.20603@hellgate.utah.edu> tolman%asylum.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Kenneth Tolman) writes:

     As has been brought up elsewhere, how can we insure the responsibility
   and accountability of cryonics organizations?  How can we be assured that
   the administration will do a good/adequate job?

I agree that these are important questions.

    1) A cryonic suspendee would be assigned a living individual who would
   safeguard that person's well being.  ...

What incentive does this person have to do a good job?  Past schemes
that have had the kids paying to keep pappa frozen have failed because
the kids lose interest after a few decades at most.  I don't expect
this to work any better.

   2) A suspendee would sign up for a contract which functions as a "share"
   which can be readily transferred from one cryonics organization to another.
   Thus a person wishing to switch organizations can readily AND EASILY do
   so.  ... It also would avoid the
   large amount of paperwork and legal bull involved with signing up anew with
   another organization.  

But if you standardize the legal aspect, you've removed one of the
main forms of competition between the organizations.  For instance,
Alcor demands the right to discard the body of a suspendee (while
retaining the head) if the financial situation gets tough enough,
whereas the Cryonics Institute insists upon keeping the body around
because (I think) they feel that head-only suspensions may fail to
preserve the self-circuit, whatever that may be.  I don't see any room
for these two groups to participate in a shared legal process.
--
Tim Freeman <tsf@cs.cmu.edu>    CompuServe ID 71045,2267 checked occasionally.
When they took the fourth amendment, I was silent because I don't deal drugs.
When they took the sixth amendment, I kept quiet because I know I'm innocent.
When they took the second amendment, I said nothing because I don't own a gun.
Now they've come for the first amendment, and I can't say anything at all.
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics