The Cryonics Society:
An Introduction
What is The Cryonics Society?
The Cryonics Society is a nonprofit organization funded by tax-deductible donations. It was founded by businessman Nick Pavlica, attorney Bruce Waugh, and writer and consultant David Pascal. Its goal is to gain public support for cryonics and for cryonics-related research by educating the public about its value and benefits.
The Society was initially conceived as a way for the cryonics community to deal with the real threat that negative press coverage posed to cryonics at the time– in particular, the events that followed the media circus surrounding the suspension of Ted Williams.
Williams’ suspension led to anti-cryonics legislation being proposed in Arizona by state representative Bob Stump.
Even though an independent Michigan-based provider called the Cryonics Institute had no connection with the Williams case, Michigan legislators soon followed suit, and passed a Cease and Desist order forbidding the Cryonics Institute from providing suspension services during its investigation. The investigation led to the Cryonics Institute now being regulated as a cemetery.
The plans of another cryonics firm, Suspended Animation, to build a facility at Boca Raton were shut down by a City Council ruling.
It seemed for a moment as though an anti-cryonics trend might well put an end to the emerging science and the movement that had slowly grown up around it. Clearly an effort was needed to counteract media hysteria and misinformation, and to replace it with facts and with a better-presented well-reasoned moral and intellectual case for cryonics.
To the founders of the Cryonics Society, it was obvious that if the cryonics community didn’t start doing a better job of promoting itself, it would cease to exist. Cryonics had to present itself to the public in a more positive way.
There was also the fact that cryonics has a long history of promoting itself badly. Even today, after forty years of receiving more publicity than the moon landing, barely 3,000 people have signed up, and the number of cryonics patients under organizational care still remains only in the hundreds.
Existing cryonics promotional efforts are a tragic record of failure. Cryonics is still viewed by many people as little more than science fiction or a scam. The Ted Williams case showed how easily that failure could put an end not just to existing cryonics patients but to cryonics itself.
So the Cryonics Society was formed. To better safeguard and promote cryonics.
What Does The Cryonics Society Do?
We work pro-actively in a variety of ways to provide a clear non-technical case for supporting cryonics to the general public. We strive to provide positive accurate up-to-date information about cryonics to the media and the public. We serve as an unaffiliated non-profit resource for responsible journalists and officials.
We’ve gotten calls for information from CNN, the Washington Post, and other groups and journalists.
We issue press releases, we network with people in the field and with the public. We try to make the public aware of organizations that are questionable, such as Sibirsky Marmont and Cryonics Institute Germany, and warn them about problematic ones, like Kriorus. We also assist people who are searching for valid providers and direct them without favoritism to Alcor, CI. Tomorrow.bio or other legitimate organizations.
We also make active marketing efforts on behalf of cryonics. The Cryonics Society is responsible for history’s first pro-cryonics direct mail campaign, which reached over 30,000 people. Our pro-cryonics articles appear in mainstream magazines – one, in Mensa Journal, reached a prime target readership of over 50,000. A podcast interview done with one of our principals with writer Steve Cobbs went out to a projected listenership of 200,000 people.
We continue to maintain and develop our well-reviewed web site (www.cryonicssociety.org) which at times has averaged thousands of visits per week.
The site uniquely hosts an Assets Preservation page, helping those interested in post-recovery financial stability, and in the financial aspect of cryonics generally. It is also developing section of papers and articles focusing on cultural and social aspects of the cryonics phenomenon.
An Independent Voice
Are we supported by, or otherwise financially beholden to, existing cryonics providers? No. The Cryonics Society is not sponsored or funded by any other organization in the field. We are completely independent.
We’ve managed to do what we’ve done so far only because of support and tax-deductible donations from Society members and the generosity of individuals who support further cryonics development. What we do is possible only because people who care about the survival of cryonics support us with their contributions.
The concern of cryonics providers is, quite properly, on how to best provide an essentially technical, medical, service. Our focus is more cultural. We look at how cryonics is perceived, how it presents itself, what supports or blocks its public acceptance, and, of course, how to improve those perceptions and that presentation.
The technical problems cryonics faces are slowly but surely being solved. The social problem of winning public support for cryonics remains, and it is the key problem keeping cryonics from public acceptance.
Seventy years of conventional approaches have failed utterly to move either the public or the bulk of the scientific community, yet the cryonics leadership continue to apply the same failed approaches. The Cryonics Society is trying to think past and push past those boundaries.
Making cryonics work isn’t just a technological problem. It’s a social problem. We need to solve that social problem if we want to survive.
Advocacy Not Controversy
Unfortunately, the reality is that literally every major existing cryonics provider has gotten a wealth of negative and critical press. They’ve endured legal investigations, bureaucratic interference, misrepresentations, and outright mockery and abuse. Whether they’re innocent or not is not the point.
Moreover, existing cryonics providers are companies that offer a product and work hard to make a profit. They’re here to beat the competition, not support it. This inevitably leaves cryonics looking, to some, like a scam, and its providers like hucksters.
Businessman and cryonics advocate David Pizer once wrote, “I have always felt that a cryonics organization that does NOT do suspensions and does NOT collect money when someone dies, is a good organization to have around for political and legal battles should they come up, as people who often oppose cryonics point to the money the suspension companies take in when they do a suspension.”
He’s right. So where’s the organization that fits that criteria?
Right here: the Cryonics Society.
The Cryonics Society is focused on promoting cryonics and nothing else. Its people have professional marketing skills, backgrounds, and experience. It isn’t in competition with any of the existing providers – indeed, it works to send business to all legitimate providers.
Not least, we have a record that is immaculate. We don’t sever heads, or charge six-figure fees, or charge any fees at all. We don’t have controversial histories involving conflicts with the law or controversial practices offensive to the public. Whether those histories and practices were justified is not the issue. The media continually highlight and emphasize the worst and most sensational elements, and that emphasis profoundly alienates the public and the scientific community. The very people who should be our friends.
The Cryonics Society has no such drawbacks. We’re simply a nonprofit advocating for legitimate scientific and medical research, for better public education, and for the right of people to do with their remains as they wish without government interference. Who in the world can object to that?
The Cryonics Society is uniquely suited to send the positive message we need. That’s why it needs people’s help and support.
An Evolving Advocacy
Initially the Cryonics Society thought of itself as a sort of adjunct marketing agency, providing boutique advertising agency services to existing cryonics providers. The problem was, there were only two possible clients in that market, and they thought they could do it better themselves. History has shown us the hard way that they were wrong.
But only a bad marketing agency blames the market. Over time the Society realized the need to reinvent itself, and is now evolving into an organization that more closely resembles a think tank than an ad agency. It’s said that nothing is stronger than an idea whose time has come. Clearly what cryonics needs is new ideas, and not repeated failed efforts to sell old ones.
Times have changed a great deal since 1967, when James Bedford became the first man to enter cryospace. It is long past time to sit down and rethink the entire cryonics effort through again from top to bottom.
Note: all text and commentary in the Cryonics Society web site may not be reproduced without the written prior consent of the authors.
Email: contact @ cryonicssociety.org
Tel.: 585-473-3321