“The main reason why I think this isn’t being worked on more is because it is even “weirder” than most EA causes, despite making a good deal of sense.”
I don’t think that is true. This was previously discussed here. It’s very hard to argue that preserving existing lives through cryonics is more cost-effective than creating new lives if you have a totalist view of population ethics. And even if you have a person-affecting view of population ethics it’s not clear how cryonics is more cost-effective than AI safety.
Is it actually more cost effective, though? Someone in suspended animation does not eat or consume resources. Unless you mean sometime in the future, but in that future we don’t know what resource constraints will actually be, and we don’t know what we will value most. Preventing irrecoverable loss of sentient minds still seems like a wiser thing to do, given this uncertainty. As for AI Safety, I think we’re facing a talent deficit much more than a financial deficit right now. I’m not sure how much adding, say, 5 more million to the cause will really change at this time.
For a successful cryopreservation, you need facilities for storage, liquid nitrogen and staff overseeing the operation. All that costs money. Plastination alleviates some of those costs, and economies of scale would also apply.
And cryonics is expensive: The cryoprotectants currently used alone are nothing to sneer at.
The perfusate has a shelf life of several years when stored in an ordinary refrigerator. Alcor’s purchase price for the ingredients in all 10 2-liter bags of perfusate, including M22, is ~$1,500. The concentration of M22 increases by a factor of 1.67 between bags, except that the last 3 bags have the same terminal concentration. While 10 bags is sufficient to achieve the desired terminal jugular cryoprotectant concentration, 16 bags were prepared for the initial trial (the final 9 bags having the same terminal concentration) to ensure that enough bags were available to achieve terminal jugular cryoprotectant concentration.
“The main reason why I think this isn’t being worked on more is because it is even “weirder” than most EA causes, despite making a good deal of sense.”
I don’t think that is true. This was previously discussed here. It’s very hard to argue that preserving existing lives through cryonics is more cost-effective than creating new lives if you have a totalist view of population ethics. And even if you have a person-affecting view of population ethics it’s not clear how cryonics is more cost-effective than AI safety.
Is it actually more cost effective, though? Someone in suspended animation does not eat or consume resources. Unless you mean sometime in the future, but in that future we don’t know what resource constraints will actually be, and we don’t know what we will value most. Preventing irrecoverable loss of sentient minds still seems like a wiser thing to do, given this uncertainty. As for AI Safety, I think we’re facing a talent deficit much more than a financial deficit right now. I’m not sure how much adding, say, 5 more million to the cause will really change at this time.
For a successful cryopreservation, you need facilities for storage, liquid nitrogen and staff overseeing the operation. All that costs money. Plastination alleviates some of those costs, and economies of scale would also apply.
And cryonics is expensive: The cryoprotectants currently used alone are nothing to sneer at.
—A Big Hairy Audacious Goal for Cryonics, Ralph Merkle, 2014