CURTIS HENDERSON - Alcor Life Extension Foundation

John is a happy-go-lucky guy on a very seriousmission to circumvent the need for cryonicsaltogether by annihilating death._______________________________________mainstream researchers now seem to be“getting it,” John is excited about the potentialfor pushing aging therapies such as hisforward more easily by passing off theirfurther development to these researchers.Most recently, John has taken this strategyto the next level with a new non-profit calledLivly. Livly focuses on enabling other immortaliststo start their own projects by makingused lab equipment available to interested individualswith ideas for potentially ultra-highimpact life extension projects.” Did you have anew idea for how to cure cancer in the bathtub, but don’t have the $100,000 to get a biolabstarted?,” John asks. “Just come over and useLivly’s gear. Human cell culture, immunology,synthetic biology – we have it all. You willremain in full control of the project and yourintellectual property; all we want is to help yousave everybody’s lives.”John joined Alcor in May 2007. He knewhe wanted to become a member for a longtime but says he needed to understand thefinancing before he decided to sign up. “Thecost quoted on the website seemed so highthat cryonics always seemed like a remotedream that I might be able to afford at theend of my life or maybe never.”But then he found out about financinghis cryonics arrangements through lifeinsurance. John felt like he was winning thelottery when he found this out. As soon ashe realized he could afford his arrangementsnow, he signed up immediately. Johntells this funny anecdote to illustrate howamazing this revelation seemed to him atthe time:“When I was very little, maybe 5 years ofage, I learned about insurance. I thoughtinsurance actually protects you – fire insurancemakes sure your house can never burn,theft insurance makes sure nobody can eversteal from you, etc. So then I heard about lifeinsurance. Great! Problem solved! When Igrow up I’ll get that to protect me from death.Mission accomplished! I proudly told myparents about this plan. They explained to methat insurance didn’t quite work that way. Iwas devastated. Now what? Decades later,when I met cryonics life-insurance agent RudiHoffman at a conference, I finally discoveredthat my parents had been wrong this one time.When used for cryonics, life insurance actuallymight just save your life directly.”But, like every cryonicist, John does havehis concerns about the challenges facing cryonicsand how they might be solved. First, hequestions how stable cryonics organizationscan be over the long run in times of technology-drivenchange or other, unforeseenchanges the future may hold. He also wondershow much time between post-legal death andsuspension is acceptable without causingunacceptable loss of personal information inthe brain, and whether cryonics as practicedtoday actually preserves enough informationto reconstruct a patient’s personality. Lastly,he wonders what we would do if cryonicssuddenly became wildly popular and 100million people showed up and demandedpreservation arrangements. These are allquestions that cryonics and cryonicists havestruggled with over the years, and there are noJohn and other young cryonicists showtheir appreciation for resveratrol-containingred wine at the Teens and Twentiescryonics conference hosted by theLife Extension Foundation.(From left: Michael Maier, John Schloendorn,Chana de Wolf, and Michael Smith.)_______________________________________easy answers. But John quickly points out thatcryonics questions can actually be addressedby research, and, of course, strongly supportsresearch efforts in the field.John says that his cryonics plans have notimpacted his lifestyle so far, simply becausehis lifestyle explicitly incorporates plans forlongevity. John feels that he’s too young to dieand hopes to survive in another way via technologiessuch as stem cell therapy oruploading. However, he acknowledges thataccidents happen and he doesn’t necessarilyknow the best way to handle that possibility.“...it does pose problems for making sure thatI die in a way that allows the most efficientsuspension,” he says. “Right now I’m more orless ignoring this problem, and that’s notgood.” He does wear his Alcor bracelet,though, and his social network consists ofother cryonicists. To further improve theirchances in case of an emergency, John and hisfriends also interact regularly with Alcorreadiness and response teams and attendtraining sessions when possible.Obviously, these days most of John’sfriends are also cryonicists or life extensionstswith no qualms about his cryonics arrangements.“Most of my friends love it,” heclaims. “The immortalist community is largeand growing fast.” In fact, it has grown so fastthat John socializes almost exclusively withthose who share his vision. “Even though it isvery pleasant, I can’t afford interacting toomuch with people who don’t share the goal –my life is at stake, after all!” John explains. “Ineed the synergy of being around fellowimmortalists.”And synergy he has found. Being anaging researcher intimately involved in thecommunity, John meets other Alcor members,immortalists, and life extensiontists all thetime. In fact, he says that almost everyone heknows wants to live forever very badly, and issigned up or has plans to sign up.Where John grew up, in Germany, hecould relate to people in terms of personalstyle and had many friends there. But, Johnlaments, “it was always hard to find a way toexperience true personally meaningful interactionwith people who wish for me andthemselves to die.” Since John has beenaround other immortalists in Arizona andCalifornia, he has finally discovered what itmeans to connect with people on this level,and he highly recommends it. “If there arereally people reading this who have never metother Alcor members,” John proclaims, “Ihave only one piece of advice – try it!” ■www.alcor.org Cryonics/Third Quarter 200917