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Comment by garmaine | Hacker News Reader

It didn't point out any issues... it just made the unsubstantiated claim that a cryonics patient has no chance of ever being revived.

It IS physically possible to revive cryonics patients--as in the laws of physics would permit it, even if we don't have anything near the technology required, yet. This isn't a bold claim but rather a statement of fact with respect to information preservation of the vitrification process, and long-term storage at cryogenic temperatures, both of which are well studied in the context of things like organ donor preservation.

So if you're claiming that cryonics has "a snowball's chance in hell" of working, then I presume that either you are (1) ignorant of the science, or (2) making some sort of statement about long-term storage prospects or the credibility of the organizations involved.

But neither you nor the grandparent actually made any specific claims.

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> So if you're claiming that cryonics has "a snowball's chance in hell" of working, then I presume that either you are (1) ignorant of the science, or (2) making some sort of statement about long-term storage prospects or the credibility of the organizations involved.

I'm signed up to be a cryonics patient when I die, but yeah, the chances are pretty much nil. Personally, I'll take a slightly diminished bank account and a potentially non-zero percent chance of further life over a zero percent chance, but I won't delude myself into thinking that there's effectively any chance of success here.

What I don't understand about this logic is, how do you have any confidence that if by some miracle you were brought back to conscious life again, your life wouldn't be an absolute living hell (organ damage, paralysis, etc.)? Like even if you had infinite money and resources to spend on whatever you wanted, would that risk be sitll worth it to you?

You don't. You can only hope that a) future people won't revive you unless they're somewhat confident it'll leave you better off than you were when frozen, and b) worst comes to worst, they can still euthanize you.

Cryonics is ultimately a bet on future technology and future humanity.

Future people will use the frozen as a resource. I would buy a 2139-October call option on 100-frozen-hopefuls ... that's when I estimate techniques for revival will be viable and when legal hurdles to mass exploitation will be overcome. In 120 years nobody will care about your intentions in being frozen.

...why? How could there possibly be utility in a corpsicle when you could much more easily achieve the same thing with AI?

> I would buy a 2139-October call option on 100-frozen-hopefuls.

Unless you live inordinately long, you'll only be in a position to benefit from that if you are wrong about it being a worthwhile investment. (But right about the technological enablers—just wrong on the socio/legal issues.)

It seems unlikely to me that we'd acquire the ability to revive a brain from death before the state of medical technology advances sufficiently to repair nerve damage or regenerate organs. You could put a kind of guarantee into this by only having your head or brain preserved, so the minimum viable tech level for resurrection would be regrowing a body.

I'd be more concerned with the emotional and mental challenges of being revived centuries hence, which would be considerable to say the least.

There's nothing new about all this...

Tutankhaman will tell you what to expect when you use cutting-edge technology and preservation techniques in the hopes of some future civilization reviving you.... you'll end up under glass in a Museum. Hell, nobody even TRIED to revive King Tut... you think they'll put much effort into a bunch of anti-freeze saturated popsicles? Seriously doubt it.

If you look far enough in the future it is probably feasible to engineer organs in the long run, or who knows maybe full bodies?

> a statement of fact with respect to information preservation of the vitrification process

That's not a statement of fact, it's a statement of belief. Personally, I think it's highly unlikely that any current vitrification process preserves sufficient information for the patient to be revived. We're nowhere near even understanding what "sufficient information" would be, let alone how to preserve it.

The thing is .. it is more about biology than physics.

You can flush water pipes with whatever you want and clean and rewater it. A complex organism like the human body - and the brain, we still dont really understand?

Not likely. Maybe not 0 chance in SciFi future, but still not likely.

Actually it is physically impossible to revive cryonics patients because essential information has been irretrievably lost. I don't think you understand the physics (or biology) here.

What information?

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