HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: tsf@CS.CMU.EDU (Timothy Freeman)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Re: Bank Accounts for the Suspended?
Date: 29 Jul 92 15:17:45 GMT
Article-I.D.: U.TSF.92Jul29101745
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University
Originator: tsf@U.ERGO.CS.CMU.EDU

In article <1992Jul28.225452.3406@hyper.hyper.com> bonneau@hyper.com (Paul Bonneau,,) writes:

   A quick question.  It seems to me that being declared legally
   dead while in suspension is a double-edged sword.  It allows
   you to collect the life insurance policy that pays for the
   suspension, but it likely prevents you from having a bank
   account or investments like, say, a mutual fund.  ...
   Is there any way around this?  

The main obstacle is the "Rule Against Perpetuities", which means that
your will cannot put restrictions on what happens to your wealth
forever after your legal death.  A small country named Liechtenstein
that borders Switzerland and Austria does not have a Rule Against
Perpetuites, and Saul Kent has set up an organization called The
Reanimation Foundation to take advantage of this.  Here's the blurb
from Kevin Brown's list of cryonics-related organizations:

   The Reanimation Foundation is set up to enable you to "take it with you"
   and provide financial support for your reanimation, reeducation, and
   reentry.  It is based in Liechtenstein, which does not have a Rule Against
   Perpetuities, and thus allows financial assets to be owned by a person
   long after the person is declared legally dead.
       Reanimation Foundation
       c/o Saul Kent
       16280 Whispering Spur
       Riverside, CA 92504
       (800) 841-LIFE

It seems to me that depositing your money with this organization is
essentially creating a rich and therefore powerful entity that is
going to lose lots of money if you get reanimated.  I feel uneasy
betting my life that this organization will prefer to pursue its
stated purpose rather than its own self-perpetuation.  On the other
hand, I don't know any better way to deal with this situation.  Caveat
emptor.

(Insert legalistic boilerplate here about this not being an offer of
any kind, and you'd better get and read a prospectus, and so forth.)
--
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: Is suspension necessary?
Organization: /usr/local/lib/news/organization
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 15:22:55 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.204459.8563@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> bsb2u@uvacs.cs.Virginia.EDU (Brian Samuel Bevins) writes:
>
>My question concerns what seems to me to be a natural extension
>of these ideas.  If you have faith that technology will eventually
>make *anything* possible, why bother with cryonic suspension?
>Eventually time travel will be developed and the citizens of the
>future will have the capability to return to the present era,
>rescue the dying individual, and transport him/her to a future
>era where his/her condition is curable.
>

Nanomachines are known to be possible; they are in action in your
cells as you read this. No one has any real reason to believe time
travel to be practical.

>What if time travel is a physical impossibillity and so is never
>developed?  Same answers as to "What if it *never* becomes medically
>possible to revive a frozen individual?"  Many cryonics proponents
>seem to have complete faith that travel to other planets will become
>possible, so why not time travel?

We've done travel to other planets already, remember the moon
landings? Its all just a question of cost. This is beside the point,
however.

We know that there are animals that can survive freezing. We also have
lots of evidence that nanotechnology is going to be a reality, from
the nanomachines in your cells to IBM researchers manipulating
individual xenon atoms with an STM. We also have the results of a
bunch of experiments that tend to indicate that what we propose is
practical. None of this is some sort of leap of faith; its all the
same sort of prognostication that says that in a couple of years
computers will be faster and have larger memories.

No one has ever demonstrated time travel; no one is sure its possible.

--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
		  Just say "NO!" to death and taxes.
			 Extropian and Proud.
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: wag5@quads.uchicago.edu (john peter wagner)
Subject: Re: neuronal misconceptions 
Reply-To: wag5@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 21:53:05 GMT

In article <dedmunds.711840674@sfu.ca> dedmunds@selkirk.sfu.ca (Darran Edward Edmundson) writes:
>wag5@quads.uchicago.edu (john peter wagner) writes:
>
>>However, the brain is a very delicate organ.  Removing one neuron
>>can have very profound effects.  
>
>This is possible but extremely unlikely.
>Neural networks are typically very insensitive to
>the removal of a significant number of member neurons.  
>
>>Mis-timing could also wreck a system.
>
>One only has to consider the case of epileptics or revived drowning victims
>to discount this argument.

