That’s lovely and all. But how is it that my question got voted down and this nothing response got voted up?
Is it because I refer to people in cryostasis as corpse popsicles?
Let’s be frank here the arguments for cryonics are positively flaccid. If what you are banking on is based on some set of technologies not yet invented, many not even thought up yet, with no large scale tests behind your claims then this is a matter of faith not science. This is trying to make the myth of the after-life not a myth.
Cryonics to date, at least the evidence, that these popsicle people will be revived from popsicle land, which is the flip side of Mr Rogers neighborhood, is essentially 98% hand waving and 2% sketchy evidence.
The last link you posted was especially unhelpful since I am inclined to discredit the source for reasons that I have already commented on.
Er, do you have an issue with any of the arguments, rather than with Eliezer or the karma system? The only critique I can see above is the exact objection that’s discussed in the “particular proof” post, and you’re not presenting any argument against the analysis there.
I can’t claim that the karma here is unbiased, but one pattern I can point to is that LW contrarians who engage with particular objections get upvoted more than contrarians who just reiterate conclusions. I’ve pointed you to a specific argument that in rationally making important decisions under uncertainty, one has to make do with the evidence that can be gathered at the time of decision (and there really is a wealth of such evidence in the case of cryonics). Do you disagree with this general principle or with this application, and if so, on what grounds?
That’s lovely and all. But how is it that my question got voted down and this nothing response got voted up?
Is it because I refer to people in cryostasis as corpse popsicles?
Well, the “nothing response” had links, and included actual facts.
As a general rule of thumb, in any online forum that uses a karma system, remarks which are polite and well written are more likely to be voted up. Remarks which are insulting or seem to be quickly typed up with little thought are more likely to be downvoted. Now, there’s also a general trend that comments which agree with the general attitude in a forum are more likely to be voted up than comments which do not. All these details apply to LW. Although LW prides itself on trying to be rational, and one could argue that comments which agree with the consensus here are simply more likely to be rational, I suspect that some amount of simply agreeing with what someone is saying does lead to upvoting. However, this seems to be less of a problem at LW than elsewhere (especially compare say Slashdot and Reddit). Now, there’s one other aspect that’s very important, the two factors (agreement with status quo, and quality of post) don’t combine in a nicely linear fashion. In particular, comments which do not seem well thought out or indicate a lack of knowledge about a topic and which go against the status quo consensus are likely to be voted down a lot.
In that regard, your repeated use of the phrase “corpse popsicles” was apparently an indication of an attempt at emotionalism, something which really doesn’t go over well at LW. Moreover, it also demonstrates a lack of detailed familiarity with cryonics since one would otherwise know that the standard derogatory pourmanteau is “corpsicle” rather than the long phrase “corpse popsicle.” (I’m under the tentative impression that this is actually a pourmanteau of corpse and icicle)
The last link you posted was especially unhelpful since I am inclined to discredit the source for reasons that I have already commented on.
This is the sort of thing that is probably getting you voted down. It wasn’t at all clear (and after rereading what you’ve wrote still isn’t at all clear) why you discredit that source. It might help for you to state what exactly in that link you object to.
Note that comments that discuss potential problems with cryonics are not in general downvoted. For example, my comment here was not downvoted (granted a single upvote isn’t much but the point is clear).
In general when posting a comment in an environment which does not by and large support your view it is extremely important to make a comment as polite and well-reasoned as you can. Directly insulting the people one is addressing may make one feel good, but it is unlikely to actually change anyone’s opinion. Moreover, it is the sort of thing which generally causes bystanders and audiences to not favor your opinion. This will likely still be true for otherwise pretty rational individuals. And judging from your remarks here and in previous posts on LW you seem to have a low opinion of the general level of rationality here. If you are correct in that assessment then it is even more important that you don’t trigger hostile emotions in the people you are trying to convince.
“Demanding that cryonicists produce a successful revival before you’ll credit the possibility of cryonics, is logically rude; specifically, it is a demand for particular proof.
