The Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Cryonics Institute and of The Immortalist Society will be held this year on the last Sunday of September -- September 25, 2005 -- at 2pm at the CI Facility in Michigan. I highly recommend for CI Members to attend the meeting, especially those who have not attended before. The CI Facility has changed in the last year and is well worth seeing. It is also good to meet the CI Directors, Officers and staff and other CI Members, as well as seeing a business meeting in which the issues facing us are discussed.

CI has too many voting Members living outside of Michigan for there to be an election of Directors at the AGM. So proxies will be mailed in August. Up for re-election are Joe Kowalsky, SR Luyckx, John de Rivaz and myself. Any CI Voting Member (ie, those with fully-funded contracts, and for Option Two, Membership longer than two years) is eligible to run for Director. Any CI Voting Member who wants to be a candidate should submit a self-description (100 words or less) that also explains the contributions the Member could make as a CI Director. Statements must be received before Friday, August 19.

Suspended Animation, the cryonics organization with whom CI now has a contract for Standby and Transport, has moved into their new building at Boynton Beach, Florida. Whereas they were having trouble obtaining permits for their operations at Boca Raton, the Boyton Beach city council has approved all required permits. Visitors are welcome at their new building and an Open House is expected in the near future. Their new website is http://www.suspendedinc.com

For CI Members to benefit from Suspended Animation Standby and Transport requires partial prepayment. Those who cannot afford to prepay, and who only fund through insurance, can get an Advanced Death Benefit Rider on their insurance policy. Insurance policies with this Rider pay money in advance of death to people who have been given a diagnosis of a few months to live. This will be discussed in more detail in future issues of THE IMMORTALIST.

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We recently received correspondence from a British Columbia official that makes the prospects for cryonics arrangements in that Canadian province look more grim than ever. Although we have formerly been told that it is only illegal to market cryonics in British Columbia, it appears that an increasingly strict interpretation may be made of the wording of the legislation, which states that "A person must not offer for sale, or sell, an arrangement for the preservation or storage of human remains that is based on cryonics" which literally means that cryonics is completely illegal in BC.

This is what any reasonable person would think when reading the law (and what any reasonable lawyer would think when advising others -- such as hospitals --what is legal):

http://www.legis.gov.bc.ca/37th5th/1st_read/gov03-1.htm#section014

Also, after consulting with David Ettinger, I have changed one of our pieces of paperwork -- both the name and content: "Rider A, Version 1" and "Rider A, Version 2" are now the "Non-Suspension Rider". The former name was hardly intuitive, and I never could remember which version was which. The Non-Suspension Rider gives more choices. If you die in a plane crash, are lost at sea, are missing in action or standing in a World Trade Center building at the time it collapses (as happened to one cryonicist), then you should make arrangements for where your funding should go if you are not cryopreserved.

The Non-Suspension agreement gives you the option to leave the money to CI (which can be a directed donation to research or pre-payment to someone in need or available for CI's greatest needs) OR to leave the money as pre-payment for some specified other person OR to make some specific person the beneficiary OR to leave the money to your estate:

http://www.cryonics.org/NonSuspensionRider.html

Tuesday, June 14, we had a film crew from Japan at the CI facility. They did interviews and filmed every piece of equipment they could find in the building (plus the bulk tank in the rear).

Evidently a famous Japanese entertainer is just turning 50 and (according to Confucius), at that age one begins to reflect upon one's mortality more seriously. The program is oriented toward letting the entertainer know that there are other options besides burial and cremation. We had a mockup of a patient on a board and a name plate for the entertainer.

Although there is undoubtedly a light-hearted tone to this program, the film crew showed an intense interest in all of the technical aspects of cryonics. I answered their questions in detail. So there may be considerable discussion of the technical aspects within the context of the program. The show was broadcast on June 30 in Tokyo, TBS, channel 16.

Hospitals are institutions designed to cure those who are sick. The first hospice was established near London, England in 1967 as an institution to handle the special needs of the terminally ill. The objective of the hospice is to neither hasten nor postpone death, but to provide relief of pain and emotional support to the dying.

