I think that in the end, regardless of everything else we’ve discussed, your argument against choosing cryonics is founded on your judgment that it has negligible chance of success.
Yes, I’ve acknowledged that much earlier. If I became much more confident in Cryonics I’d be more likely to sign-up, as I think it would then be a comfort in the dying process, to know that maybe this is “just going to sleep for awhile”.
I’ve also acknowledged I prefer resuscitation so even though “I’m out” for a period, yes I could see a value in cryonics now if I expected it to work.
So what is the evidence and reasoning that led you to that conclusion?
Well we know that pretty serious damage happens to the brain, beginning minutes after heart failure and getting worse and worse due to autolysis as the hours pass before vitrification. We also know that vitrification does cause some damage; not the devastation that actual freezing would be but damage nonetheless.
Cryonics advocates wave what I call the “future nano-wand” at all of these problems. While it does not in theory seem infeasible that future resuscitation could avoid the destruction caused by ischemia, and that our nano-friends can repair any chemical contamination caused by vitrification itself; it is very, very doubtful to me that there is any information left in a brain that has suffered several hours of autolysis.
As a young man, I’d expect my death to be unexpected (e.g. due to accident or violence) and that it would be hours before I could be vitrified. When this changes (e.g. I get older or find I’m doomed by a a life-threatening disease) maybe I’d be more interested in cryonics.
Even assuming we can vitrify people in a state that preserves information, I have some doubts about revival actually ever happening.
First, we don’t really know what is going to be possible and when with nanotechnology. So some people want to say revival is 50 years out, I’ve got no reason—no successes in nanotechnology to date—to make me think its not 200 years out.
I’ve got serious concerns about our economic and political stability over the next fifty years. There is no doubt, there are going to be some serious changes in the world. I think there may be problems beyond their control that would force Alcor into insolvency. Trust funds established today may be as worthless as the pension funds and retirement accounts, and yes foundation trusts that have been utterly annihilated over the last few years.
I work for a large bank and for a long time (2004 to mid 2009) managed the systems that do the margin monitoring of trust account loans. I’ve seen first hand the damage that has been suffered by all manner of legal trusts, even ones that were invested in what were thought to be very stable instruments.
The idea that interest on capital will always outpace inflation has been refuted many, many times over. Modern monetary policies have not proven effective, and there is no reason to assume our current crisis won’t deteriorate into the kind of stagflation
we saw in the 80s again.
I’m not preaching doom and gloom and the end of western civilization, but I am skeptical that people sleeping for 200 years will have trust funds capable of keeping them on ice. The people that recover from these slumps will be the ones who are working and producing new income streams independent of their current capital.
Finally, I’m concerned that a massive adoption of cryonics would actually be a serious problem. So suppose Alcor generates enough new money (via sign-ups) and its trust fund remains solvent for 200 years so they can keep the lights on. What if they don’t have the money to revive everyone? We have no idea what that would cost. And then what are we to do with these revived people? They would almost certainly have no personal assets of any value (see above) and so would essentially be destitute refugees from the distant past. We’d have to solve world hunger before we could responsibly wake anyone up.
A small number of people would be novelty revivals; ironically your best chance for revival is to keep as few vitrified people as possible, although this increases the reliance on the trust fund since there is no new income.
So to sum up:
I expect autolysis to destroy the information in my brain before I’m vitrified
I don’t expect any trust fund to survive 200 years
Large numbers (millions) of ancient corpsicles may not find many friends interested in reviving them and then sponsoring them until they can be trained and given a vocation in 200 years
The longer these corpsicles hang around without being revived the less people will sign up for cryonics, and then we’re back to dependence on a dwindling trust fund until they’ve solved world hunger, there is plenty for everyone and there is little political opposition to reviving millions of “dead” penniless refugees from the 21st century.
In light of the recent post on logical rudeness, I feel I ought to complete this thread with a final reply. It is this: if your first post had consisted of this analysis instead of your remarks on fearing death, I would not have begun a conversation; therefore, having reached this point, I’m happy to stop here. On the substance of the parent, I’ll say I don’t agree on a couple of points, these points make all the difference, and I don’t expect a return on the investment of arguing them.
Well I thought some about this whole thread after reading that article.
In my defense, I did acknowledge a number of errors or fallacies: the most important being that I do have preferences now about things that happen even when I am unconscious, and that the same apply even when I am dead. The second is your point, which is that underscoring my entire argument is a basic belief that it “just won’t work”; and thats really all my argument amounts to.
For me, I take it as a given that cryonics won’t work, just as I take atheism as a given. So when I’m presented with someone who is in favor of cryonics, I don’t really take their preference for it at face-value. I project (incorrectly) that they are buying to cryonics to get a hedge against “fear of dying” and so my only point is it doesn’t really help much with that...if you believe what I believe. Its a pretty stupid argument really; while there was some learning value in this thread for me the OP is pretty fail.