A successful cryonics revival performed with modern-day technology is not a piece of evidence you could possibly expect modern cryonicists to provide, even given that the proposition of interest is true. The whole point of cryonics is as an ambulance ride to the future; to take advantage of the asymmetry between the technology needed to successfully preserve a patient (cryoprotectants, liquid nitrogen storage) and the technology needed to revive a patient (probably molecular nanotechnology).
Given that you don’t currently have molecular nanotechnology, you can’t reasonably expect to revive a cryonics patient today even given that they could in fact be revived using future molecular nanotechnology.
You are entitled to arguments, though not that particular proof, and cryonicists have done their best to provide you with whatever evidence can be obtained. For example:
A study on rat hippocampal slices showed that it is possible for vitrified slices cooled to a solid state at −130ºC to have viability upon re-warming comparable to that of control slices that had not been vitrified or cryopreserved. Ultrastructure of the CA1 region (the region of the brain most vulnerable to ischemic damage) of the re-warmed slices is seen to be quite well preserved compared to the ultrastructure of control CA1 tissue (24). Cryonics organizations perfuse brains with vitrification solution until saturation is achieved...
A rabbit kidney has been vitrified, cooled to −135ºC, re-warmed and transplanted into a rabbit. The formerly vitrified transplant functioned well enough as the sole kidney to keep the rabbit alive indefinitely (25)… The vitrification mixture used in preserving the rabbit kidney is known as M22. M22 is used by the cryonics organization Alcor for vitrifying cryonics subjects. Perfusion of rabbits with M22 has been shown to preserve brain ultrastructure without ice formation (26).”
In my experience, it’s quite fruitless to get into the discussion of evidence on this particular problem. That’s because it’s absolutely clear that cryonics (on current evidence) does not work. The entire argument in favor of cryonics is based on projections for future discoveries and technologies, which any cryonics proponent will admit. Thus their argument is not really an argument based on evidence—it is more of an argument based on expectation. Now, this expectation may very well be solid and well justified, but in my experience, the LW community tends to really bastardize the argument and claim that the evidence is somehow solid and well worked out. To the extent that you should dish out a lot of money, starting now. This goes so far as to the IMO absurd idea in ciphergoth’s post above, whereby he states that the burden of proof or evidence should be put on the cryonics critics.
EDIT to look at it from another angle: it’s clear that the first serve in this discussion has to come from the cryonicists, since we’re the ones trying to change people’s minds. But cryonicists have served and served and served; there’s a massive literature arguing in favour, of which I’d pick out Ben Best’s “Scientific Justification of Cryonics Practice”. If you don’t feel that anything in that literature is enough to show that cryonics might be a good idea, you’re going to have to make some sort of actual return to those serves, at least to be more specific about what you feel is missing from them that could and should be there to justify signing up. Because as I’ve shown, no-one is even trying to return any of those serves.
I understand that there is work supporting the idea that cryonics/regeneration/etc. will eventually be successful. However, I don’t feel the need to respond to this work very directly, because this work, after all, is very indirect, in the sense that it is only making plausibility arguments. As a cryonics skeptic, I am not attempting to rule out the plausibility or possibility of cryonics. After all, it seems fairly plausible that this stuff will eventually get worked out, as with the usual arguments for technological advancement. As a cryonics skeptic, I am only asserting that there is insufficient evidence that it will work for my personal freezing/revival to justify my substantial investment.
The response to this might be to claim that I am unfairly or erroneously making “demands for particular proof”. I think that this point is an intelligent point, but that it is being somewhat abused or overused in this context. In areas like physics or biology, it is completely status-quo to believe nothing except that which has been shown by fairly direct evidence. You might even abstractly characterize the entirety of professional science as an area in which “demands for particular proof” are the centralizing, unifying, distinguishing feature. Seeing as how cryonics is essentially an area of physics and biology, I view it in much the same way. I expect to see more concrete proof of its ability before being willing to believe in it, invest in it, or rely on it for my supposed personal immortality.
I understand that there is work supporting the idea that cryonics/regeneration/etc. will eventually be successful. However, I don’t feel the need to respond to this work very directly, because this work, after all, is very indirect, in the sense that it is only making plausibility arguments.
