The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved • Hacker News Board

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#21

Post by therein » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 7:43 PM UTC

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #11

Has any living person ever had their heart intentionally stopped, been cryonically frozen, defrosted, and revived? Because if not, then we don't know if it works on people who aren't yet dead. And if we can't do that, what hope do we have for reviving the actually dead? (I'm aware in rare cases people have been massively cooled down and had their heart stopped for operations, but that's not quite the same.)

As far as I know nobody went through the cryogenic preservation process before they were declared dead due to legal reasons. It is a shame really. I hope at one point, somewhere in a country with less regulations, that will be done as well. Similar to the first heart transplantation.

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#22

Post by privacy101 » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 7:43 PM UTC

xgbi wrote: post #8

Serious question: what's to salvage from the brain of a terminal brain cancer child? This strikes me as a very silly way to preserve a human being. If they really wanted to give their child a "chance" to live a full life, they should have cryogenized her sooner, no? (It might be illegal, though.)

Wouldn't it make more sense to clone her whenever the cure becomes available? since she was so young...

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#23

Post by reasonattlm » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 7:44 PM UTC

geographomics wrote: post #16

dahart wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The serious answer is that resuscitation of cryopreserved humans is not currently possible and has never been done. We have no idea whether anything from the brain or the body is salvageable, nor whether starting sooner or later makes any difference. Perhaps one way to think about it is that cryopreservation is a modern alternative to a grave burial, and the thing most salvaged is the hope and memories in the family…

I agree. Resuscitation seems unlikely, given that the freezing process itself damages the tissues, as well as the degradation that has already happened post-mortem.

They don't freeze, they vitrify. That's a very big difference.

http://www.alcor.org/cryomyths.html#myth2

We can debate the degree to which cryoprotectant perfuses the brain outside a laboratory test of tissue, but vitrification appears to preserve the fine structure of tissue very well:

http://www.brainpreservation.org/competitors/

There is evidence of synaptic preservation in preserved and restored nematodes:

http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/rej.2014.1636

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#24

Post by api » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 7:53 PM UTC

xgbi wrote: post #8

Serious question: what's to salvage from the brain of a terminal brain cancer child? This strikes me as a very silly way to preserve a human being. If they really wanted to give their child a "chance" to live a full life, they should have cryogenized her sooner, no? (It might be illegal, though.)

If we have the technology to both:

(1) Resuscitate cryo-preserved (vitrified) brain tissue.

(2) Re-create a body and somehow transfer this brain or mind into it (or upload consciousness)?

... then it is likely that we would have such a deep understanding of consciousness and mind that we could repair or scan-around the damage. I think we're talking about "singularity" levels of both technology and philosophical comprehension here. It's all total sci-fi for the time being.

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#25

Post by porejide » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 7:59 PM UTC

listic wrote: post #13

xgbi wrote: post #8

Serious question: what's to salvage from the brain of a terminal brain cancer child? This strikes me as a very silly way to preserve a human being. If they really wanted to give their child a "chance" to live a full life, they should have cryogenized her sooner, no? (It might be illegal, though.)

Personally, I'm with you on this. Cryonically suspending a person that died from brain damage or debilitating disease has even more fleeting chance for success. Unless there's a chance that at the moment of death the conscience is still there (due to great redundancy in the brain), it might be futile, after all. This is one issue that I believe all cryonics companies and advocates prefer to wholly overlook. I imagine…

It is clear that you have done a good amount of research, which is great! If you look further, you will find that in fact there are plenty of people who are interested in precisely this aspect of brain preservation/cryonics. See, for example, [1], [2], [3], [4].

[1] http://chronopause.com/chronopause.com/index.php/2012/05/20/...

[2] http://www.brainpreservation.org/preservation-rights/

[3] http://www.oregoncryo.com/aboutCryonics.html

[4] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/zoltan-istvan/should-cryonics-...

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#26

Post by listic » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 8:01 PM UTC

moyix wrote: post #20

listic wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I'm with you on this. Cryonically suspending a person that died from brain damage or debilitating disease has even more fleeting chance for success. Unless there's a chance that at the moment of death the conscience is still there (due to great redundancy in the brain), it might be futile, after all. This is one issue that I believe all cryonics companies and advocates prefer to wholly overlook. I imagine…

> Unless there's a chance that at the moment of death the conscience is still there (due to great redundancy in the brain), it might be futile, after all. This is one issue that I believe all cryonics companies and advocates prefer to wholly overlook. You seem to be arguing that death is a binary state, but I don't think this is particularly well established. There are all sorts of arguments over what constitutes def…

I didn't mean to disagree argue that; just didn't have enough time to think this question over before typing.

