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Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

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Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#261

Post by TeMPOraL »

pron wrote: post #247
TeMPOraL wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no intractability here, with enough power you could just push the air around any way you like. Weather is transforming energy in a very, very complex set of feedback loops, but you could override it completely with even more energy. You can throw paper balls at a cat to try and get it to move somewhere, or you can just grab it and put it where you want it to be (and then catch it again, because it will most d…

> with enough power you could just push the air around any way you like Maybe a real god could, but we can't. Unless you have tractor beams, anti-gravity force fields and other sci-fi tech, either you'd have to have these "weather machines" placed in a fairly tight grid, or intractability would rule (outside a small area of influence). The problem isn't just energy, but directing it.

You don't need tractor beams, you just need blowdryers the size of Texas. Hence, it's a power problem.

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#262

Post by lsparrish »

gress wrote: post #112
tonysuper wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you do it out of a sense of duty to the past. People spend ages carefully preserving forks and other trinkets from the 1700s. Surely an entire person would be worth equal care, and a group of people more so.

If duty were enough, we wouldn't have wars or poverty, 'out of duty to our fellow human beings'. Why are people who are already dead more deserving of such 'duty'?

Um. You also stop poverty and wars. That is also your duty.

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#263

Post by scott_karana »

pron wrote: post #216
Widdershin wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're probably right, but I just thought about it from the point of view of someone dying from a (currently) incurable illness. On one hand, you can die, and that will probably be it for you. On the other hand, you can become cryogenically preserved. In that case, there are two outcomes I can see. One, you're never revived (which is functionally equivalent to death). The other, you awake (in what feels like an insta…

another possibility is you wake up, disembodied, in a jar and live an eternal life of torment.

For the downvoters: I think pron is referring tongue-and-cheek to Futurama, not a literal torture. :)

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#264

Post by tomjen3 »

jacquesm wrote: post #70
tomjen3 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Words have meaning. When we hit the edge of technology those meanings tends to be obscure or wrong and so we need a new word. Murder is so final, while this is more akind to shutting down a computer that you hope to be able to start up again. Hence active shutdown being a more appropriate idea.

Until someone is revived we can consider it final.

That is certainly one option. It is also the most pessimistic version, which is why a pro tech forum like HN is not likely to take it as the majority view.

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#265

Post by gress »

lsparrish wrote: post #262
gress wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If duty were enough, we wouldn't have wars or poverty, 'out of duty to our fellow human beings'. Why are people who are already dead more deserving of such 'duty'?

Um. You also stop poverty and wars. That is also your duty.

Um, so obviously duty doesn't stop poverty or wars.

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#266

Post by lsparrish »

NhanH wrote: post #7

On the topic of cryopreservation, to borrow a question from Scott Aaronson [1]: have you signed up for cryopreservation? And regardless of your answer, how do you defend yourself against the charge of irrationality? On one hand, it seems like a different version of Pascal's wager - if you can afford it, the upside is potentially far more beneficial than the downside. On the other hand, well, it is crazy... I can thin…

It's interesting that the comments by cell biologist Len Ornstein in that thread completely omit any mention of high osmolality vitrification, which is what is practiced in cryonics. I get the impression he is not aware of Fahy's approach at all. It probably is not used in his specialty.

HOV is using extremely high concentrations of solutes to reduce the freezing point (a colligative property). That is the only way to vitrify something big like the brain. At least, until some super material is invented that lets us pull out lots of heat really fast. The trouble is that it is toxic to cells to be exposed for very long. With rabbit kidneys and small slices of brain tissue, the exposure time at warm temperatures can be very brief. So with current cryonics we can only make a morphological argument for information theoretic preservation.

With better materials that enable faster cooling, prevent the toxicity mechanisms of the cryoprotectant, and/or block ice formation non-colligatively (certain polymers do this), it is theoretically possible that we could get to a point where the cells are still viable. In that event, it would be like placing the brain in an "off state". You wouldn't be able to resume it again without a body to implant it in, but that's more likely to be on the 200-year radar than nanorepair, so the chances would be improved quite a bit. Also, I suspect more people would sign up for a process that does not involve "killing" their brain cells.

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#267

Post by lsparrish »

lsparrish wrote: post #266
NhanH wrote: post #7

On the topic of cryopreservation, to borrow a question from Scott Aaronson [1]: have you signed up for cryopreservation? And regardless of your answer, how do you defend yourself against the charge of irrationality? On one hand, it seems like a different version of Pascal's wager - if you can afford it, the upside is potentially far more beneficial than the downside. On the other hand, well, it is crazy... I can thin…

It's interesting that the comments by cell biologist Len Ornstein in that thread completely omit any mention of high osmolality vitrification, which is what is practiced in cryonics. I get the impression he is not aware of Fahy's approach at all. It probably is not used in his specialty. HOV is using extremely high concentrations of solutes to reduce the freezing point (a colligative property). That is the only way t…

I should also mention that the wood frog is really more a counterexample of vitrification. It forms ice (which they are adapted to tolerate, unlike us), but the interior or the cells remains a slightly more concentrated liquid. It is nowhere near the concentrations used in cryonics, which are high enough to prevent freezing entirely (50-80%). A wood frog cannot survive any temperature below around -5 C.

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#268

Post by maaku »

amalag wrote: post #250
Coincoin wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he was referring to the legal clusterfuck that happens when someone who is legally dead isn't actually dead. http://www.loweringthebar.net/2013/10/no-youre-still-decease... http://www.loweringthebar.net/2014/08/feds-say-legally-dead-...

No I think they are stupid to try to bring back the dead.

Ok I'll feed a troll. You know they are dead, how? I guess once someone is declared clinically dead, it's a futile effort right? Then how do you explain this:

http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/dead-40-minutes-man/2013/05/1...

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#269

Post by amalag »

maaku wrote: post #268
amalag wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No I think they are stupid to try to bring back the dead.

Ok I'll feed a troll. You know they are dead, how? I guess once someone is declared clinically dead, it's a futile effort right? Then how do you explain this: http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/dead-40-minutes-man/2013/05/1...

So they are going to resuscitate the fellow after freezing him for 50 years?

Re: Hal Finney being cryopreserved now

#270

Post by maaku »

amalag wrote: post #269
maaku wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok I'll feed a troll. You know they are dead, how? I guess once someone is declared clinically dead, it's a futile effort right? Then how do you explain this: http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/dead-40-minutes-man/2013/05/1...

So they are going to resuscitate the fellow after freezing him for 50 years?

Yes. The brain undergoes fewer changes during 50 years at liquid N2 temperature than 40 minutes at room temperature. Next question?
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