In this case, indirect evidence is the only kind of evidence you can hope to obtain, so your current conclusion has to be formed based on indirect evidence. And this applies to any conclusion. If you believe that cryonics won’t work, this is also based only on indirect evidence. It has to be.
Now, in most cases, the prior of a given idea not working is high enough, so we have a “by default” argument, believing something is impossible until proven possible. But this is a matter of framing: is it possible to implement a manned expedition to Mars, say? Is it possible to travel faster than light? The difference is always in intuitive estimation of detail that goes into the question, and what exactly is being asked matters. The “impossible by default” heuristic is a good tool, but has apparent points of failure, and you have to be aware of these where obtaining explicit evidence is not expected.
You’re saying the level of confidence to look for is one that would be appropriate for any new medical treatment, rather than (say) the confidence you’d look for when making a change in foreign policy.
One reason we’re so demanding in the realm of medical evidence is because we can be, and since it can be life and death, if we can be we probably should be. In the case of a pill, we can do an RCT, providing high quality, repeatable statistical evidence on its efficacy—so anyone proposing I take a pill who doesn’t have an RCT backing them up is a bit suspicious. In the case of cryonics, I hope it’s clear that it’s not because of a lack of respect for evidence that we’re unable to show you an RCT.
There is absolutely insufficient evidence to have the same confidence in cryonics as we do in, say, ibuprofen for reducing inflammation. Because of this lack of evidence, we have great uncertainty. What we’re trying to ask is, in the face of that uncertainty, how will you make a decision? Is it always appropriate in the medical sphere to choose inaction whenever the evidence in favour of action is only weak and circumstantial?
The response to this might be to claim that I am unfairly or erroneously making “demands for particular proof”. I think that this point is an intelligent point, but that it is being somewhat abused or overused in this context. In areas like physics or biology, it is completely status-quo to believe nothing except that which has been shown by fairly direct evidence. You might even abstractly characterize the entirety of professional science as an area in which “demands for particular proof” are the centralizing, unifying, distinguishing feature.
That’s very much not the case. If one has a hypothesis we don’t care which method of bringing evidence for that hypothesis you do as long as it is actual evidence. For example, the neutrino was originally hypothesized based on very indirect evidence. That evidence then became progressively stronger. But at no point did anyone assert that they wouldn’t accept neutrinos unless a specific experiment was performed.
So following on from my other comment, I say to you: go ahead. Perform the experiment of whether
“believe nothing except that which has been shown by fairly direct evidence.”
or
“incorporate all available evidence to arrive at probabilistic beliefs and then calculate expected utilities”
is best. Go ahead and perform it in on yourself by not getting cryo. If you do this, and cryo works, then I will be revived and know that you and many others just got proved wrong catastrophically. If cryo fails, then I will be 80 cents a day poorer and I’ll be just as dead as you.
How is that an “experiment”? You don’t get to answer any questions because of performing specifically the described actions, as opposed to performing any other actions.
You have a point about the epistemology at work in the sciences. But the founders of this rationality movement actually think that they know better, that they are smarter than the average scientist, and that they can prognosticate probabilisitically about the future.
And really, I think that in this case, it isn’t too hard to be smarter than a scientist; scientists know a lot about science and mostly nothing about philosophy of science/epistemology. Scientists (especially biologists) mostly still work with a yes/no epistemology rather than a probabilistic one and so underperform versus a good probabilistic reasoner.
In areas like physics or biology, it is completely status-quo to believe nothing except that which has been shown by fairly direct evidence.
Investment and sociological acceptance seem to me separate from the purely physical and biological aspects. For example, I am signaling optimism about the future very strongly by signing up for cryonics. Even an extremely low probability rating for cryonics working would not change this fact.
But in any case, the specific proofs needed for at least some guarded acceptance in physics and biology are already available. We know cells survive in large numbers, memories are structural (not dependent on electric fields), and vitrification limits damage (to the point that a kidney can survive in working condition). If you want to be a scientific skeptic of cryonics you need to be begin as literate of these facts and refer to reasons why you are still skeptical.