The first hospice was established in the United States in Connecticut in 1974. American hospices now number in the thousands. For those who are over 65 years of age and have a prognosis of less than six months to live, hospice care is paid for by the Medicare Hospice Benefit. Most hospice patients receive their care in the home of a relative or friend, where they can receive the emotional support of friends and family - an important element of the hospice concept.

Terminally-ill cryonicists also have special needs which are best provided for in the home. Standby equipment and personnel can be ready and waiting for the (legally) fatal moment. Death can be pronounced by a nurse, paramedic or (in certain states) by a family member. Speedy pronouncement means speedy application of cool down and cardiopulmonary support. I was able to participatein a home hospice case in Toronto, Canada in the Fall of 2002:

To have a home hospice means locating and working with a licensed Home Health Agency Serving Terminally Ill Patients. To locate such an agency in your city and state you can go to The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization website:

http://www.nhpco.org/custom/directory/index_program.cfm?program=HHA_SERVE_TRMILL

Some cryonicists have the hope of creating a hospice that specializes in care for terminally-ill cryonicists. If our movement continues to grow, cryonics-related hospices are inevitable, given our highly specialized needs and given the urgency of those needs.

At the end of June, 2005, the Cryonics Institute had 529 Members of known location and one "lost" Member. By country, the 529 Members can be classified as follows:

392 United States

50 United Kingdom

23 Australia

19 CANADA

10 Germany

9 Netherlands

4 Spain

3 Sweden

2 Belgium

2 New Zealand

2 Singapore

1 Austria

1 Chile

1 Denmark

1 France

1 Greece

1 Italy

1 Japan

1 Lithuania

1 Malta

1 Mexico

1 Russia

1 Switzerland

1 Ukraine

Within Australia:

9 New South Wales

6 Victoria

3 Queensland

3 Western Australia

1 South Australia

1 Tasmania

Within Canada:

7 British Columbia

7 Ontario

3 Province of Quebec

2 Alberta

Within the United Kingdom:

7 London

5 Somerset

4 East Sussex

4 Kent

3 Staffordshire

3 Westmidlands

2 Bedsfordshire

2 Cornwall

2 Isle of Man

2 Middlesex

2 Nottinghamshire

1 Avon (Manchester)

1 Buckinghamshire

1 Essex

1 Hertfordshire

1 Manchester

1 Merseyside (Liverpool)

1 North Somerset

1 Northumberland

1 Scotland

1 Suffolk

1 West Sussex

1 West Yorkshire

1 Wiltshire

1 Worcestershire

Within the United States:

50 California

42 Florida

39 Michigan

34 New York

31 Texas

15 Colorado

14 Kentucky

12 Arizona

11 Washington

10 Illinois

10 Indiana

10 Massachusetts

9 North Carolina

8 Pennsylvania

7 Georgia

7 Louisiana

7 New Jersey

6 Ohio

5 Alaska

5 Maryland

5 Maine

4 New Hampshire

4 Virginia

4 Wisconsin

3 Iowa

3 Missouri

3 Montana

3 Nevada

3 Utah

2 Connecticut

2 Hawaii

2 Kansas

2 Minnesota

2 Mississippi

2 Nebraska

2 New Mexico

2 Oregon

2 Tennessee

1 Alabama

1 Idaho

1 Oklahoma

1 South Carolina

1 West Virginia

1 Wyoming

4 in the United States are in the military (no state)

Ben Best

That’s according to researchers at SUNY, Stony Brook. Their findings, reported in NEWSDAY, state that you are younger, or at least act younger, than your parents did when they were your age.

Why? Because the average person has even more years to live as the clock ticks onward, and that perception makes people live with a younger outlook. Researchers have added sand to the hourglass by looking at aging in a different way. Instead of focusing on how many years you've lived, they think society should concentrate on how many years one has left, he said. When they did this analysis with demography statistics over a 140-year period, they found Americans are getting younger while growing older.