However, any brain surgeon will tell you that there is irreversible damage
involved in any intrusive surgery.  The benefits must outweigh the costs
to make it feasible. No, epileptics do undergo some rather radical changes
as anyone who knows an epileptic will state.
	What does the case of revived drowning victims have to do with
this? The systems are not destroyed.  If they were there would be
no revival.  Timing states change, but they are still very complex.
REM sleep displays a departure from the waking brain cycles but it
is nevertheless a stable state.  How do you know that these 'revived
droen victims' did not have a similar stable state?
>
>>A functioning mature brain, to be recreated, would also require an
>>exact duplicate of not only the orientation and mapping of the cells,
>>but also complete duplication of the states of those cells and of the
>>chemical environment in which those cells live.  
>
>The `states of those cells' are governed by the synaptic connection weights.
>This information is presumably not lost by freezing or else cryonics would
>pointless.

However, cryonics IS pointless.  The 'states of those cells' are governed
by much more than merely the synaptic connection weights.  I think you
are trying to fit primitive computer science's version of artificial
intelligence to the human brain, an organ which has been developed over
millions of years. I think you underestimate it.

>
>[ description of cloning and duplicating environment deleted ]
>
>>	In any case, through trial and error the computer may eventually
>>create a brain almost duplicating the original.  This is of course only
>>speculative but is in any case as realistic as any hope for defrosting
>>a corpse to life.
>
>Based on the above fallacies that you support, I have to question your 
>conclusion.

But the 'above fallacies' as you call them merely display the facetiousness
of the cryonics argument. They do not have much to do with the computer
regenration speculation, which is the body of my message.

>-- 
>
>Darran Edmundson
>darran@chaos.phys.sfu.ca
>
From: csuab@warwick.ac.uk (Steve Strong)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Re: Specific capabilities needed for reanimation?
Date: 27 Jul 92 10:19:12 GMT
Organization: Computing Services, Warwick University, UK
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4

szabo@techbook.com (Nick Szabo) writes:
: >There is nothing that we know of which shows us that time travel is
: >possible - many good physicists are convinced that it isn't.
: 
: Physicists also have told as that FTL is impossible, but quantum
: erasers can now transmit identical random data (eg encryption keys, 
: synchronization signals, etc.) instanatenously across the universe
: (as long as there is a receiver and was a common light source).

Random Data is they key phrase in the above. Physicists have never been
concerned about FTL transfer of random data, it is the FTL transfer
of information which is supposedly impossible.

: There still exists a remote possibility that gravity waves propagate FTL.  
: There is still quite a bit we just don't know, one way or the other.
  
Certainley, lots of things *may* be possible, but if I am considering 
possible ways to extend my live span, I'll go with things that are *known*
to be possible.
(This is not saying that cryonics is known to be possible, just that
the technology likely to be able to get patients back *is* possible)

I agree that it would be better to start addressing the actual issues
that may be involved in reviving someone - unfortunatly, my knowledge
of freezing damage is not sufficient to start the conversation off.

: szabo@techbook.COM  Public Access User --- Not affiliated with TECHbooks
: Public Access UNIX and Internet at (503) 644-8135 (1200/2400, N81) 

Steve
-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Strong - email csuab@dcs.warwick.ac.uk  | Me? Nah, not me pal. Must have
               voice 44 344 424842 extn 2279  | been the *other* Steve Strong.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger)
Subject: Re: Bank Accounts for the Suspended?
Organization: /usr/local/lib/news/organization
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 15:37:57 GMT

In article <1992Jul28.225452.3406@hyper.hyper.com> bonneau@hyper.com (Paul Bonneau,,) writes:
>Hi.
>
>A quick question.  It seems to me that being declared legally
>dead while in suspension is a double-edged sword.  It allows
>you to collect the life insurance policy that pays for the
>suspension, but it likely prevents you from having a bank
>account or investments like, say, a mutual fund.  I tend to
>agree with Drexler that the nanotechnology required for
>reanimation will be available within the century so it seems
>a good guess that financial institutions will continue to
>exist more or less as they do now (they have continued to do
>so for several hundred years so far).  So it would be nice to
>have some money in the bank when you wake up.
>
>Is there any way around this?  It seems unlikely that I can
>form a trust given today's laws for the future benefit of
>a cryonaut.