The demand for reanimation of a whole human or complex animal is far in excess of what is necessary to prove this as a good bet based on physical and biological data. The cost of ignoring the evidence in favor of cryonics that can accrue before that particular demonstration is vastly disproportionate to the cost of a false positive.
That’s because it’s absolutely clear that cryonics (on current evidence) does not work.
Doesn’t work? It quite clearly gets heads and freezes them in a static state. You appear to be demanding evidence regarding functional medical nanotechnology, a rather different problem.
The extent of qualification necessary to clearly convey a meaning on here is absolutely unfathomable. No, it’s beyond unfathomable, it’s really utter rubbish, it’s exasperating and despicable how this happens almost every time one starts a substantive disagreement.
It’s perfectly clear from context that I am referring to the entire cryonics refrigeration and revival process, but in case that wasn’t clear, let that be clearly stated now. In case that was clear and it was intentionally or subconsciously disregarded, as I must shamefully and cynically suspect, then you can simply go fuck yourself.
On the other hand I suggest I understand you perfectly and have attempted to respond to the core objection I have with your comment. That is, it is a demand for unobtainable evidence.
The entire purpose of cryonics is to freeze a person pending the availability of future technologies. If that technology was, in fact, available now it would be evidence that cryonics was unnecessary.
You make the claim:
he entire argument in favor of cryonics is based on projections for future discoveries and technologies, which any cryonics proponent will admit. Thus their argument is not really an argument based on evidence—it is more of an argument based on expectation.
There is no other interpretation that can be made of that than a demand for unobtainable evidence. You explicitly include, “Thus their argument is not really an argument based on evidence—it is more of an argument based on expectation”. That is absurd. Projections are a form of (or, if you prefer, contain and depend on) evidence. If you question those projections then you can question the evidence they have. You can not assert that they are not basing their claims on evidence just because it is evidence about the future.
In case that was clear and it was intentionally or subconsciously disregarded, as I must shamefully and cynically suspect, then you can simply go fuck yourself.
I appreciate it when people can make their aggression explicit, rather than try to foist it off via whatever mechanisms decorum allows. In this case however, I’d like to point out that I am not signed up for cryonics and, while some of the reason for that is economic and akrasiatic factors, cryonics is still not a core element of my identity. I have little vested interest in supporting cryonics but something I do seem to take personally is aggressive, fallacious argument.
If you go reread your earlier post, take some time to think through what you are really trying to say, remove the overgeneralisations and sloppy reasoning and write your position down clearly and with some semblance of respect for your audience then I will almost certainly acknowledge your point.
I am something of a cryo-skeptic because I think at best all you will get is a copy of the person who was frozen. I am much more interested in SENS-style rejuvenation efforts. But I am curious about the source of your (and Sam Adams’) skepticism. Are you of the opinion that it would be impossible to set all those frozen molecules in motion again, or impossible to make a living copy of the frozen original? Do you doubt that the important information (memory, personality...?) survives the freezing process?
Contemporary science and technology are showing that nature permits atoms to be manipulated with extraordinary precision. Of course, your molecular structure is a lot more complex and dynamic than that of Carbon Monoxide Man. But then we would hardly need to get every atom back to exactly where it was, in order to make something a lot like you. We would just need tissues grown from cells containing your genome, and then arranged in a structure grossly resembling your current body. The brain is presumably the place where certain fine details matter the most. But I really don’t see what is to stop us from growing a decerebrated body in your image (having first synthesized a copy of your genome a la Craig Venter), and then carefully filling its skull, layer by layer, with synthetic neural tissue made in imitation of the microstructure of your frozen brain, assuming that we have it available.
That is a procedure for making a copy of you; but I would tend to think that something which reanimates the frozen carcass is also possible, albeit more difficult to describe. These things are very high technology by current standards, but how to do them is not an unfathomable mystery. It’s of a level of difficulty more akin to constructing an inhabited space station that will orbit Neptune. A big engineering challenge.
