CryoNet #32434 - #32437

CryoNet - Sun 28 Feb 2010

    #32434: Every cryonics suspension member counts! [david pizer]
    #32435: Re: CryoNet #32424 Re: Anonymity on Cryonics Plans - Disaster... [Kitty Antonik Wakfer]
    #32436: The real cost of doing Neuros [david pizer]
    #32437: Physical and biological aspects of renal vitrification. [oberon]

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Message #32434
Date: Sat, 27 Feb 2010 10:49:00 -0800 (PST)
From: david pizer <[email protected]>
Subject: Every cryonics suspension member counts!

I support the Alcor Board's efforts to recover and suspend each and every signed up Alcor member no matter how difficult the situation.  This has always been our policy even to the extent that some Alcor members (me included) were willing to be taken into police custody when we refused to let them destroy our members remains (as in the Dora Kent situation).

The so called "bad publicity" does not harm Alcor pertaining to those people who are reasonable and willing to be open minded.   This publicity mainly causes bad thoughts in those who are already strongly against cryonics.  Most of that bad publicity is caused when the suspension involves cutting off the patient's head.  (Actually we remove the patients lower body and save the head).  We don't have this amount and degree of resistance in most whole body cases.

Each and every cryonics member counts and their suspension organization (Alcor or CI) should be willing to go to bat for them if needed.

What I do think needs to be looked at though is continuing to offer the neuro option.  In these times, with the cost of storing a whole body being just a little more then the cost of storing a neuro, and most of the cost of doing cryonics is in keeping the organization strong and doing the actual suspension preparation (not the storage), I think it is time to look at doing away with the neuro option.   

Doing a neuro, not a whole body, is what causes so called bad publicity.  Alcor could grandfather in all existing neuro members and upgrade them to a whole body for the existing amount of money they have arranged for and from now on only offer whole body suspension.  Many Alcor neuro members have enough funding in place to pay for a whole body suspension already. This would eliminate the bad publicity and make things much better for the cryonics movement.  

David Pizer

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Message #32435
Date: Sat, 27 Feb 2010 13:22:48 -0700
From: Kitty Antonik Wakfer <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: CryoNet #32424 Re: Anonymity on Cryonics Plans - Disaster...
References: <[email protected]>

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CryoNet wrote:
>
> Message #32424
> From: David Stodolsky <[email protected]>
> Subject: Re: Anonymity on Cryonics Plans - Disaster Hazard
> Date: Thu, 25 Feb 2010 20:12:27 +0100
> References: <[email protected]>
>
> On 25 Feb 2010, at 11:00 AM, CryoNet wrote:
>
>> Being anonymous about
>> cryonics is *not* protection for a signed-up cryonicist but rather an
>> opportunity for relatives who do not agree to wreak havoc with those  
>> plans.
>
> As long as cryonics is regarded as a cult or as quackery by the
> mainstream, being associated with it can result in being banned from
> certain organizations. Therefore, such public association could have
> negative consequences for one's career.

Why should a person who is a cryonicist because s/he does *not* think it 
is a cult or quackery - one who is not simply signed up because of hir 
spouse's or significant other's desire for cyronics preservation - 
really want to be associated with those who hold such a view? And if a 
cryonicist is good in hir chosen work field and/or avocation(s), a 
person whose skills and/or views are respected, then it is highly likely 
that s/he will be listened to should the topic of cryonics come up in 
discussion.

I am not suggesting that cryonicists go around wearing T-shirts 
promoting cyronics ("Freeze your head to save your ass") or handing out 
unrequested literature. However, I am suggesting that when someone is 
respected for skills/views in one area s/he is highly likely to be 
listened to if sh/e voices positive views towards (even having a 
contract for) cryonics. Paul's experience from the early 80s is just one 
of these. He had before this thought of cryonics as total bunk; he knew 
the physics of low temperature storage and had even experimented with 
objects in LN2. However, he was introduced to the literature from early 
Alcor, when Mike Darwin was CEO, by someone whom he respected for being 
a sound thinker. This made all the difference. Consequently he read what 
Mike wrote and was convinced that there was a small, but still possible, 
reason to think that cryonics was better than doing nothing at all upon 
legal death - at least for the person who wanted to continue to live, 
even if only at some time in the far future.

> It  could also retard progress
> in cryonics by restricting where scientific work can be published by
> those with a public association.
I know very well that this reason has been and continues to be used, but 
it is - to be very blunt - cowardly. From what I have been told by 
several individuals, the Society for CryoBiology has and may continue 
for some time to require that its members not have anything to do with 
cryonics. However, that is actually in contradiction to the first of its 
stated applications for cryobiology:
"Preservation of cells and tissues for purposes of long-term storage"
It is clear that such a philosophically non-integrated stand by the 
Society for CryoBiology does, for now at least, require that a 
cryonicist researcher in the field of cryobiology as applied to human 
whole body/brain cryopreservation publish hir papers in the most 
scientific journals that will accept them, even if that is not in the 
journal, CryoBiology.

