Thanks for the kind comments on my book, Emlyn.
At 11:24 AM 19/04/99 +1000, Emlyn wrote:
>I especially loved the chapter about Black Holists, mostly for the tone
>of the discussion. I'm not usually one for wholesale bagging of people,
>but when the execution is so artful...
This is the very chapter that most offended James Bradley in his *Age* review, who found it evidence of a `deep-seated intellectual intolerance'. Of New Age drivel? Yessir, your Honor, guilty as charged!
< speaking of immortality when among the old: >
>How insulting is this to a person of, say, 80 years? Really, I'm writing
>them off, as part of the doomed past, so near and yet so far. It makes me
>feel like a heel
I feel that way, too, but there's an option for the old - not a very good one yet, I suspect, but it's there: cryonic suspension. And if they don't know about it because nobody's bothered to inform them, they'll die permanently. What a waste. (That said, I'm not signed up for freezing myself. Shocking evasion.)
>What do other list members think about this? I'd be *especially*
>interested in the opinions of older members.
I'm a comparatively old fart, and my sister is married to a guy in his 70s. The sooner we decrepit old dogs shake a leg and insist on work being done in longevity and cryostasis research, the better chance everyone will have of living a decent length of time, like at least a few thousand years. Being embarrassed to raise the topic isn't going to make death go away.
Damien Broderick