It’s perfectly clear from context that I am referring to the entire cryonics refrigeration and revival process
Ok. So you are talking about the entire process. What then is your objection to the refrigeration aspect? Do you think that the information is irretrievably destroyed? Do you think that the information is not destroyed but that the body is too far damaged to ever be restored in any useful way? Do you think that the preservation process does not do a good enough job at preventing ongoing damage? Do you think that the probability of thawing due to the catastrophic events or economic problems is too high? Or do you have some other objection that I have not listed?
Thus their argument is not really an argument based on evidence—it is more of an argument based on expectation. Now, this expectation may very well be solid and well justified, but in my experience, the LW community tends to really bastardize the argument and claim that the evidence is somehow solid and well worked out.
That’s lovely and all. But how is it that my question got voted down and this nothing response got voted up?
Is it because I refer to people in cryostasis as corpse popsicles?
Let’s be frank here the arguments for cryonics are positively flaccid. If what you are banking on is based on some set of technologies not yet invented, many not even thought up yet, with no large scale tests behind your claims then this is a matter of faith not science. This is trying to make the myth of the after-life not a myth.
Cryonics to date, at least the evidence, that these popsicle people will be revived from popsicle land, which is the flip side of Mr Rogers neighborhood, is essentially 98% hand waving and 2% sketchy evidence.
The last link you posted was especially unhelpful since I am inclined to discredit the source for reasons that I have already commented on.
Er, do you have an issue with any of the arguments, rather than with Eliezer or the karma system? The only critique I can see above is the exact objection that’s discussed in the “particular proof” post, and you’re not presenting any argument against the analysis there.
I can’t claim that the karma here is unbiased, but one pattern I can point to is that LW contrarians who engage with particular objections get upvoted more than contrarians who just reiterate conclusions. I’ve pointed you to a specific argument that in rationally making important decisions under uncertainty, one has to make do with the evidence that can be gathered at the time of decision (and there really is a wealth of such evidence in the case of cryonics). Do you disagree with this general principle or with this application, and if so, on what grounds?
Well, the “nothing response” had links, and included actual facts.
As a general rule of thumb, in any online forum that uses a karma system, remarks which are polite and well written are more likely to be voted up. Remarks which are insulting or seem to be quickly typed up with little thought are more likely to be downvoted. Now, there’s also a general trend that comments which agree with the general attitude in a forum are more likely to be voted up than comments which do not. All these details apply to LW. Although LW prides itself on trying to be rational, and one could argue that comments which agree with the consensus here are simply more likely to be rational, I suspect that some amount of simply agreeing with what someone is saying does lead to upvoting. However, this seems to be less of a problem at LW than elsewhere (especially compare say Slashdot and Reddit). Now, there’s one other aspect that’s very important, the two factors (agreement with status quo, and quality of post) don’t combine in a nicely linear fashion. In particular, comments which do not seem well thought out or indicate a lack of knowledge about a topic and which go against the status quo consensus are likely to be voted down a lot.
In that regard, your repeated use of the phrase “corpse popsicles” was apparently an indication of an attempt at emotionalism, something which really doesn’t go over well at LW. Moreover, it also demonstrates a lack of detailed familiarity with cryonics since one would otherwise know that the standard derogatory pourmanteau is “corpsicle” rather than the long phrase “corpse popsicle.” (I’m under the tentative impression that this is actually a pourmanteau of corpse and icicle)
This is the sort of thing that is probably getting you voted down. It wasn’t at all clear (and after rereading what you’ve wrote still isn’t at all clear) why you discredit that source. It might help for you to state what exactly in that link you object to.
Note that comments that discuss potential problems with cryonics are not in general downvoted. For example, my comment here was not downvoted (granted a single upvote isn’t much but the point is clear).
In general when posting a comment in an environment which does not by and large support your view it is extremely important to make a comment as polite and well-reasoned as you can. Directly insulting the people one is addressing may make one feel good, but it is unlikely to actually change anyone’s opinion. Moreover, it is the sort of thing which generally causes bystanders and audiences to not favor your opinion. This will likely still be true for otherwise pretty rational individuals. And judging from your remarks here and in previous posts on LW you seem to have a low opinion of the general level of rationality here. If you are correct in that assessment then it is even more important that you don’t trigger hostile emotions in the people you are trying to convince.
