Post by Azan on Nov 8, 2005 15:23:15 GMT -5
Cryogenics is quite real, basicaly its the cooling of living things to preserve them (Ex. Futurama) its the process of people being cryogenicaly frozen untill (usualy) a cure is found for a disease they have, and its quite real.
The debate is wheather or not you think its a good idea, or as many people believe it wont work because no human has been unfrozen before (and lived) so many assume they are just trying to get your money.
visit www.alcor.org for more info or read this FAQ
Well whats everyones take on the subject? Is it something that you would consider? Do you think it should be persued by researchers?
The debate is wheather or not you think its a good idea, or as many people believe it wont work because no human has been unfrozen before (and lived) so many assume they are just trying to get your money.
visit www.alcor.org for more info or read this FAQ
Q: What is cryonics?
A: Cryonics is the process of using very cold temperature to prevent people from dying when ordinary medicine can no longer sustain them. This is done to save their life until a cure for their illness can be found, and means developed to reverse the cryonics process. The technology to reverse the cryonics process is still speculative and far in the future.
Q: Has anyone ever been revived?
A: No adult human has ever been revived from temperatures far below freezing. Cryonics patients are cared for in the expectation that future technology, especially molecular nanotechnology, will be available to reverse the cryonics process. This technology may become a reality a century or more in the future.
Q: When will patients be revived?
A: That depends on when they are cryopreserved. Cryonics technology is always improving; it is better now (2003) than it was in 2000, which was better than it was in 1990, which in turn was much better than the crude methods used on the first cryonics patients in the late 1960s. Eventually a time will come, perhaps in the mid-21st century, when human suspended animation will be perfected. In other words, it will be possible to routinely turn people "off and on" for medical time travel, space travel and other purposes. As progress continues, it will then become possible to recover people preserved at earlier times, with less perfect methods and greater degrees of injury. Cryonics is a last-in-first-out process, wherein the first in may have to wait a very long time (possibly centuries) to get out.
Q: Is cryonics guaranteed to work?
A: No. Cryonics can fail in two ways. Either cryonics patients will not remain cryopreserved long enough to reach the medicine they need, or an insufficient record of their mind has been successfully cryopreserved.
The likelihood of the second failure mode has been diminishing for years as cryonics technology improves, and will continue to diminish. The risk of inadequate preservation may disappear completely within another decade if techniques for transplantable organ banking can be adapted to achieve reversible preservation of the brain.
At present, the greatest uncertainty seems to be whether cryonics patients will remain preserved long enough to reach the medicine they need. (This includes the risk of socio-economic disruption due to many possible causes.) As shown by the recent family turmoil over the alleged cryopreservation of Ted Williams, we still live in a culture that places no value on the lives of cryonics patients.
Q: If cryonics fails, how will it fail clinically?
A: Future medicine will not fail by patients failing to wake up. If patients can be overhauled completely at a molecular level, it's hard to imagine any injury other than complete physical destruction that would not permit repair and restoration to an awake state. The final intractable problem of future medicine will be the problem of amnesia -- the problem of information loss during major brain repair.
It is currently impossible to say how much amnesia, if any, is caused by present preservation methods from a future medical standpoint. A positive answer may be found in the near future as more serious efforts are made to evaluate the effects of cryopreservation using methods of neurobiology. If positive results are not found, a negative answer will take a very long time. Even if it appears that memory traces are lost during cryopreservation, the possibility of inferring and reconstructing them from other molecular information cannot be ruled out until very advanced methods become available.
A: Cryonics is the process of using very cold temperature to prevent people from dying when ordinary medicine can no longer sustain them. This is done to save their life until a cure for their illness can be found, and means developed to reverse the cryonics process. The technology to reverse the cryonics process is still speculative and far in the future.
Q: Has anyone ever been revived?
A: No adult human has ever been revived from temperatures far below freezing. Cryonics patients are cared for in the expectation that future technology, especially molecular nanotechnology, will be available to reverse the cryonics process. This technology may become a reality a century or more in the future.
Q: When will patients be revived?
A: That depends on when they are cryopreserved. Cryonics technology is always improving; it is better now (2003) than it was in 2000, which was better than it was in 1990, which in turn was much better than the crude methods used on the first cryonics patients in the late 1960s. Eventually a time will come, perhaps in the mid-21st century, when human suspended animation will be perfected. In other words, it will be possible to routinely turn people "off and on" for medical time travel, space travel and other purposes. As progress continues, it will then become possible to recover people preserved at earlier times, with less perfect methods and greater degrees of injury. Cryonics is a last-in-first-out process, wherein the first in may have to wait a very long time (possibly centuries) to get out.
Q: Is cryonics guaranteed to work?
A: No. Cryonics can fail in two ways. Either cryonics patients will not remain cryopreserved long enough to reach the medicine they need, or an insufficient record of their mind has been successfully cryopreserved.
The likelihood of the second failure mode has been diminishing for years as cryonics technology improves, and will continue to diminish. The risk of inadequate preservation may disappear completely within another decade if techniques for transplantable organ banking can be adapted to achieve reversible preservation of the brain.
At present, the greatest uncertainty seems to be whether cryonics patients will remain preserved long enough to reach the medicine they need. (This includes the risk of socio-economic disruption due to many possible causes.) As shown by the recent family turmoil over the alleged cryopreservation of Ted Williams, we still live in a culture that places no value on the lives of cryonics patients.
Q: If cryonics fails, how will it fail clinically?
A: Future medicine will not fail by patients failing to wake up. If patients can be overhauled completely at a molecular level, it's hard to imagine any injury other than complete physical destruction that would not permit repair and restoration to an awake state. The final intractable problem of future medicine will be the problem of amnesia -- the problem of information loss during major brain repair.
It is currently impossible to say how much amnesia, if any, is caused by present preservation methods from a future medical standpoint. A positive answer may be found in the near future as more serious efforts are made to evaluate the effects of cryopreservation using methods of neurobiology. If positive results are not found, a negative answer will take a very long time. Even if it appears that memory traces are lost during cryopreservation, the possibility of inferring and reconstructing them from other molecular information cannot be ruled out until very advanced methods become available.
Well whats everyones take on the subject? Is it something that you would consider? Do you think it should be persued by researchers?