In 2000, the average American was 35.3 years old, with 43.5 years left to live.

Turn back the hands of time to 1960 when the average age was 29.6. Calculations show they had 43.6 years - ahead of them. We're not any older in the sense that we have around the same number of years ahead of us than those 29-year-olds in 1960. But we're not -behaving like we are 5.7 years older, either." Jumping ahead to 2020, the average age will be 37.7, a little more than two years older than today. But that person will have 44.4 years ahead of him. "So he is actually younger. It's not just a numbers game, either. As people have more years to live, they have to plan their lives differently. They behave as if they are younger.

Bruce Klein has a 20 min. DVD preview of the Immortality Institute (ImmInst) film "Exploring Life Extension." For more information, reply to his email address (bjk@imminst.org) Also, he hopes we will join him at ImmInst's first Life Extension Conference in Atlanta, GA - Nov 5, 2005. Here’s the program:

Anti-aging - de Grey

Artificial Heart - Houghton

Artificial Intelligence - Yudkowsky

Brain-computer Interfacing - Passaro

Cryobiology - Wowk

Cryonics - Merkle

Cryonics Affordability - Hoffman

Design for Change - Vita-More

Diachronous Self - More

Immortalizing Brains - Goertzel

Neurological Remediation - Hughes

Technology Studies - Arrison

http://www.imminst.org/conference

We had hoped to be able to report on some details of their operation as well as have photos of their new staff and building for this issue, but Charles Platt tells us that they’re still a few weeks away from completion.

President Ben Best

Vice President Robert Ettinger

Secretary Royce Brown

Treasurer Pat Heller

Royse Brown, Alan Mole, Pat Heller, John Strickland, Alan Sinclair, SR Luyckx, Joe Kowalsky, Ben Best, Constance Ettinger, Robert Ettinger, John deRivaz, Jim Fitzgerald

If you are a CI member and your address has changed, please call us at 586-791-5961 or e-mail CI at the earliest possible opportunity at

cryonics@cryonics.org.

Also, if the state of your health has changed and you may be in a life-threatening situation, OR if insurance policy coverage or other funding of your cryonics suspension contract has changed, please contact and update CI as soon as possible.

If you are NOT a CI member, and you or a loved one is in a life threatening situation and you are considering last-minute cryonics suspension services, please first visit our new Emergency Pages at www.cryonics.org/emergency.htm

Disclaimer: The publishers and editors of this publication do not knowingly print any misinformation, but do not necessarily vouch for the quality or safety of any products or services mentioned herein

The closing dates for submissions for 2005 are Jan.1, March 1, May 1, July 1, Sept.1, and Nov.1 Advertisements may now be placed in The lmmortalist. For pricing and other details, please contact us at: jbull@cfl.rr.com

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President York Porter

Vice President Robert Ettinger

Secretary Royse Brown

Treasurer John Besancon

By John Bull

hat’s the beginning of a Book Preview in a recent FORTUNE (May 30, 2005.) The preview and book by Joel Garreau is RADICAL EVOLUTION: The Promise and Peril of Enhancing our Minds, our Bodies—and What it Means to Be Human, published by Doubleday

The preview begins by envisioning a world where students find themselves segregated by whether or not their bodies have been "enhanced." Those enhanced students have creative and thinking abilities unheard of previously. They have photographic memories, can read a book in minutes, and have total recall. They talk casually about living a very long time. They practice telepathy routinely, sharing thoughts no matter how far apart. They can go for a week without sleep.

Those students, who don’t take advantage of this new technology, are dubbed the "naturals" because they believe it’s not natural to become "enhanced." They find themselves at an increasing disadvantage in dealing with the ‘enhanced," even to the point of having a simple conversation with them.

He writes about technologies that can alter our minds, our personalities, our memories, and our metabolisms. It goes on to report on the military’s interest in the technology: Limb regeneration, controlled bleeding on the battlefield and pain control.

Against this backdrop, getting frozen for later rejuvenation/reanimation sounds pretty routine. One would think they’d be pretty receptive to the concept of cryonics.