There is a relatively concise rebuttal of this statement in “demands for particular proof”, which I quote:
“Demanding that cryonicists produce a successful revival before you’ll credit the possibility of cryonics, is logically rude; specifically, it is a demand for particular proof.
A successful cryonics revival performed with modern-day technology is not a piece of evidence you could possibly expect modern cryonicists to provide, even given that the proposition of interest is true. The whole point of cryonics is as an ambulance ride to the future; to take advantage of the asymmetry between the technology needed to successfully preserve a patient (cryoprotectants, liquid nitrogen storage) and the technology needed to revive a patient (probably molecular nanotechnology).
Given that you don’t currently have molecular nanotechnology, you can’t reasonably expect to revive a cryonics patient today even given that they could in fact be revived using future molecular nanotechnology.
You are entitled to arguments, though not that particular proof, and cryonicists have done their best to provide you with whatever evidence can be obtained. For example:
A study on rat hippocampal slices showed that it is possible for vitrified slices cooled to a solid state at −130ºC to have viability upon re-warming comparable to that of control slices that had not been vitrified or cryopreserved. Ultrastructure of the CA1 region (the region of the brain most vulnerable to ischemic damage) of the re-warmed slices is seen to be quite well preserved compared to the ultrastructure of control CA1 tissue (24). Cryonics organizations perfuse brains with vitrification solution until saturation is achieved...
A rabbit kidney has been vitrified, cooled to −135ºC, re-warmed and transplanted into a rabbit. The formerly vitrified transplant functioned well enough as the sole kidney to keep the rabbit alive indefinitely (25)… The vitrification mixture used in preserving the rabbit kidney is known as M22. M22 is used by the cryonics organization Alcor for vitrifying cryonics subjects. Perfusion of rabbits with M22 has been shown to preserve brain ultrastructure without ice formation (26).”
In my experience, it’s quite fruitless to get into the discussion of evidence on this particular problem. That’s because it’s absolutely clear that cryonics (on current evidence) does not work. The entire argument in favor of cryonics is based on projections for future discoveries and technologies, which any cryonics proponent will admit. Thus their argument is not really an argument based on evidence—it is more of an argument based on expectation. Now, this expectation may very well be solid and well justified, but in my experience, the LW community tends to really bastardize the argument and claim that the evidence is somehow solid and well worked out. To the extent that you should dish out a lot of money, starting now. This goes so far as to the IMO absurd idea in ciphergoth’s post above, whereby he states that the burden of proof or evidence should be put on the cryonics critics.
Could you break down your objection?
EDIT to look at it from another angle: it’s clear that the first serve in this discussion has to come from the cryonicists, since we’re the ones trying to change people’s minds. But cryonicists have served and served and served; there’s a massive literature arguing in favour, of which I’d pick out Ben Best’s “Scientific Justification of Cryonics Practice”. If you don’t feel that anything in that literature is enough to show that cryonics might be a good idea, you’re going to have to make some sort of actual return to those serves, at least to be more specific about what you feel is missing from them that could and should be there to justify signing up. Because as I’ve shown, no-one is even trying to return any of those serves.
I understand that there is work supporting the idea that cryonics/regeneration/etc. will eventually be successful. However, I don’t feel the need to respond to this work very directly, because this work, after all, is very indirect, in the sense that it is only making plausibility arguments. As a cryonics skeptic, I am not attempting to rule out the plausibility or possibility of cryonics. After all, it seems fairly plausible that this stuff will eventually get worked out, as with the usual arguments for technological advancement. As a cryonics skeptic, I am only asserting that there is insufficient evidence that it will work for my personal freezing/revival to justify my substantial investment.
The response to this might be to claim that I am unfairly or erroneously making “demands for particular proof”. I think that this point is an intelligent point, but that it is being somewhat abused or overused in this context. In areas like physics or biology, it is completely status-quo to believe nothing except that which has been shown by fairly direct evidence. You might even abstractly characterize the entirety of professional science as an area in which “demands for particular proof” are the centralizing, unifying, distinguishing feature. Seeing as how cryonics is essentially an area of physics and biology, I view it in much the same way. I expect to see more concrete proof of its ability before being willing to believe in it, invest in it, or rely on it for my supposed personal immortality.
