Since it came to my attention that signing up for cryonics is not as pointless as I’d once thought, I’ve been pondering how to sell my dad on the idea.
This is somewhat urgent for a couple of reasons. First, he’s already pushing sixty and would meet increased resistance in acquiring another life insurance policy at a much steeper rate than myself. Second, even given his age, he could afford to sign us both up easily, and after some consideration, convincing him seems like the more efficient path to being signed up myself than trying to arrange it for myself alone. And, well, he’s my dad, and while he has his flaws, he’s kind of awesome.
The sticking point, I can easily predict, will be getting passed his Cached Skepticism towards the concept of Cryonics. He is proud of being Skeptical; it’s important to his self-concept, so I need to hit him with an opening that he can’t easily dismiss. I would predict that if I simply linked him to Alcor’s webpage, absolutely nothing would happen. I need something that will motivate him to investigate.
The frustrating part, is that I’m quite sure that if he’d never heard of cryonics before, he’d have no resistance to the idea beyond the basic pain of dispelling the emotional numbness towards a Certain Doom by suggesting it might not be certain after all. Unless my model of him is very much inaccurate, his Cached Skepticism of Cryonics is the only notable obstacle. I would appreciate any recommendations on which if any articles in particular would be best for initially getting through that.
Convincing my dad to sign up for Alcor: Advice?
Since it came to my attention that signing up for cryonics is not as pointless as I’d once thought, I’ve been pondering how to sell my dad on the idea.
This is somewhat urgent for a couple of reasons. First, he’s already pushing sixty and would meet increased resistance in acquiring another life insurance policy at a much steeper rate than myself. Second, even given his age, he could afford to sign us both up easily, and after some consideration, convincing him seems like the more efficient path to being signed up myself than trying to arrange it for myself alone. And, well, he’s my dad, and while he has his flaws, he’s kind of awesome.
The sticking point, I can easily predict, will be getting passed his Cached Skepticism towards the concept of Cryonics. He is proud of being Skeptical; it’s important to his self-concept, so I need to hit him with an opening that he can’t easily dismiss. I would predict that if I simply linked him to Alcor’s webpage, absolutely nothing would happen. I need something that will motivate him to investigate.
The frustrating part, is that I’m quite sure that if he’d never heard of cryonics before, he’d have no resistance to the idea beyond the basic pain of dispelling the emotional numbness towards a Certain Doom by suggesting it might not be certain after all. Unless my model of him is very much inaccurate, his Cached Skepticism of Cryonics is the only notable obstacle. I would appreciate any recommendations on which if any articles in particular would be best for initially getting through that.