Comment by Dennis_Gorelik2 on Justified Expectation of Pleasant Surprises · 2009-01-15T08:38:10.000Z · LW · GW

I would definitely prefer the world where I know about my potential future as much as possible. If I don't know something, then the chances are significantly higher that I will be screwed up about that something. If I know -- I at least partially in control my life. If I don't know -- somebody else is in control of my life, or even worse -- nobody is in control at all.

From evolution standpoint it's beneficial to have good idea about potential future. That's why evolution benefits individuals who want to know. That means that overall we should enjoy more the situation when we know what to expect.

Comment by Dennis_Gorelik2 on You Only Live Twice · 2008-12-13T02:06:31.000Z · LW · GW

Eliezer,

Cryonics is usually funded through life insurance.

So, Cryonics is the way for life insurance companies not to pay immediately in case if your body is frozen. Instead they would pay for keeping your dead body in frozen form and then quit paying after ~50 years when all your close relatives are dead.

Pumping someone full of cryoprotectant and gradually lowering their temperature until they can be stored in liquid nitrogen is not a secure way to erase a person.

Exactly. What are the chances that typical information that is [not securely] deleted today will be even tried to be restored? The chances are close to zero. The chances that average frozen body would be tried to be restored are close to zero too.

That if you let yourself die, people who aren't even born yet will be sad for the irreplaceable thing that was lost.

Not true. People are perfectly replaceable (for example, by other people).

Would you like thousands of Middle Ages' peasants around you? Would you like to deal with their deceases? Would you spend your time and efforts resurrecting them instead of working on cloning the most advanced versions of human beings and/or AGIs?

Would you like to get thousands of modern Rwandan refugees around you right now?

Not signing up for cryonics - what does that say? That you've lost hope in the future.

Not really. I believe that the future would be better than the present. I also believe that people (or AGIs) in the future would be rational and wouldn't maintain informational junk in high quantity. ("Informational junk" = lots of frozen bodies).

I want you to live.

"to live" or "to be frozen to death"?