CRYONICS: THE ARGUMENTS, FEARS AND THE FUTURE.

Wikipedia defines Cryonics “as the low-temperature preservation of people who cannot be sustained by contemporary medicine with the hope that resuscitation and restoration to full health may be possible in the far future.”

Founded by Robert. C. Ettinger in April 1976 (who is cryopreserved as well) Cryonics is in the business of selling hope of resurrection in the future to Cryonauts (people who are cryopreserved) if placed at a cryogenic storage during the final stages of their lives.

Cryonics uses temperature below -196 degrees Celsius called Cryopreservation to preserve enough brain information which will enable revival of the Cryonaut in the future when or IF there is breakthrough in science. Cryonauts are preserved with cryoprotectant to reduce the damage or by Vitrification to avoid ice damage.

Currently Cryonics.org states that there are only 7 cryonics centres worldwide: 5 in the US, one in Portugal and one in Russia housing 112 cryonauts including Ettinger himself and costing around 28,000 dollars for full body preservation.

ARGUMENTS:

Cryonics is built on hope that the technology will progress to a point that those cryopreserved will have the chance of living again. A year ago, a Judge in London granted the dying wish of a 14-year-old girl who wanted to be cryopreserved when she dies.

Personally it is almost impossible reconciling my idea of resurrection on the last day with Jesus with this resurrection that science offers because it leaves some gaping holes.

Some experts argue that cryopreservation is most successful if the head is the only part preserved. But out of curiosity, what happens to the other parts?

Arthur Caplan, director at the Centre of Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania told NBC News that the likelihood of a person coming back to life using current freezing technique is nil. He further argues that even if the person was successfully reanimated they will end up being a “kind of freak”.

FEARS:

1. Some people fear that the institute is making a lot of money preying on terrified people who are scared of death.
2. Others believe that once the mortal body dies, the soul transitions or is gone forever (depending on beliefs) which makes resuscitation highly impossible.
3. More people wonder where cryonauts will get bodies from if the head was the only part preserved.
4. To some, the prospect of attaching a head to another body raises immunological concerns (when viewed through the lens of short-term technological perspective).
5. Others worry that the ice made from the freezing process might destroy almost every cell in a cryonaut.

FUTURE?

Founders of cryonics believe they will achieve their big break someday while others believe that a Cryonaut will awake in a future where corporeal bodies will be unneeded, perhaps in a computer existence. Whatever the outcome is, we hope to still be alive to witness the success or failure of cryonics.

Share your thought with us, do you subscribe to the visions of Cryonics?

Photo Credit: Google images