Well, you can form such a trust in Luxembourg, and there is an
organization Saul Kent formed to help you do just that, but many
people just set up cryonics research endowments with Alcor -- that
money gets earmarked for your personal revival and rehabilitation if
things get tight.

This should all be in the FAQ.
--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
		  Just say "NO!" to death and taxes.
			 Extropian and Proud.
From: szabo@techbook.com (Nick Szabo)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Self-genociding space colonies
Date: 23 Jul 92 10:46:34 GMT
Article-I.D.: techbook.1992Jul23.104634.4494
Organization: TECHbooks --- Public Access UNIX --- (503) 644-8135

In article <1992Jul15.192718.21706@javelin.sim.es.com> pashdown@javelin.sim.es.com (Pete Ashdown) writes:

>So what do we do once we're out in the middle of Wyoming in a Bucky Fully
>comfy-fit structure?  Is there anything left to eat? 

This issue has been beat senseless in sci.environment.  John McCarthy
issued a challenge for anybody to demonstrate that Earth could not 
support 20 billion people at U.S. standard of living within 100 
years.  Nobody even came close.  

We went on to discuss the various projections, eg World Bank, that show
human population converging on 10-15 billion people in 2050 and declining 
thereafter.  Populations are already starting to decline in highly educated 
populations, and birth rates are below replacement in developed countries.
Cryonics and nanotech may be the only way to forestall our self-genocide.


-- 
szabo@techbook.COM  Public Access User --- Not affiliated with TECHbooks
Public Access UNIX and Internet at (503) 644-8135 (1200/2400, N81) 
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: kqb@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (kevin.q.brown)
Subject: Re: Specific capabilities needed for reanimation?
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 15:04:41 GMT

In article <1992Jul25.093059.9816@techbook.com> szabo@techbook.COM
   (Nick Szabo) writes:

> It's not too early to begin designing speculative devices to accomplish
> these tasks.  We should not restrict ourselves to a vague vision of
> "nanotech", but look at the entire spectrum of chemical, mechanical,
> and biological tech to draw inspiration.

The booklet "Cryonics : Reaching For Tomorrow", available (via
U.S. Mail, not email) from Alcor Life Extension Foundation
(alcor@cup.portal.com), includes a 17 page, 58 reference Appendix
on that.  ("A 'Realistic' Scenario for Nanotechnological Repair of
the Frozen Human Brain" by Gregory Fahy, Ph.D.)  I'm not qualified
to evaluate the cryobiology involved, so the best I can do is
recommend that you read it yourself.
				       Kevin Q. Brown
				       kqb@whscad1.att.com
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: kqb@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (kevin.q.brown)
Subject: Research Grant Announcement
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 23:35:25 GMT

> Date: 06 Jul 92 21:40:21 EDT
> From: Brenda Peters <72727.560@CompuServe.COM>  <- Actually, Courtney Smith
> Message-Subject: Research Grant Announcement

5 June 1992


Dear fellow Alcor members,

I am pleased to announce that Pinnacle Capital Management, Inc. will be making
a grant of $500 available to any Alcor member for research devoted to either:
        1. Proof of the viability of cryonics, or
        2. Enhancing the current technology of cryonics.

Please send us:
        1. A simple description of your experiment or suggested technological 
improvement. If you are proposing an experiment, please describe what you hope
to prove. If you are proposing a technological improvement, please describe 
why it is an improvement. Please keep this short and to the point! 
        2. Your expected budget. Please keep this short and to the point!
        3. Your expected time to completion.

If your expected budget is greater than $500, please submit it anyway. We may 
lead an effort to raise the total funds! I already have an offer to match any 
donations we make.

Please make your proposal short and send it to the [email] address above.
We don't want you to spend a lot of time on the proposal. We want you to
spend time on progress.

We look forward to priming the pump of research to help move cryonics forward.

We look forward to working with you.

