Update:Nanomedicine and Cryonics Future Salon moved to Tuesday 24th of April. Please RSVP (http://tinyurl.com/yvmocq)
About 5 years ago Ralph Merkle presented at Park just down the road from SAP. I think it was an SDForum lecture series event, but I can't find it right now. There for the first time I heard about Cryonics. It was very interesting. The argument that stuck the most in my mind was. Hey, this is an experiment, you sign up for it or you don't. So far it is not looking good for the control group ;-)
Here the paragraph from Ralph Merkle's Cryonics page:
What to do
| It works | It doesn't work | |
| Sign up | Live | Die, lose life insurance |
| Do nothing | Die | Die |
How might we evaluate cryonics? Broadly speaking, there are two available courses of action: (1) sign up or (2) do nothing. And there are two possible outcomes: (1) it works or (2) it doesn't. This leads to the payoff matrix to the right. In using such a payoff matrix to evaluate the possible outcomes, we must decide what value the different outcomes have. What value do we place on a long and healthy life? (It is important to realize that the kinds of medical technology required to restore today's cryonics patients will almost certainly be able to restore good health for an extended period). What (presumably negative) value do we place on being dead? And finally, in the absence of direct experimental results in one direction or the other, what estimate do we make of the chances that it will work?
This week I stumbled upon a similar argument done by Pastor Rick Warren in an atheism versus God debate:
We're both betting. He's betting his life that he's right. I'm betting my life that Jesus was not a liar. When we die, if he's right, I've lost nothing. If I'm right, he's lost everything. I'm not willing to make that gamble.
If you believe in reincarnation, are you engineering yourself out of your true destiny by going the cryonics route? Any philosophers or religious people out there that have spent some time thinking about this? We are happy to give you 5 to 10 minutes to make your case at the event. Let me know.
Remember Cryonics is only one part of the Future Salon next Tuesday the 24th of April. Ralph Merkle will primarily cover what the latest developments in Nanomedicine are and I can't wait to hear them. More details to the event on the Nanomedicine and Cryonics Future Salon Wiki page.
Actually both the cryonics and atheism logic boxes both ignore a third possibility: that God exists, and God absolutely despises both Christians and people who freeze themselves after death. These two groups go to hell. Oops!
Posted by: noname | April 23, 2007 at 12:39