NancyLebovitz comments on Cryonics Wants To Be Big - Less Wrong

28 Post author: lsparrish 05 July 2010 07:50AM

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Comment author: JoshuaZ 05 July 2010 01:03:33PM 2 points [-]

Using a large unit for cryonics does have some complications. One would need to be able to be able to add people in at different times without disrupting the temperature. And when we eventually start taking people out they'll need to be able to remove the the then repairable ones without disruption to the more injured/sick. I suspect that neither of these will be a large technical hassle. Maybe someone who knows more about low temp engineering can comment if that's correct.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 05 July 2010 01:41:15PM 1 point [-]

I'm wondering whether the most efficient size isn't the largest imaginable-- that there's some medium-sized unit which would be better.

Comment author: lsparrish 05 July 2010 01:56:12PM *  5 points [-]

The largest imaginable is probably somewhere in the millions of cubic meters. Bringing in futuristic mass-beam tech (hey, it's feasible with superconductors and you're under cryogenic temperatures already) and you can go bigger than any building built to date, perhaps even hitting the kilometric cube -- a billion cubic meters.

So we might say 30 meters is a relatively small one.

But even still, you are absolutely right that smaller ones are worth considering. In fact they are more worth considering because they can be done sooner. Every time you scale up by 1000, thermal transfer drops by 10. So if you just want to go from $22k to $2.2k, all other things equal, you can do this by going from 14 patients to 14000 patients.

The next wave of cryonics could take the form of relatively small (but still huge) urban cryo-centers that replace graveyards. A place like the UK where they are running short on grave spaces might be a good starting point for that.

Another important idea to look at is piggybacking cryonics onto other forms of cryogenic storage, or perhaps renting out storage in our cryogenic warehouses for other purposes as a source of funding.

Comment deleted 05 July 2010 02:34:27PM *  [-]
Comment author: lsparrish 05 July 2010 04:08:37PM 1 point [-]

I'm not quite sure I understand the math, but it sounds like you are saying that since there is a tenfold increase in volume per unit area that means not only does less heat reach the cryogen there is more of it to be reached. So the energy efficiency is 10 times, but the storage capacity is also 10 times. Or am I barking up the wrong tree?

100 times as much slack time between refills, wow. That reduces a lot of costs and risks.

Comment deleted 05 July 2010 05:36:16PM *  [-]