I’ll limit my response to the following amusing footnote:
If scientists dismissed cryonics because of the supporters’ race, religion, or politics, you might have a point.
This is, in fact, what happened between early cryonics and cryobiology.
EDIT: Just so people aren’t misled by Jiro’s motivated interpretation of the link:
However, according to the cryobiologist informant who attributes to this episode the formal hardening of the Society for Cryobiology against cryonics, the repercussions from this incident were far-reaching. Rumors about the presentation—often wildly distorted rumors—began to circulate. One particularly pernicious rumor, according to this informant, was that my presentation had included graphic photos of “corpses’ heads being cut off.” This was not the case. Surgical photos which were shown were of thoracic surgery to place cannula and would be suitable for viewing by any audience drawn from the general public.
This informant also indicates that it was his perception that this presentation caused real fear and anger amongst the Officers and Directors of the Society. They felt as if they had been “invaded” and that such a presentation given during the course of, and thus under the aegis of, their meeting could cause them to be publicly associated with cryonics. Comments such as “what if the press got wind of this,” or “what if a reporter had been there” were reported to have circulated.
Also, the presentation may have brought into sharper focus the fact that cryonicists existed, were really freezing people, and that they were using sophisticated procedures borrowed from medicine, and yes, even from cryobiology, which could cause confusion between the “real” science of cryobiology and the “fraud” of cryonics in the public eye. More to the point, it was clear that cryonicists were not operating in some back room and mumbling inarticulately; they were now right there in the midst of the cryobiologists and they were anything but inarticulate, bumbling back-room fools.
You’re equivocating on the term “political”. When the context is “race, religion, or politics”, “political” doesn’t normally mean “related to human status”, it means “related to government”. Besides, they only considered it low status based on their belief that it is scientifically nonsensical.
My reply was steelmanning your post by assuming that the ethical considerations mentioned in the article counted as religious. That was the only thing mentioned in it that could reasonably fall under “race, religion, or politics” as that is normally understood.
Most of the history described in your own link makes it clear that scientists objected because they think cryonics is scientifically nonsense, not because of race, religion, or politics. The article then tacks on a claim that scientists reject it for ethical reasons, but that isn’t supported by its own history, just by a few quotes with no evidence that these beliefs are prevalent among anyone other than the people quoted.
Furthermore, of the quotes it does give, one of them is vague enough that I have no idea if it means in context what the article claims it means. Saying that the “end result” is damaging doesn’t necessarily mean that having unfrozen people walking around is damaging—it may mean that he thinks cryonics doesn’t work and that having a lot of resources wasted on freezing corpses is damaging.
I’ll limit my response to the following amusing footnote:
This is, in fact, what happened between early cryonics and cryobiology.
EDIT: Just so people aren’t misled by Jiro’s motivated interpretation of the link:
Obviously political.
You’re equivocating on the term “political”. When the context is “race, religion, or politics”, “political” doesn’t normally mean “related to human status”, it means “related to government”. Besides, they only considered it low status based on their belief that it is scientifically nonsensical.
My reply was steelmanning your post by assuming that the ethical considerations mentioned in the article counted as religious. That was the only thing mentioned in it that could reasonably fall under “race, religion, or politics” as that is normally understood.
Most of the history described in your own link makes it clear that scientists objected because they think cryonics is scientifically nonsense, not because of race, religion, or politics. The article then tacks on a claim that scientists reject it for ethical reasons, but that isn’t supported by its own history, just by a few quotes with no evidence that these beliefs are prevalent among anyone other than the people quoted.
Furthermore, of the quotes it does give, one of them is vague enough that I have no idea if it means in context what the article claims it means. Saying that the “end result” is damaging doesn’t necessarily mean that having unfrozen people walking around is damaging—it may mean that he thinks cryonics doesn’t work and that having a lot of resources wasted on freezing corpses is damaging.