Arc or state of the future:

Apocalyptic - linear jump

Evolutionary - broken spiral

Alternative - forking path offshoot

Dimension of the future: deep future (200-300 years); postmillennial; an alternative future rather than death.

Other relevant course objectives:

Human outcomes -

Being revived in the future would categorize the revivee as different; therefore, a division is born at the onset. Just as apocalyptic divides people into two camps of the saved and the damned and evolutionary divides people into the haves and the have nots, a cryonic rebirth would create a new dividing definition of the natural and the unnatural. In addition, it falls under the alternative path depending on the date of revival to determine one’s future.

Another aspect to consider is the reaction of society towards the cryonic revivee. Would the unnatural rebirth be viewed as repulsive or interesting? Would the revivee ever really fit in with society? Would there be prejudice in the future against revivees?

Films that depict whole-body cryopreservation: Austin Powers, Forever Young, Encino Man, X-Files, and Alien.

View film clip of Austin Powers where Dr. Evil is being advised by No. 2 about the progress of his company during the last 30 years. Dr. Evil suggests a plan involving a scandal with Prince Charles not realizing it has already happened. Then he suggests damaging the ozone layer not realizing it is already damaged. Finally, he suggests blackmailing with a nuclear weapon for $1 million not realizing the inflation and current value rate of money. Dr. Evil, having been frozen for 30 years, is unaware of world events and the value of money. He has to adapt his threat relevant to the current time.

Main point: Adaptation is necessary to survive in the new world.

Cryonics - the science of placing humans and animals into a low-temperature, biologically unchanging state, immediately after clinical death, with the expectation that advances in medical technology may eventually enable full restoration to life and health.

Cryogenics - the branch of physics that deals with very low temperatures

Cryobiology - the branch of science that deals with the effects of reduced temperatures on living organisms. First person to refer to cryobiology was Robert Boyle in 1683. He wrote New Experiments and Observations Touching Cold.

Cryopreservation - low temperature preservation. In 1964, a physics professor, Robert Ettinger, suggested cryopreservation as a means of enabling dying patients to be treated by tomorrow’s medicines. He suggested waiting until the patient dies before applying cryopreservation since the patient is then legally dead, and cryonics can do no additional harm. .

Nanotechnology - the science of protein engineering on a molecular scale foreseen by Eric Drexler, MIT engineer, in a 1981 technical paper and in 1986 in the book Engines of Creation. He foresaw general purpose "assemblers" that could build anything from powerful computers the size of bacteria to microscopic "nanobots" able to do surgery on individual cells.

Human cryopreservation is not reversible today. The practice of cryonics is based on the speculative possibility that advanced future technologies, such as nanotechnology, may be able to revive today’s cryonics patients in the future.

There are six preserving centers in the USA already in care of 70 heads and bodies, and this number is increasing. Among the 70 are Walt Disney and Andy Warhol. Whole-body cryopreservation costs approximately $125,000 and neuropreservation (head only) costs approximately $58,000.

The films I mention are not aimed at reviving the dead; they are depicted as modes of transport, time travel, and preservation. However, the revived awakening in a distant future creates the question of social adjustment and adaptation.

How would society react?

How would the revivee respond?

Question for Discussion: If you chose cryonics rather than burial and, with the progress of nanotechnolgy and biotechnology, woke up in the year 2300 with a healthy body and mind, how do you think you would react and how would society embrace you? Would you be a freak and an outcast or a respected phenomenon of scientific technology? Would it work?

Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery. Dir. M. Jay Roach. Perf. Mike Myers, Elizabeth Hurley, Michael York, Mimi Rogers, Robert Wagner, Seth Green, and Fabiana Udenio. New Line Cinema, 1997. -- This source was a good visual reference as to the social adjustment and consequences that could occur after a successful whole-body cryopreservation and revival.

Smith, Audrey U. Ed. Introduction. Current Trends in Cryobiology. Plenum: NY, 197, 1-4.. -- This source provided the historical references to R. Boyle who wrote New Experiments and Observations Touching Cold in 1683.