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Old 07-01-2005, 12:46 AM
AleoMagus AleoMagus is offline
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Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Victoria BC
Posts: 252
Default Re: Is science about to prove/disprove the existence of Heaven/Hell?

All of this suspended animations stuff, and cryogenics is not really bringing the dead back to life.

They say 'scientifically' dead, to try to give that impression, but that really just means that they had no heartbeat, no breathing, and all the usual stuff we think of that takes place in an emergency room.

Same thing as when a patient flatlines on an operating table. Many claim to have been 'technically' dead, but were then revived, or brought back from the dead.

This is all false.

Even after all the usual criteria for death have been satisfied, many of a person's internal systems continue for some time. Cells continue with important functions, hair and skin grows, and even our nervous system continues with basic functions. All of this constitutes a broader definition we have for 'life' and will continue significantly longer than most imagine. How long these cells will continue to function and survive has a lot to do with our circulatory and respiratory system functioning properly (heartbeat and breathing). Without blood flow and a supply of oxygen, we will eventually be impossible to revive. This is why CPR works. We artificially cause blood to move and oxygen to be forced into the lungs.

The thing is, the colder a person is, the longer it takes for cells to use up existing oxygen. This is why there are stories of kids who were trapped under icy cold water for very long times and who could still be revived. It's not that they died in the first place. They simply were able to slow the death process for a much greater time because of the cold temperature.

Theoretically, if we could make a person cold enough, without having the freezing process cause too much tissue damage, we could slow this death process to the point that a person could remain in stasis for hundreds of years.

So, the point again is that these dogs, or any person who might be revived by cryogenic technology, have not really died in the first place.

To truly claim to have brought a person back from the dead. we would need to let the respiratory cycle completely use up all existing oxygen and let all important cells die. Or, even just completely disintegrate a person... then reconstruct them.

This will probably also happen one day. That or we will simply reconstruct a person's conciousness in a virtual space. This brings up a whole new philosophical debate however, about whether the reconstructed individual is the same individual at all.

Regards
Brad S
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