Live long,


Courtney Smith
President and Chief Investment Officer

CDS:kma
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: bonneau@hyper.com (Paul Bonneau,,)
Subject: Just My Brain?
Organization: HyperCube Inc.
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 22:48:16 GMT

Hi all.

Well, now that the noise has abated somewhat (and I finally
got caught up on all the messages), I have a question.  For
you folks that are already members of a Cryonic Institute,
have you arranged to have only your brain (i.e head) frozen,
or your entire body?  Alcor charges roughly 3 times as much
for whole body suspension and makes a case for regeneration
of one's body from the preserved DNA.  Just curious to see if
there is a consensus.

cheers - Paul.
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: dedmunds@selkirk.sfu.ca (Darran Edward Edmundson)
Subject:  neuronal misconceptions 
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 21:31:14 GMT

wag5@quads.uchicago.edu (john peter wagner) writes:

>However, the brain is a very delicate organ.  Removing one neuron
>can have very profound effects.  

This is possible but extremely unlikely.
Neural networks are typically very insensitive to
the removal of a significant number of member neurons.  

>Mis-timing could also wreck a system.

One only has to consider the case of epileptics or revived drowning victims
to discount this argument.

>A functioning mature brain, to be recreated, would also require an
>exact duplicate of not only the orientation and mapping of the cells,
>but also complete duplication of the states of those cells and of the
>chemical environment in which those cells live.  

The `states of those cells' are governed by the synaptic connection weights.
This information is presumably not lost by freezing or else cryonics would
pointless.

[ description of cloning and duplicating environment deleted ]

>	In any case, through trial and error the computer may eventually
>create a brain almost duplicating the original.  This is of course only
>speculative but is in any case as realistic as any hope for defrosting
>a corpse to life.

Based on the above fallacies that you support, I have to question your 
conclusion.
-- 

Darran Edmundson
darran@chaos.phys.sfu.ca

Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: kqb@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (kevin.q.brown)
Subject: Alcor New York August 16
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Distribution: nj
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 16:15:23 GMT


Alcor New York's next meeting will be on Sunday, Aug. 16th, 2 - 4 PM at
the usual place: 72nd. Street Studios, 131 West 72nd. Street, in Manhattan.
We will have a question and answer session with our special guests.

SPECIAL GUESTS will include:

SAUL KENT is an author, life extension activist, Co-founder of the
New York Cryonics Society in the 60's, and fighter for freedom in
health care. Mr. Kent has contributed over $500,000.00 to Life
Extension Research and is the major financial supporter of cryonics.

MICHAEL DARWIN is President of Biopreservation, past President of Alcor,
past Alcor Director of Research, and a major participant in over two
decades of cryonics research and suspensions.

                              Kevin Q. Brown
                              UUCP        ...att!whscad1!kqb
                              INTERNET    kqb@whscad1.att.com
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From: kqb@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (kevin.q.brown)
Subject: Alcor Pennsylvania August 15th
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 23:42:14 GMT

> Date: 21 Jul 92 11:44:51 EDT
> From: brenda Peters <72727.560@CompuServe.COM>
> Message-Subject: ANNOUNCEMENT

FINALLY!! PENNSYLVANIA TO HAVE IT'S FIRST ALCOR CRYONICS MEETING

Alcor Pennsylvania (ALCOR PA) will hold its first meeting on the afternoon of 
August 15th at 2PM.

SPECIAL GUESTS will include:

DR. MEL SEESHOLTZ is an author, international speaker, expert on Virtual 
Reality, and Professor at Pennsylvania State University who teaches the first 
course ever offered on Cryonics.

SAUL KENT is an author, life extension activist, Co-founder of the New York 
Cryonics Society in the 60's, and fighter for freedom in health care. Mr. Kent
has contributed over $500,000.00 to Life Extension Research and is the major 
financial supporter of cryonics.

MICHAEL DARWIN is President of Biopreservation, past President of Alcor, past 
Alcor Director of Research, and a major participant in over two decades of 
cryonics research and suspensions.

