34 replies to this topic

[Liquidus]

If the chances of cryonics bringing someone back to life are 0.01%, it's still better than trying to dig somebody up from a graveyard in hopes that they'll come back to life.

(*personally, I think it's above 0.01%, but just to put it into perspective).

Besides, the percentage of any of us existing to begin with is much lower than the success potential of modern day cryonics.

[Agarikon]

Bgwowk, I wrote a rough copy of the 2 possibilities based on your recommendations.

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There is simply no good reason not to be Cryopreserved. There are 2 scenarios if choose to. The second one can only be realized if you are preserved instead of decomposed:

1. The future world fails at ever reviving humans from Cryopreservation. In this case you die and go to heaven just like you would if you were placed into a coffin without preservation technology, such as the ones used all around the world at any cemetery.

2. The future world develops advanced technology to revive people. This technology wakes you up after a long hibernation. Your family and friends are right by your side at the moment you wake to comfort you and answer all your questions. Now you have the opportunity for more life on earth and can stay as long as you choose.

[bgwowk]

Bgwowk, I wrote a rough copy of the 2 possibilities based on your recommendations.

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There is simply no good reason not to be Cryopreserved.  There are 2 scenarios if choose to.  The second one can only be realized if you are preserved instead of decomposed:

1. The future world fails at ever reviving humans from Cryopreservation.  In this case you die and go to heaven just like you would if you were placed into a coffin without preservation technology, such as the ones used all around the world at any cemetery.

2. The future world develops advanced technology to revive people.  This technology wakes you up after a long hibernation.  Your family and friends are right by your side at the moment you wake to comfort you and answer all your questions.  Now you have the opportunity for more life on earth and can stay as long as you choose.

Yes, those are the two possibilities, and the best possible outcomes of each possibility.

[marcopolo]

I have also been trying to talk my parents into this, but so far to no avail. Their excuse is that it would be a waste of money, but that is a stupid excuse for them, first, they are wealthy, they multi millionaires so the money it would take even to preserve the full body is nothing to them.
They are also intelligent people so I don't quite understand their objections. They are both Christians, my dad only nominally, but my mother I think really believes in it. Even so, to my knowledge it says nothing in the Bible about cryopreservation being against God's will or anything. I think one existential argument I thought of is that the universe will still die out in 70 trillion years max(according to current theory), so whether you go to heaven in 70 years or 70 trillion years, what is the difference? After all, doesn't the Bible say to God 1000 years is to a minute and a minute is a 1000 years? Well, that is one argument anyway.
Then there is my grandmother, and I will be really sad when she goes. She is 90 now so she probably doesn't have too much longer. I am not sure how I will be able to pull off saving her since I have a feeling that alot of my extended family may have the same objections as my parents even if I pay to have her Cryopreserved when she "dies". She is also somewhat more religious and set in her ways than she used to be, and getting senile. So I think I would somehow need to get power of attorney to pull it off, and with the current extended family situation(and I have a very large extended family) I don't think that is possible.
The especially sad thing about it is that I remember having conversations with her when I was younger, and she was convinced by now they would have drugs that would cure many diseases including those of old age, and she had a very open attitude about this. She was actually one of the few college educated women of her time(a chemist), but she gave that up to have a family. She was a very intelligent lady but old age seems to have really changed the way she thinks, but anyway sorry for getting off on a tangent there.

[bgwowk]

Don't be too hard on yourself. There are powerful psychological reasons why barely one in a million people sign up for cryonics. They include reluctance to do things outside of social norms, fear of social displacement, and especially the large investment of mental energy made over decades coming to terms with a short defined lifespan. People become emotionally invested in specific expectations of what life has in store for them, including their own death. This is very human.

Note that none of this has anything to do with cryonics being unproven. The reasons people give for doing or not doing things are often not the real reasons. Life decisions are the product of complex subconscious calculations. The reasons that your parents don't want cryonics may be inscrutable, even to them.