Yes, I’ve acknowledged that much earlier. If I became much more confident in Cryonics I’d be more likely to sign-up, as I think it would then be a comfort in the dying process, to know that maybe this is “just going to sleep for awhile”.
I’ve also acknowledged I prefer resuscitation so even though “I’m out” for a period, yes I could see a value in cryonics now if I expected it to work.
Well we know that pretty serious damage happens to the brain, beginning minutes after heart failure and getting worse and worse due to autolysis as the hours pass before vitrification. We also know that vitrification does cause some damage; not the devastation that actual freezing would be but damage nonetheless.
Cryonics advocates wave what I call the “future nano-wand” at all of these problems. While it does not in theory seem infeasible that future resuscitation could avoid the destruction caused by ischemia, and that our nano-friends can repair any chemical contamination caused by vitrification itself; it is very, very doubtful to me that there is any information left in a brain that has suffered several hours of autolysis.
As a young man, I’d expect my death to be unexpected (e.g. due to accident or violence) and that it would be hours before I could be vitrified. When this changes (e.g. I get older or find I’m doomed by a a life-threatening disease) maybe I’d be more interested in cryonics.
Even assuming we can vitrify people in a state that preserves information, I have some doubts about revival actually ever happening.
First, we don’t really know what is going to be possible and when with nanotechnology. So some people want to say revival is 50 years out, I’ve got no reason—no successes in nanotechnology to date—to make me think its not 200 years out.
I’ve got serious concerns about our economic and political stability over the next fifty years. There is no doubt, there are going to be some serious changes in the world. I think there may be problems beyond their control that would force Alcor into insolvency. Trust funds established today may be as worthless as the pension funds and retirement accounts, and yes foundation trusts that have been utterly annihilated over the last few years.
I work for a large bank and for a long time (2004 to mid 2009) managed the systems that do the margin monitoring of trust account loans. I’ve seen first hand the damage that has been suffered by all manner of legal trusts, even ones that were invested in what were thought to be very stable instruments.
The idea that interest on capital will always outpace inflation has been refuted many, many times over. Modern monetary policies have not proven effective, and there is no reason to assume our current crisis won’t deteriorate into the kind of stagflation we saw in the 80s again.
I’m not preaching doom and gloom and the end of western civilization, but I am skeptical that people sleeping for 200 years will have trust funds capable of keeping them on ice. The people that recover from these slumps will be the ones who are working and producing new income streams independent of their current capital.
Finally, I’m concerned that a massive adoption of cryonics would actually be a serious problem. So suppose Alcor generates enough new money (via sign-ups) and its trust fund remains solvent for 200 years so they can keep the lights on. What if they don’t have the money to revive everyone? We have no idea what that would cost. And then what are we to do with these revived people? They would almost certainly have no personal assets of any value (see above) and so would essentially be destitute refugees from the distant past. We’d have to solve world hunger before we could responsibly wake anyone up.
A small number of people would be novelty revivals; ironically your best chance for revival is to keep as few vitrified people as possible, although this increases the reliance on the trust fund since there is no new income.
So to sum up:
I expect autolysis to destroy the information in my brain before I’m vitrified
I don’t expect any trust fund to survive 200 years
Large numbers (millions) of ancient corpsicles may not find many friends interested in reviving them and then sponsoring them until they can be trained and given a vocation in 200 years
The longer these corpsicles hang around without being revived the less people will sign up for cryonics, and then we’re back to dependence on a dwindling trust fund until they’ve solved world hunger, there is plenty for everyone and there is little political opposition to reviving millions of “dead” penniless refugees from the 21st century.
In light of the recent post on logical rudeness, I feel I ought to complete this thread with a final reply. It is this: if your first post had consisted of this analysis instead of your remarks on fearing death, I would not have begun a conversation; therefore, having reached this point, I’m happy to stop here. On the substance of the parent, I’ll say I don’t agree on a couple of points, these points make all the difference, and I don’t expect a return on the investment of arguing them.
Well I thought some about this whole thread after reading that article.
In my defense, I did acknowledge a number of errors or fallacies: the most important being that I do have preferences now about things that happen even when I am unconscious, and that the same apply even when I am dead. The second is your point, which is that underscoring my entire argument is a basic belief that it “just won’t work”; and thats really all my argument amounts to.
For me, I take it as a given that cryonics won’t work, just as I take atheism as a given. So when I’m presented with someone who is in favor of cryonics, I don’t really take their preference for it at face-value. I project (incorrectly) that they are buying to cryonics to get a hedge against “fear of dying” and so my only point is it doesn’t really help much with that...if you believe what I believe. Its a pretty stupid argument really; while there was some learning value in this thread for me the OP is pretty fail.
Upvoted.