Add a question about cryonics to distinguish technical feasibility estimate from total probability estimate (the current P(Cryonics) question). This distinction is important, as the results of past surveys are sometimes misleadingly cited as talking about technical feasibility. Something like this could work:
P(Cryonics | No external defeaters) What is the probability that at some future time, it will become technically feasible to successfully restore to life an average person cryonically frozen today, conditional on no global catastrophe and on the storage facility remaining functional (in some form)?
(I replaced “will be restored” with “feasible”, since I suspect it might be morally suboptimal to restore frozen humans as opposed to doing something else, which is a factor unrelated to technical feasibility. The “in some form” is intended to address hypothetical change in form of storage, such as plastination or uploading, taking place before the “restore to life” point.)
I think it should count for the purposes of this question (which is about technology, not values/motivation, and reasonableness of a cost depends on values). But since the question is about what happens eventually in the hypothetical where we don’t ever run out of time, I guess eventually the cost will become reasonable (in some sense).
But since the question is about what happens eventually in the hypothetical where we don’t ever run out of time, I guess eventually the cost will become reasonable (in some sense).
Are assuming that the economy will grow forever, so that one billion present-day dollars will eventually become an arbitrarily small fraction of the economy? Unless we colonize other planets within a very few centuries, I don’t think that’s possible.
Add a question about cryonics to distinguish technical feasibility estimate from total probability estimate (the current P(Cryonics) question). This distinction is important, as the results of past surveys are sometimes misleadingly cited as talking about technical feasibility. Something like this could work:
P(Cryonics | No external defeaters)
What is the probability that at some future time, it will become technically feasible to successfully restore to life an average person cryonically frozen today, conditional on no global catastrophe and on the storage facility remaining functional (in some form)?
(I replaced “will be restored” with “feasible”, since I suspect it might be morally suboptimal to restore frozen humans as opposed to doing something else, which is a factor unrelated to technical feasibility. The “in some form” is intended to address hypothetical change in form of storage, such as plastination or uploading, taking place before the “restore to life” point.)
Would a future where it would be possible to restore a cryo patient but it’d cost the equivalent of one billion present-day dollars per patient count?
I think it should count for the purposes of this question (which is about technology, not values/motivation, and reasonableness of a cost depends on values). But since the question is about what happens eventually in the hypothetical where we don’t ever run out of time, I guess eventually the cost will become reasonable (in some sense).
Are assuming that the economy will grow forever, so that one billion present-day dollars will eventually become an arbitrarily small fraction of the economy? Unless we colonize other planets within a very few centuries, I don’t think that’s possible.
(I left a comment on a new version of the question.)