PLANS FOR THIS FIRST MEETING INCLUDE:

Election of local officers
Set goals for coming year
Mike Darwin/Saul Kent discussion of
  cryonics and upcoming research projects
Plan PA meeting locations, times, and frequency
Plan publicity and/or events for local PA group
Fund raising strategies for ALCOR PA
An opportunity to network

   REFRESHMENTS WILL BE SERVED!
           (courtesy of Brenda Peters)

****MEETING TO BE HELD AT THE HOME OF DOUG PLATT AND GRACE KIRKWOOD****

DIRECTIONS: Assuming you are heading West on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, take 
Exit 25 (Norristown). Continue straight past the Toll Booth to Plymouth Road 
where you will take a Left. (If you were not heading West on the PA Trnpk., 
please ask the Toll Booth person how to get to Plymouth Rd. or the Plymouth 
Meeting Mall.) Having taken a Left at Plymouth Rd., proceed to the first 
traffic light and take a Right on Germantown Pike (you will be heading west). 
Begin to count the stop lights. As an indicator that you are going in the 
correct direction, you will soon pass the Plymouth Meeting Mall on your Right.
A few more lights and you will pass Rt. 202. You are very close, now. Eleven 
lights after your initial turn onto Germantown Pike you will arrive at Swede 
Road. Turn Left. The first house on the Left is 2838 and has a pink sign in 
front that says "IT'S YOUR PARTY". You will have been on Germantown Pike for 
about three miles. Doug's number if you need help is (215)277-4264.
From: 5916rahmank@vms.csd.mu.edu (Anisur Rahman)
Newsgroups: sci.materials
Subject: Re: Insulator with good heat conductivity
Date: 28 Jul 92 20:18:35 GMT
Article-I.D.: vms.0095E400.B107D060
Reply-To: 5916rahmank@vms.csd.mu.edu
Distribution: na
Organization: Marquette University - Computer Services

In article <7926@dirac.physics.purdue.edu>, parks@gibbs.physics.purdue.edu (Chris Parks) writes:
|>
|>What is a good material (good=price + availability) which is
|>an electrical insulator and a good conductor of heat?
|>
|>It will be used at temperatures as low as 4.2 Kelvin and it needs
|>to hold up to about 200 volts / mm, heat conductivity needs to
|>be comparable to copper.  Does it exist?
|>
|>Note: Diamond may be ideal but not practical!
|>
|>Chris Parks
|>parks@physics.purdue.edu

You may try Tin oxide or Ruthenium oxide based glaze materials. We have
made thick film resistor with these materials. Their heat conductivity
is very good. These materials may be obtained as 'glaze' or as 'ink.
Thanks,
	Anis Rahman
	EECE (Materials Sc.)
	Marquette University
	5916rahmank@vms.csd.mu.edu

Newsgroups: sci.materials
From: smadden@titan.trl.OZ.AU (Steve Madden)
Subject: Re: Insulator with good heat conductivity
Organization: Telecom Research Labs, Melbourne, Australia
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 02:56:33 GMT

kludge@grissom.larc.nasa.gov ( Scott Dorsey) writes:

>In article <7926@dirac.physics.purdue.edu> parks@gibbs.physics.purdue.edu (Chris Parks) writes:
>>
>>What is a good material (good=price + availability) which is
>>an electrical insulator and a good conductor of heat?
>>
>>It will be used at temperatures as low as 4.2 Kelvin and it needs
>>to hold up to about 200 volts / mm, heat conductivity needs to
>>be comparable to copper.  Does it exist?

>If it weren't for the low temperature requirement, I would recommend some
>of the silicone compounds, which are very good heat conductors.  Mica is
>right out.  Are there any silicones that are useful at temperatures that
>low?
>--scott
 You don't specify how big, but diamond might be a candidate if the insulator 
is only a millimetre or so across and less than that thick. For instance,
from the Chemical Rubber Company Handbook:

		Material                   K (W/cm.k) - at 273 K

		  Cu			      4.03

		Type IIa diamond	      26.2

	  	Type IIb diamond	      15.2

		Type I   diamond	      9.94

I have in the past seen adverts for diamond heat sinks at remarkably low 
prices (tens of dollars if I remember correctly), so they might not be right
out for your application.
      /~~~\   !                           
      \___    !---   ___ .    .  ___       ###########################
          \   !     /___> \  /  /___>      # smadden@titan.trl.OZ.AU #
      \___/   \__/  \___   \/   \___       ###########################