The fact that you keep mentioning timescales suggests that you haven’t internalized the fact that we are talking about a temperature at which most chemical reactions are effectively stopped.
“Effectively stopped” is not the same as “stopped”; and of course there are other effects that add up over time, such as mechanical damage an even cosmic rays. But I think my biggest mistake was in vastly overestimating the time scale that you’re talking about. I assumed that you were thinking in terms of centuries, but you say:
I was thinking more like 10 to 50 years. We’re talking ordinary business/marketing/infrastructure network effects, plus relatively near term (as I must insist) incremental scientific advances.
Does this mean that, should you be cryopreserved today, you expect yourself to be successfully revived after 10 to 50 years ? IMO, that’s a very strong claim. I want to address it, as well as the rest of your points, but first I want to make sure we’re on the same page.
Here you go.
Er, thanks, but that still doesn’t help me figure out which of the possible expansions of the acronym you’re referencing.
Note that by some estimates one has on the order of millions of years at liquid nitrogen temperatures being chemically equivalent to seconds at liquid nitrogen temperatures. There are problems with this sort of simplistic estimate. But even if one makes very worst case scenarios one gets something like a hundred years being equivalent to 10 minutes at room temperature
Incidentally, I agree that . Ishparrish is making a pretty optimistic estimate for when cryonic patients will be revived. We don’t seem to be anywhere near having the technology in 10 years, although 50 years does seem more plausible.
Incidentally, I agree that . Ishparrish is making a pretty optimistic estimate for when cryonic patients will be revived. We don’t seem to be anywhere near having the technology in 10 years, although 50 years does seem more plausible.
I wasn’t referring to reanimation time. I was saying that cryonics will make more economic sense in 10 years if people buy it today, no more and no less. I’m not sure where Bugmaster got the idea I was talking about reanimations in that timeframe, I’d have to agree that’s rather ridiculous.
I’d say 50 years is plausible for reanimation of patients that are near-perfectly vitrified (i.e. they might be near-perfectly vitrifying patients by then, which means they can bring them back right away if they choose—though terminal patients would still have to wait for a cure), but that is certainly not my envisioned timeframe for patients that need extensive repairs such as today’s patients.
If the singularity occurs in the meantime all bets are off of course, but I currently regard that as fairly low probability; not enough to factor into my cryonics calculations, though sufficient to make me worry about the existential risks (where the burden of proof is a lot lower).
“Effectively stopped” is not the same as “stopped”; and of course there are other effects that add up over time, such as mechanical damage an even cosmic rays. But I think my biggest mistake was in vastly overestimating the time scale that you’re talking about. I assumed that you were thinking in terms of centuries, but you say:
Does this mean that, should you be cryopreserved today, you expect yourself to be successfully revived after 10 to 50 years ? IMO, that’s a very strong claim. I want to address it, as well as the rest of your points, but first I want to make sure we’re on the same page.
Er, thanks, but that still doesn’t help me figure out which of the possible expansions of the acronym you’re referencing.
SENS stands for Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence. Being acronym-challenged myself, I certainly understand the occasional agonies involved in working an unfamiliar one out.
Note that by some estimates one has on the order of millions of years at liquid nitrogen temperatures being chemically equivalent to seconds at liquid nitrogen temperatures. There are problems with this sort of simplistic estimate. But even if one makes very worst case scenarios one gets something like a hundred years being equivalent to 10 minutes at room temperature
Incidentally, I agree that . Ishparrish is making a pretty optimistic estimate for when cryonic patients will be revived. We don’t seem to be anywhere near having the technology in 10 years, although 50 years does seem more plausible.
I wasn’t referring to reanimation time. I was saying that cryonics will make more economic sense in 10 years if people buy it today, no more and no less. I’m not sure where Bugmaster got the idea I was talking about reanimations in that timeframe, I’d have to agree that’s rather ridiculous.
I’d say 50 years is plausible for reanimation of patients that are near-perfectly vitrified (i.e. they might be near-perfectly vitrifying patients by then, which means they can bring them back right away if they choose—though terminal patients would still have to wait for a cure), but that is certainly not my envisioned timeframe for patients that need extensive repairs such as today’s patients.
If the singularity occurs in the meantime all bets are off of course, but I currently regard that as fairly low probability; not enough to factor into my cryonics calculations, though sufficient to make me worry about the existential risks (where the burden of proof is a lot lower).