In this case, indirect evidence is the only kind of evidence you can hope to obtain, so your current conclusion has to be formed based on indirect evidence. And this applies to any conclusion. If you believe that cryonics won’t work, this is also based only on indirect evidence. It has to be.
Now, in most cases, the prior of a given idea not working is high enough, so we have a “by default” argument, believing something is impossible until proven possible. But this is a matter of framing: is it possible to implement a manned expedition to Mars, say? Is it possible to travel faster than light? The difference is always in intuitive estimation of detail that goes into the question, and what exactly is being asked matters. The “impossible by default” heuristic is a good tool, but has apparent points of failure, and you have to be aware of these where obtaining explicit evidence is not expected.
You’re saying the level of confidence to look for is one that would be appropriate for any new medical treatment, rather than (say) the confidence you’d look for when making a change in foreign policy.
One reason we’re so demanding in the realm of medical evidence is because we can be, and since it can be life and death, if we can be we probably should be. In the case of a pill, we can do an RCT, providing high quality, repeatable statistical evidence on its efficacy—so anyone proposing I take a pill who doesn’t have an RCT backing them up is a bit suspicious. In the case of cryonics, I hope it’s clear that it’s not because of a lack of respect for evidence that we’re unable to show you an RCT.
There is absolutely insufficient evidence to have the same confidence in cryonics as we do in, say, ibuprofen for reducing inflammation. Because of this lack of evidence, we have great uncertainty. What we’re trying to ask is, in the face of that uncertainty, how will you make a decision? Is it always appropriate in the medical sphere to choose inaction whenever the evidence in favour of action is only weak and circumstantial?
That’s very much not the case. If one has a hypothesis we don’t care which method of bringing evidence for that hypothesis you do as long as it is actual evidence. For example, the neutrino was originally hypothesized based on very indirect evidence. That evidence then became progressively stronger. But at no point did anyone assert that they wouldn’t accept neutrinos unless a specific experiment was performed.
So following on from my other comment, I say to you: go ahead. Perform the experiment of whether
“believe nothing except that which has been shown by fairly direct evidence.”
or
“incorporate all available evidence to arrive at probabilistic beliefs and then calculate expected utilities”
is best. Go ahead and perform it in on yourself by not getting cryo. If you do this, and cryo works, then I will be revived and know that you and many others just got proved wrong catastrophically. If cryo fails, then I will be 80 cents a day poorer and I’ll be just as dead as you.
How is that an “experiment”? You don’t get to answer any questions because of performing specifically the described actions, as opposed to performing any other actions.
You have a point about the epistemology at work in the sciences. But the founders of this rationality movement actually think that they know better, that they are smarter than the average scientist, and that they can prognosticate probabilisitically about the future.
And really, I think that in this case, it isn’t too hard to be smarter than a scientist; scientists know a lot about science and mostly nothing about philosophy of science/epistemology. Scientists (especially biologists) mostly still work with a yes/no epistemology rather than a probabilistic one and so underperform versus a good probabilistic reasoner.
Investment and sociological acceptance seem to me separate from the purely physical and biological aspects. For example, I am signaling optimism about the future very strongly by signing up for cryonics. Even an extremely low probability rating for cryonics working would not change this fact.
But in any case, the specific proofs needed for at least some guarded acceptance in physics and biology are already available. We know cells survive in large numbers, memories are structural (not dependent on electric fields), and vitrification limits damage (to the point that a kidney can survive in working condition). If you want to be a scientific skeptic of cryonics you need to be begin as literate of these facts and refer to reasons why you are still skeptical.
The demand for reanimation of a whole human or complex animal is far in excess of what is necessary to prove this as a good bet based on physical and biological data. The cost of ignoring the evidence in favor of cryonics that can accrue before that particular demonstration is vastly disproportionate to the cost of a false positive.