>
> The ideal solution is for a signed-up cryonicist have any public
> association to cryonics protected by a secure pseudonym.
I do not agree at all; pseudonyms simply avoid the real problems. The 
best solution for all in the longterm for optimal social order is Social 
Preferencing by each individual towards each other individual. Positive 
Social Preferencing is the voluntary association with and to the degree 
that that one agrees with another person; the closest friend(s) is the 
person with whom one holds the highest values in common and decreasing 
association with others accordingly. Negative Social Preferencing is the 
withdrawal of voluntary association with a person who takes actions that 
are in opposition to the optimization of lifetime happiness of the 
evaluator, in hir evaluation of course. Encouraging others to do 
likewise - positively and negatively - is the logical continuation and 
extension of this practice with everyone evaluating everyone else. This 
is merely the extension to the realm of human relationships, what 
everyone already does with regard to products and services, and in this 
time of almost instant communication, the evaluation of everyone by 
everyone else is possible both in theory and practice. In fact, rulers 
and their enforced rules are truly obsolete - the rulers and still most 
of the ruled just haven't yet come to realize it.

[snip of pseudonym details]

>
> dss
>
> David Stodolsky
> [email protected]  Skype: davidstodolsky
>
>

**Kitty Antonik Wakfer

MoreLife for the rational - http://morelife.org
Reality based tools for more life in quantity and quality
The Self-Sovereign Individual Project - http://selfsip.org
Self-sovereignty, rational pursuit of optimal lifetime happiness,
individual responsibility, social preferencing & social contracting


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Message #32436
Date: Sat, 27 Feb 2010 16:41:32 -0800 (PST)
From: david pizer <[email protected]>
Subject: The real cost of doing Neuros

When Alcor does a suspension the cost of doing a whole body vs doing a Neuro are close to the same EXCEPT  for the storage costs.  

Let's say for discussion purposes that if one puts $15,000 into the Patient Care Trust that will generate enough income to cover the cost of storage for a Neuro until reanimation time.  

Let's say that if one put $30,000 into the Patient Care Trust that will generate enough income to pay the costs of storing a whole body until reanimation time.

So if these figures are accurate, doing  Neuro only saves $15,000 over doing a whole body.


BUT every Neuro costs Alcor hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in attorney fees and lost revenues and other costs because the general public does not like Neuros and does not like Alcor for doing them.  They throw roadblocks in front of Alcor's growth and acceptance at every opportunity.  It costs Alcor extra money to overcome these.

Just One Example: If TW had been a whole body and his head not removed, Alcor would have saved a lot of money in legal fees and not had so much bad publicity in that case.  Same with the other cases Alcor has lost and will continue to loose in court every time the Alcor member is a Neuro.

Doing Neuros is costing Alcor a lot of money in the long run and the savings of doing a Neuro is just not worth the lost money, lost good will, and loss of several patients that the courts ruled for the relatives against Alcor because the the Neuro just can't be tolerated by the general public.

I believe if we want cryonics to grow fast and if we want to save on legal expenses, and if we want to quit losing court cases where we loose the patients, we need to quit offering Neuros.

I have been involved in cryonics for over 25 years and have talked to thousands of people one on one and in groups and I can tell you from the feedback that as long as we offer Neuros the cards will be stacked against us in public relations, the press, and court battles of all kinds.


Sincerely,

David Pizer

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Message #32437
Date: Sat, 27 Feb 2010 18:01:45 -0800 (PST)
From: [email protected]
Subject: Physical and biological aspects of renal vitrification.

[Partial vitrification is all that is available as yet, due to
cryoprotectant toxicity limiting the concentration of solutes. This is a
work in progress...]

Organogenesis. 2009 Jul;5(3):167-75.
Physical and biological aspects of renal vitrification.
Fahy GM, Wowk B, Pagotan R, Chang A, Phan J, Thomson B, Phan L.
21 Century Medicine, Inc.; Fontana, CA USA.
Cryopreservation would potentially very much facilitate the inventory control and distribution of laboratory-produced organs and tissues. Although simple freezing methods are effective for many simple tissues, bioartificial organs and complex tissue constructs may be unacceptably altered by ice formation and dissolution. Vitrification, in which the liquids in a living system are converted into the glassy state at low temperatures, provides a potential alternative to freezing that can in principle avoid ice formation altogether. The present report provides a brief overview of the problem of renal vitrification. We report here the detailed case history of a rabbit kidney that survived vitrification and subsequent transplantation, a case that demonstrates both the fundamental feasibility of c
 omplex system vitrification and the obstacles that must still be overcome, of which the chief one in the case of the kidney is adequate distribution of cryoprotectant to the renal medulla. Medullary equilibration can be monitored by monitoring urine concentrations of cryoprotectant, and urine flow rate correlates with vitrification solution viscosity and the speed of equilibration. By taking these factors into account and by using higher perfusion pressures as per the case of the kidney that survived vitrification, it is becoming possible to design protocols for equilibrating kidneys that protect against both devitrification and excessive cryoprotectant toxicity.
PMID: 20046680 [PubMed - in process]

Free text>
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2781097/pdf/org0503_0167.pdf

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