[extropy-chat] Cryonics questions...

[Keith Henson]

At 11:07 PM 5/8/2006 -0400, Anna wrote:
>I'm trying to understand cryonics a bit better and I had a few questions.
>(These questions are on a broad sense.)
>
>Is mind solely information and is the brain just
>matter?

Think of the distinction between a computer operating system and the hardware.

An OS runs in the hardware in a way fundamentally the same as a mind runs 
in a brain.  As for a brain being "just" matter, it is exquisitely 
organized matter.  It may take 3 to 4 decades for computers to catchup to 
it and they are now at 40 million active elements.

>Will reversal cryonics only be made available when
>mind experiences will be able to be transfered
>and/or when the matter can be transfered?

It may help you to think of computer disk information.  A human in cryonic 
suspension is very much like a disk with damaged power supply.  The 
information is still there, you just can't access it.  There are services 
today that recover information even from badly damaged disks.  We can't do 
that with humans yet because we lack tools fine enough repair damage at 
that scale.

Repairing a cryonic suspension patient's brain is mostly putting the 
slightly deranged matter back into the proper organization and warming them 
up.  From what we know of cold water drownings, they should just wake up, 
missing the last 12 hours or so of memory.  If you have tools fine enough 
to repair brains, you could read out all the information and build an atom 
for atom copy.  But why bother?

>If I'm not understanding clearly please let me know, it would be appreciated.

This is explained to far more depth at www.alcor.org, but I think the 
computer analogy is a quicker way to understand.

Keith Henson

>Thanks
>Anna
>
>
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