TechCentralStation has two more sympathetic pieces from (unsurprisingly) folks at Cato and Reason (Ron Bailey).

And Kevin McGehee has some thoughts on the implications for souls. To the degree that I believe in souls (not very much), I agree with him. If souls exist, God determines when they leave the body–not doctors or lawyers, and if a body is frozen with the prospect of being reanimated later, I suspect that God’s smart enough to know that, and leave it in place until the situation changes in some way. If not, He doesn’t really live up to His reputation for being omniscient.

I received another comment questioning our right to “impose ourselves on the future.” The quick response is that you impose yourself on the future with every day that you decide to continue to live, instead of tossing yourself off a bridge. The distinction between cryonics, and other means of preserving and extending life, including simply continuing to breathe, is an artificial and arbitrary one.

Along those lines, unlike Jay Manifold, Kevin Holtsberry (who’s having a problem with Trackback) sees a fundamental conflict between cryonics and Christianity.

If cryongenics [sic] was just a way to help people live longer more productive lives, fine. But it is not, it is perserving your body in hopes that someday they can bring you back to life.

In what way does this differ from keeping someone in a coma on life support? Does Mr. Holtsberry propose that we pull the plug on them?

This is quite clearly an unwillingness to accept death. The reference to Lazarus gets us nowhere because that was Christ – God incarnate – using a miracle to teach those around him. Using this to imply that we should go around trying to raise people from the dead is a stretch and one that assumes we should play God. At least Jesus raised Lazarus within a relatively short period of time. Cyrogenics [sic] is not going to raise someone any time soon.

We have a problem of terminology here. Cryonicists don’t propose to “raise people from the dead.” Simply put, they don’t accept that they are dead–just that they are badly broken, and beyond the help of current medical technology to restore them to full function.

Many people who die are allowed to do so, by not taking heroic measures at the end. In the process of cryopreservation, a well-performed procedure in fact involves restarting the heart, so that the necessary preserving fluids can be circulated properly throughout the body. So in what sense is someone in this state “dead”?

Once you get past the notion that death is an objectively-verifiable state (it’s not) then the whole notion of “raising the dead” disappears, and it’s simply another medical procedure designed to, at least ultimately, cure the patient of what ails him. The fact that the functional deterioration, and even absence, is great is mitigated by the fact that future medical technology may be even greater.

At base, cyrongenics [sic] is not life affirming but rather worships life on earth as the end all be all. Those who have faith in a better life beyond this earthly one will not choose to escape thier finite nature and cheat death via technology. Christ death and resurection has already cheated death. Those that accept that gift need not freeze themselves in hope of an earthly solution.

Well, as I said above, if we accept that the unearthly solution is to be preferred, why wait? Why not just end it all now?

How is a cryonic suspension different than prescribing an anti-biotic, or performing a heart transplant, or putting someone with severe brain damage on life support? Which medical technologies does Kevin consider “cheating death,” and which ones will he therefore abjure if the circumstances arise? Will he avoid taking anti-malarial pills before a trip to the tropics, so he doesn’t appear to be thwarting God’s possible will that he die a feverish death? If he’s injured in a car accident, and is conscious, will he beg the doctor, amid the hemmorhaging, not to stitch him up, because it reeks of hubris, and he’s content, even eager to reach the hereafter?

If God objects to any of these things, including cryonic suspension, I presume that he will make his objections known in some divine manner. So far though, medical science continues to advance.

I should point out (and should have pointed out earlier) that almost all of these philosophical issues have been treated extensively in a book by Dr. Mike Perry, titled Forever For All: Moral Philosophy, Cryonics, and the Scientific Prospects for Immortality. He is associated with Alcor. His book assumes the materialist premise, but I suspect he treats souls at least on a theoretical basis, as Kevin did at the post referenced above (since there’s really no other way to treat them).

[Update, a few minutes later]

I see there’s also a post over at Samizdata (which has finally gotten off of blogspot) on the subject.