Cryogenics - it's the Ice Age all over again!

Reading the Straits Times today, I came across an article on Cryogenics. What did I think of it? Another rich innocent being bites the dust again!

What is it? Cryonics is a speculative life support technology that seeks to preserve human life in a state that will be viable and treatable by future medicine. It is expected that future medicine will include mature nanotechnology, and the ability to heal at the cellular and molecular levels.*

Damage done to your wallet: minimum USD$80K - USD$150k
The former is only if you choose to preserve your head, the latter, for your entire body.

Personally, I think mere little humans like us, who do not have any of the powers that be, should not dabble to change the life cycle. A lot of ethical as well as religious issues are associated with Cryogenics.

At the outset, there is the issue of playing God (if you happen to be a free-thinker, an atheist, or a really staunch sociologist who believes that religion is man-made and therefore fictitious, skip this comment). Religion dictates that there is a greater being that made life the way it is. Hence, we are supposed to be born, live through our lives, and die at the end of the day only to ascend to the greater heavens for an afterlife, or be reincarnated. Really staunch Catholics believe that if we fall ill, or meet with mishap, it’s all part of God’s plan. Dying is glorified – a path to a better life. Cryogenics, viewed in this light, is thus, interference in God’s plan, and to some, may even be viewed as Devil-influenced.

Of course, there are the naturalists, who simply state that this goes against nature. Either way, Cryogenics upsets the life cycle.

Not to mention there is NO guarantee that revival is possible. Revival would be an improbability with current technology. Cryogenics supporters will tell you that sooner or later, following the rapid development of technology, revival will be made possible in the future. Even if that were to be true, which I highly doubt, it would still be untested technology.

How do you think technology is tested? On guinea pigs. Who do you think are those guinea pigs? Animals? Testing on animals, would not only be cruel but also offer no assurance that humans will respond in the same manner. The only way people are going to know for sure that something works, is to test it on a human. Who do you think are these test subjects? The very first would most definitely be one of those poor souls, who forked out a tenth of a million USD dollars, lying in their ‘sub-zero tombs’. Good for you if it works, but what if it doesn’t?

Information runs scarce when it comes to complications during revival, if it should even be possible. There is information, do not get me wrong. However, the manner in which this information is presented is not as obvious, or publicized as it should be, given the nature of Cryogenics. Amnesia is ONLY ONE of the complications that might occur. What is the point of being revived if one cannot remember the people around you, the life you’ve had, or worse, who you are yourself?

I find it difficult to believe that the process of preservation requires an initiation ideally within 1-2 minutes of your heart stopping. It is claimed that the maximum gap between the preservation procedure and the time of your heart stopping is 15 minutes. Here’s the thing: if the preservation procedure needs to be initiated within 1-2 minutes of your heart stopping, this would mean either (1) specialists from the cryogenics lab are standing by your deathbed (2) you are in the cryogenics lab on your deathbed. While the former perhaps requires a simple phone call, the latter would mean that you know exactly when you are going to die – either that or you would be living the remainder of your days in the cryogenics lab, or nearby surrounded by equipment. What a lovely memory to have as your last second on earth ticks away.

“Don’t be absurd! You can drop dead anywhere you wish, and still be preserved, as long as it’s within 15 minutes!” you say. I thought our brain dies within 6 minutes of our heart stopping? What’s the point of preserving yourself if you’re brain dead, since you’ll be revived as a brain dead person anyway! The heart cannot function without a brain and the brain a heart. If you are brain dead, you’ll have to be kept on life support for the rest of your life. If you are revived, it would probably mean the rest of your after-life. Seriously, 15 minutes isn’t a hell lot of time in the first place. Fine if you drop dead amongst people who can make that one phone call to get the cryogenics specialists down, but if you die in isolation?

There’s also the issue of the preservation of the dead. If you’re dead when they preserve you, won’t you be dead when they revive you? Cryogenics argue that you are biologically alive but legally dead. I thought you have to be biologically dead to be legally dead? What if you die of cancer? When you are revived, don’t you still have the cancer? So won’t you die again anyway? Even if you die naturally in your sleep, there’s a reason you actually die. Reviving you in the same state as when you died isn’t going to help things.

The one fact I read that really got me laughing on the ground was the fact that you actually had a choice whether to preserve your body or your head alone. Bad enough you choose to preserve your body, forking out all that money, with no certainty of revival, going against nature itself, but to preserve your head only? I think that just brings it to a whole new level of idiosyncrasy. Do you really expect people to be able to reconstruct your entire body? If not, the only other option I see at this point of time, is grafting your head on someone else’s body. For one, you have no idea where that body’s been.

Face it, vitrification (the technology of preservation by cryogenics at temperature -124 degrees celsius) is almost like freezing, just that you look prettier and healthier, and there is no ice formation.

I can’t believe over 700 people were suckered into believing in this nonsense, and yet another estimated 70 people lie ‘dead’ in their frozen tombs. Why not just donate the money to charity, or to me?

*Source: Alcor Life Extension Foundation. http://www.alcor.org/
Photo obtained from same source.