Yes, death is not a binary state physically, but it is legally. This is what cryonics counts for.

Also, conscience is not binary; there is plenty of evidence that it is uneven and noncontinuous. People lose conscience and then regain it and live on all the time. Many people live in reduced states of consciousness most or all of the time. Our mind tries to maintain illusion of continuity of consciousness for our convenience. Sometimes people survive ridiculous amount of brain damage (men living with a hole in their head). All this is evidence that whatever forms our conscience is very redundant and just might survive the damage of what today is considered death and future restoration. Especially with the help of whatever medical technology will be available in the future (nanotech, hi-res brain scanning, etc.); especially if it would be needed anyway to counter the damage sustained during cryopreservation.

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#27

Post by imaginenore » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 8:15 PM UTC

privacy101 wrote: post #22

xgbi wrote: post #8

Serious question: what's to salvage from the brain of a terminal brain cancer child? This strikes me as a very silly way to preserve a human being. If they really wanted to give their child a "chance" to live a full life, they should have cryogenized her sooner, no? (It might be illegal, though.)

Wouldn't it make more sense to clone her whenever the cure becomes available? since she was so young...

You don't need to wait for the cure if you're just going to clone. But it won't be the same person. A two year old is old enough to know and recognize and do all kinds of things.

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#28

Post by wutbrodo » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 8:15 PM UTC

listic wrote: post #26

moyix wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unless there's a chance that at the moment of death the conscience is still there (due to great redundancy in the brain), it might be futile, after all. This is one issue that I believe all cryonics companies and advocates prefer to wholly overlook. You seem to be arguing that death is a binary state, but I don't think this is particularly well established. There are all sorts of arguments over what constitutes def…

I didn't mean to disagree argue that; just didn't have enough time to think this question over before typing. Yes, death is not a binary state physically, but it is legally. This is what cryonics counts for. Also, conscience is not binary; there is plenty of evidence that it is uneven and noncontinuous. People lose conscience and then regain it and live on all the time. Many people live in reduced states of conscious…

> People lose conscience and then regain it and live on all the time.

Do you mean "consciousness" here? I assumed you actually meant conscience at first but this sentence doesn't seem to make sense with that word but then you use consciousness later which means it isn't just a spelling error. I'm not asking to be pedantic, but because I'm now getting confused about what you're trying to say in parts of your otherwise interesting comment.

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#29

Post by wutbrodo » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 8:18 PM UTC

notahacker wrote: post #18

xgbi wrote: post #8

Serious question: what's to salvage from the brain of a terminal brain cancer child? This strikes me as a very silly way to preserve a human being. If they really wanted to give their child a "chance" to live a full life, they should have cryogenized her sooner, no? (It might be illegal, though.)

Attempts to cryopreserve people who are still (just about) living will take more months of human life than will ever be restored by foreseeable future revival attempts.

> foreseeable future revival attempts.

I don't fully disagree with you, but this is sort of begging the question, since cryonics seems to rely heavily on the chance of unforeseeable advantages.

On top of that, you seem to be committing the common fallacy of equating every minute of life as the same, whether you're suffering terminally in a hospital bed or watching the sunset with friends (this is also why people choose to be taken off the respirator or have DNRs). Using something like QALYs makes infinitely more sense (though switching to QALYs may not quite invalidate your point).

Re: The youngest person to be cryogenically preserved

#30

Post by notahacker » Sun, Nov 22, 2015, 8:30 PM UTC

wutbrodo wrote: post #29

notahacker wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Attempts to cryopreserve people who are still (just about) living will take more months of human life than will ever be restored by foreseeable future revival attempts.

> foreseeable future revival attempts. I don't fully disagree with you, but this is sort of begging the question, since cryonics seems to rely heavily on the chance of unforeseeable advantages. On top of that, you seem to be committing the common fallacy of equating every minute of life as the same, whether you're suffering terminally in a hospital bed or watching the sunset with friends (this is also why people choo…

When the only certainty is killing people, I'd question whether the incalculably remote possibility of "unforeseeable advantages" undoing that killing counts for anything at all.

The last thing advocates of euthanasia and DNR for the heavily-suffering should want to see is their ethical arguments muddied by cryogenics salespeople hanging round hospitals persuading people that they'd be better off dying shortly after diagnosis...