[ExI] Extrope Robert Bradbury Has Died

[John Grigg]

Max More wrote:
Damn.

Robert, as some of you old-timers will know, was a former director of
Extropy Institute. He was an extremely smart guy and a major advocate
of (and practical entrepreneur for) life extension and other
transhumanist goals.

I'm not only extremely unhappy to hear of his sudden and unexpected
death, but also distressed that he had no arrangements for
cryopreservation (to the best of my knowledge). That's quite
surprising and, frankly, appalling given Robert's understanding of the
technology and future possibilities. This is especially distressing
because Alcor has people in Florida, where he died, who could have
started the transport and cooldown on very short notice.

Robert had his oddities but was always intelligent and probing and on
the side of life. All we can do for him now is remember him. It's
something, but it's very little, for he is gone forever.
>>>


Arghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  This is so horribly
sad!!!  When I was living in Alaska, I joined the Extropy mailing
list, and was enthralled with the many fascinating concepts and memes.
 I desperately wanted to attend the Extropy 5 Conference, back in
2001, but could not afford an airline ticket.  Robert came forward
with a bunch of frequent flyer miles, to sell me a ticket at a bargain
basement rate!  I had a wonderful time attending and have such fond
memories of palling around with Robert, Anders, Greg, Spike, Amara,
and others.  I remember sitting at a table in Spike's backyard, and
Robert was discussing with Greg Burch about his upcoming project that
involved nanotubes.  Robert touched on some of his painful business
reversals, during that conversation.

The Robert I knew (both online and at the conference) was a very
affable and extremely intelligent gentleman, who was very good
company.  I recall him "holding court" at the hotel where a bunch of
young people were hanging on his every word.  They spoke into the wee
hours of the morning.  I was so tired but did not want to leave!

I really wish I had been there for Robert's fantastic Extropy 3
Conference talk that Anders discussed, but at least I have my Extropy
5 memories.

I am amazed that he had no suspension contract in place, because I had
extensively corresponded online with him about the subject, and he had
told me that he was so confident that cryonics would work, that upon
his death, people could simply dump his decapitated and untreated head
into a big bucket of liquid nitrogen, thereby freezing it, remove it
from the bucket, smash it into the floor with all of their strength,
splintering it into thousands of small pieces, sweep up the pieces and
dump them into a foil bag, put that in a dewar, and then within a
century or so the technology would be in place to fully restore him to
health with little or no information loss!!!

Looking back on things, Robert and I had a sort of uncle/nephew
relationship, and among other subjects, we discussed women,
relationships and modern marriage.  He wanted to marry and have
children, but had doubts about having a successful and lasting
relationship.  Robert had considered the foreign bride (he was partial
to intelligent and educated Russian beauties) route, but realized it
held some dangers.

I am just so shocked by this development!!!  It makes me think of
Sasha Chislenko, who I never met in person, and who passed away in
2000.  He was another man who treated me kindly and impressed me with
his intelligence.  And in Sasha's case I was even offered a job!  I
unfortunately did not meet the stiff requirements for the I.T.
position.  But still, I was touched.

I realize I am among many agnostics and atheists here, but I hope
considering how he was not frozen, that for both his sake and ours,
there will prove to be some sort of afterlife (and I am not talking
about a sophisticated simulation).  I would really like to see my
friend Robert Bradbury again one day.

John Grigg


On 3/3/11, David Lubkin <lubkin at unreasonable.com> wrote:
> Spike wrote:
>
>>I think it's ok to use the photos on his homepage for an obit?  I never
>>really thought about it, but I guess that would be ok.
>>
>>http://www.aeiveos.com:8080/~bradbury/index.html
>>
>>Information hipsters, it is OK to grab photos off of the deceased's
>> homepage
>>for that person's obituary?  If he made it public, then that means its
>>public, right?
>
> As a legal matter, no. The copyright to them is owned by whoever took
> them. They are the only ones who can authorize use thereof. (Which
> people don't think about when putting pictures of themselves online.)
> If the photo is of a human, you also need a model release, which
> would have to be from Robert's heirs.
>
> I don't think anyone would object to use on a personal site for a
> tribute, but Amara needs to adhere to the niceties for Kurzweil AI.
>
> We should see about continuing to host his site as is indefinitely,
> as we did for Sasha. I'd be happy to take it on, if needed.
>
>
> -- David.
>
> _______________________________________________
> extropy-chat mailing list
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat
>