Cryonics and Frozen Strawberries

Metaverseguy: I don't follow this movement very much. I'm a pretty big skeptic and it looks like there is little progress in this field. What one popular company does is pump chemicals into their bodies shortly after death to preserve it better than embalming fluid, behead the person and then freeze their head in liquid nitrogen.

One day they hope to reanimate the bodies and repair any damage done during the freezing process. Freezing creates ice crystals, which tear and shred through cells. So yes they preserve the body from bacteria that will decompose the body, but it is not foolproof.

One analogy is like strawberries. You take a whole fresh strawberry and freeze it and it will keep, but defrost it and it will be a little mushier and soft, unlike the ripe and juicy strawberry you had to begin with.

There are several large research facilities over the world doing this, but it has very little respect from any people and associated with sci-fi gurus who might be too optimistic. No one is defending this movement and asking for more research money like stem cell research, cancer research or other huge charities in biology and medicine.

Thoughts? Opinions? Experience? Would you be cryonically frozen? What would you do if you came back 300 years later?

lori100: it's just crazy...wouldn't work...we have souls/spirit..-------Problems with head transplants - Business Insider

www.businessinsider.com/problems-with-head-transplant...


Business Insider

Apr 27, 2015 - In 2017, a surgeon wants to perform the world's first head transplant ... Here are a few of the reasons head transplants aren't going to take place ...

Metaverseguy: I actually just heard about that and think the doctor should have his license suspended since the patient will most likely die, but I'm not on the committee and he's going to probably die anyways.

But there's a few key differences. The cryonic patients that are beheaded are waiting for their second life. They are already dead with 0 chance of returning. That patient hopes to live again immediately. Anyways, these guys hope to one day return to life, even if that day is 100 or 200 years in the future. While I think it's stupid it's probably the best chance there is for reanimation or immortality or whatever you want to call it. Even if those guys have only a 1% or less chance of ever breathing again.

lori100: won't work....we live on anyway....there is more than the physical life..

Metaverseguy: Not everyone believes in that. There is no proof that there is anything after death. However, we can all enjoy the existential and frustration that authors have wrote about for hundreds of years. Why did the ape learn to walk upright, only to die on its back purposeless and all for naught?

lori100: people have had experiences out of body... according to some that ape is your ancestor...so you could live and die too?

Metaverseguy: Unfortunately, they are all first-hand experiences and can't be tested or verified by science. Just like people who are legally dead and come back to life with all their religious conceptions confirmed. It's hearsay that wouldn't even stand up in a courtroom.

duncan124:
In the UK and USA out of body experiences are legally recognised.


And head and brain transplants are easily possible and have happened.

The "new" powerful drugs have enabled doctors to return people to life after being dead and after serious injury.

But the NHS has run in to trouble because it did not buy the drugs from a reputable dealer and was buying illegal weaker copies.

A nasty case of German racism if there ever was one.

Metaverseguy: Of course duncan chimes in with untrue remarks. Wikipedia lists the only head and brain transplants to have ever successfully occurred were performed on lesser animals - rats, dogs, and monkeys and none have been done with humans.

sprocket girl:
My serious thought on this is possibly someday. Most likely not but I can not really say it is impossible. It sounds crazy to me at first glance and no way would I try it today. Nor, would I want to be frozen for later use. the strawberry mush brain sounds like a drawback

But what medical science can someday do is pretty much impossible to say as an absolute. The issue to me is the nervous system. Keeping blood going to the brain is one thing, motoring the body without severe pain is another. We can not even repair many spinal chord injuries. My view is the money wasted in this area should be used to do something a lot closer to being actual. I know they are not asking for funds but individuals are investing money. It is their money and they have the choice. Though helping someone walk seems a little more noble than hoping you can somehow save your own awesome self.

Now while not confirmed what if religions claiming one has a soul are correct?
Not trying to debate theism. Just pointing out if one of the religions that claim a soul leaves the body to go to the ever after is correct. Suddenly brains are revived after being frozen for 50 years and here are these people one place and their soul another. Of course there is no proof of souls. But what if? Man that could be a mess, or maybe it would not matter.

I could list pages of what if things like the soul one...
Seems crazy stuff to mess with since we really have no conclusive idea of exactly what happens when one dies....

I would not do it because it just may not bring about a good life. What if in 300 years the one who figures this out and revives everyone does so to have slaves?

To me the level of unknown this gets into is simply more risk than I would take.

In the end I think it is not really ever going to be possible. That however does not mean I think it impossible. Possible just not probable.

Metaverseguy: People have done some pretty amazing things when approached with impossible. Somehow doctors have done heart transplants, organ transplants, and used mechanical hearts to help patients with bad hearts. Next they want stem cell transplants so that if someone has a failing organ or a bad pancreas from diabetes they can get a new one that won't be rejected from their body.

Of course, this isn't designing a vaccine from a bad virus. This is stopping death altogether. Quite possibly the least possible thing ever to occur. Probably why there is so much resistance to a breakthrough. They are trying to stop death altogether. Some decent ideas have been presented - nanotechnology, drugs that repair damaged cells.

Not just cryonicists but many other biologists are "trying to cure aging" as they say it. The disease that ends up killing us all, whether healthy or not, since age plays a big role in being able to fight off infections. As we age our cells go through a process called "mitosis", where our cells are constantly dividing, and as they divide there is a small microscopic tear in the cells. Some people age better than others. They say it is because of genetics, environment, and something in the cell called a telomere. Supposedly nanotechnology will be the panacea; able to repair damaged tissue, so that no one ages passed something like 16 years old.

Where's the success though? It's just journals and journals and journals full of notes. Optimistic scientists make promises and tell us that judging by the progress of technology this breakthrough will occur by year 20XX. Who knows? It could happen. I've seen microscopic computers. Just seems so far fetched. Like science fiction.

If doctors are able to use 3D printers to make organs by 2020 I'll be less skeptical.

sprocket girl:
One issue with stopping aging, is it goes against nature. Do those who wish stop ageing feel the theory of evolution is nonsense?

Science has been working at discovering how the world and universe came to be and functions for a long time. It is my view that when we start trying to change how it functions, we may not like the resulst if we succeed. Splitting the atom seemed great and nuclear power is great but the atomic bomb may yet still end all our lives or at least life as we know it.

This is not meaning head transplants or stopping ageing will not someday happen. What I ponder with to no final conclussion, is do we want either to happen? Sounds awesome to live forever. Depending on the quality of life maybe it is less awesome than we think.

In science-fiction I can name many immortal charracters who go to great lengths to gain mortality. But there are just as many going to great lengths to gain it.... not sure which group I would belong to!

sprocket girl:
Fortran great thread and a lot to think on. It is cool to be someone open to something outside the box. Most are going to take a possible or impossible stance. I think it is not that simple and it seems you do as well....

Cool thread!