Depressed Metabolism

A recent investigation (PDF) of state statutes and legislation affecting the ability to implement a nation-wide program to standardize medical orders reflecting individual patients’ end-of-life treatment preferences was made publicly available by Oregon Health & Science University. The POLST (Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment) Paradigm Program was developed in Oregon and strives to increase adherence [...]

In “Philosophical Models of Immortality in Science Fiction,” (in: Immortal Engines: Life Extension and Immortality in Science Fiction and Fantasy) John Martin Fischer and Ruth Curl construct a taxonomy for immortality. As can be seen in the figure on the left (click for larger image), only some models of immortality meet the criterion of real [...]

The idea that cryonics does not involve the freezing of “dead” people but is form of low temperature care to prevent death is almost as old as the idea of cryonics itself. In May 1968, Cryonics Reports, the publication of the Cryonics Society of New York (CSNY), writes that recognition of cryonics as a form [...]

In “Heritage of Horror,” Lovecraft scholar S.T. Joshi writes that Lovecraft’s short story “Cool Air” “anticipates cryogenic research.” We can forgive Joshi the common mistake of writing “cryogenics” when he means “cryonics,” but how much cryonics is there really in Lovecraft’s “Cool Air?” “Cool Air” (1926) tells the story of a struggling writer who has [...]

Cryonics Reports was the publication of the Cryonics Society of New York (CSNY). In April 1968 a call to arms to conquer aging was published. This editorial stressed that the problems of aging will not be solved until we decide that we want to conquer aging and extend our lives. Heart disease and cancer are [...]

Before the scientific conquest of death became a serious topic of conversation, philosophers, writers and poets had to resign themselves to the inevitable demise of the individual in this world. Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667), the “Shakespeare of Divines,” gave poetic expression to the brevity and fragility of life in his The Rule and Exercises of Holy [...]

H.P. Lovecraft’s Herbert West is a man of science, not superstition. Following Ernst Haeckel, he believes that “all life is a chemical and psychical process,” that the soul is “a myth,” and that “unless actual decomposition has set in, a corpse fully equipped with organs may with suitable measures be set going again in the [...]

Arthur C. Clark ( 1917-2008 ) was no stranger to cryonics. The famous science fiction author even assisted the cryonics organization Alcor during its legal battles. As he states in a letter in support of cryonics, “Although no one can quantify the probability of cryonics working, I estimate it is at least 90% — and [...]

A major public misperception is that cryonics involves the freezing of dead people. The objective of cryonics is not to preserve dead people with the hope of future revival but to place critically ill patients in a state of biostasis until a time when more advanced medical technologies might be available to treat and cure [...]

Twenty years ago, Charles B. Olson published an article called “A Possible Cure for Death” in the journal Medical Hypotheses. In it, he favorably compares methods of chemical preservation to cryogenic preservation. Unfortunately, this article provoked no wide discussion or attempts at implementation. As the author notes on his website, other than requests for reprints, [...]

One scientific question that weighs heavily on the feasibility of contemporary cryonics is what happens to the brain after cardiac arrest. Common wisdom has it that the brain “dies” within 5-7 minutes after circulatory arrest. This is true in the sense that patients resuscitated from such insults die of brain death (or develop higher brain [...]

“Cryonics does not involve the freezing of dead people. Cryonics involves placing critically ill patients that cannot be treated with contemporary medical technologies in a state of long-term low temperature care to preserve the person until a time when treatments might be available.” Read the complete article here.

“Even in the case of advanced Alzheimer’s disease, a person is ultimately not declared dead because of the loss of personhood, but as a consequence of secondary whole brain death or cardiac and respiratory arrest. In essence, today’s medicine routinely prolongs life while allowing destruction of the person but pronounces death, using cardiac criteria, without [...]