Doesn’t work? It quite clearly gets heads and freezes them in a static state. You appear to be demanding evidence regarding functional medical nanotechnology, a rather different problem.
The extent of qualification necessary to clearly convey a meaning on here is absolutely unfathomable. No, it’s beyond unfathomable, it’s really utter rubbish, it’s exasperating and despicable how this happens almost every time one starts a substantive disagreement.
It’s perfectly clear from context that I am referring to the entire cryonics refrigeration and revival process, but in case that wasn’t clear, let that be clearly stated now. In case that was clear and it was intentionally or subconsciously disregarded, as I must shamefully and cynically suspect, then you can simply go fuck yourself.
On the other hand I suggest I understand you perfectly and have attempted to respond to the core objection I have with your comment. That is, it is a demand for unobtainable evidence.
The entire purpose of cryonics is to freeze a person pending the availability of future technologies. If that technology was, in fact, available now it would be evidence that cryonics was unnecessary.
You make the claim:
There is no other interpretation that can be made of that than a demand for unobtainable evidence. You explicitly include, “Thus their argument is not really an argument based on evidence—it is more of an argument based on expectation”. That is absurd. Projections are a form of (or, if you prefer, contain and depend on) evidence. If you question those projections then you can question the evidence they have. You can not assert that they are not basing their claims on evidence just because it is evidence about the future.
You’re Entitled to Arguments, But Not (That Particular) Proof.
I appreciate it when people can make their aggression explicit, rather than try to foist it off via whatever mechanisms decorum allows. In this case however, I’d like to point out that I am not signed up for cryonics and, while some of the reason for that is economic and akrasiatic factors, cryonics is still not a core element of my identity. I have little vested interest in supporting cryonics but something I do seem to take personally is aggressive, fallacious argument.
If you go reread your earlier post, take some time to think through what you are really trying to say, remove the overgeneralisations and sloppy reasoning and write your position down clearly and with some semblance of respect for your audience then I will almost certainly acknowledge your point.
I am something of a cryo-skeptic because I think at best all you will get is a copy of the person who was frozen. I am much more interested in SENS-style rejuvenation efforts. But I am curious about the source of your (and Sam Adams’) skepticism. Are you of the opinion that it would be impossible to set all those frozen molecules in motion again, or impossible to make a living copy of the frozen original? Do you doubt that the important information (memory, personality...?) survives the freezing process?
Contemporary science and technology are showing that nature permits atoms to be manipulated with extraordinary precision. Of course, your molecular structure is a lot more complex and dynamic than that of Carbon Monoxide Man. But then we would hardly need to get every atom back to exactly where it was, in order to make something a lot like you. We would just need tissues grown from cells containing your genome, and then arranged in a structure grossly resembling your current body. The brain is presumably the place where certain fine details matter the most. But I really don’t see what is to stop us from growing a decerebrated body in your image (having first synthesized a copy of your genome a la Craig Venter), and then carefully filling its skull, layer by layer, with synthetic neural tissue made in imitation of the microstructure of your frozen brain, assuming that we have it available.
That is a procedure for making a copy of you; but I would tend to think that something which reanimates the frozen carcass is also possible, albeit more difficult to describe. These things are very high technology by current standards, but how to do them is not an unfathomable mystery. It’s of a level of difficulty more akin to constructing an inhabited space station that will orbit Neptune. A big engineering challenge.
Ok. So you are talking about the entire process. What then is your objection to the refrigeration aspect? Do you think that the information is irretrievably destroyed? Do you think that the information is not destroyed but that the body is too far damaged to ever be restored in any useful way? Do you think that the preservation process does not do a good enough job at preventing ongoing damage? Do you think that the probability of thawing due to the catastrophic events or economic problems is too high? Or do you have some other objection that I have not listed?
Expectation can only be obtained based on currently available indirect evidence.
What ought we discuss if not evidence?
Cryonics either works, or does not; there’s no way for it to work “on current evidence” but not work on some other set of evidence. Perhaps you mean that cryonics hasn’t worked yet, but this is also what you would expect to see if it would eventually work.
In part, this seems to merely be a disagreement over the definition of “evidence”.