More From Transvision 2007

by Ronald Bailey

Ronald Bailey brings us another report from Transvision 2007 at Reason Online: "The Tuesday evening session was devoted to another sort of speculative revival technology, cryonics.

Presentations were made by three members of the Alcor Life Extension Foundation. ... Alcor currently has 850 members with 78 patients who are cryonically suspended. The first talk was by nanotechnologist Ralph Merkle who gave the standard line that cryonics is an experimental technology for life extension. The question is do you want to be in the experimental group or in the control group? ... Alcor has a team that flies to the bedsides of clients whose hearts are about to stop.

Once they do stop, the team begins immediately to try to limit damage to their brains. To do that Alcor technicians pump patients' bodies up with cryoprotectants that prevent the formation of damaging ice crystals. ... Alcor is about to begin experiments with mice to see if they can be cooled and then revived. ...