Cryonics has a number of denial issues like that. Mike Darwin addresses the neuroscience one on his Chronosphere blog with his Cryonics Intelligence Test, though I don't think you can still access the reference materials (a mass of scientific papers he sent to various participants, myself included):
http://chronopause.com/index.php/2012/05/06/take-the-cryonics-intelligence-test/
http://chronopause.com/index.php/2012/05/20/cryonics-intelligence-test-responses/
Other issues:
The persistence in invoking Drexler's "nanotechnology" as the Green Lantern's Ring solution to revival problems, when people can see after 30 years that the idea turned out sterile. It also sounds made-up now, like invoking "warp field mechanics" or something from Star Trek. This does not help to establish cryonics as a serious idea. with knowledgeable people.
The coming breakdown in institutional continuity in cryonics organizations as the members in cryonics' founding generation die and presumably go into suspension, while we seem to lack younger people ready to maintain something analogous to the "apostolic succession" in christian culture to keep the organizations functional over the coming decades and centuries. Or if you come from a Jewish background, ponder Exodus 1:8 and its consequences: "Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph." I'd like to see an effort starting soon to establish a leadership hierarchy about three layers deep, and with about a generation between each layer, so that, say, the tested and competent leaders in their 60's cultivate and vet leaders in their 40's, and together they cultivate and vet potential leaders in their 20's. (Lather, rinse, repeat.)
And I don't understand the implied business model in these cryonics revival trusts. Supposedly some very wealthy cryonicists want to tie up hundreds of millions of dollars in these trusts, while relying on financially threadbare cryonics organizations to try to keep them in suspension for however long it takes to try to revive them according to the standard model of good, rejuvenated physical and cognitive health. This sounds like the Gnomes' business model from that famous South Park episode.
Further down the line, if newer, more capable cryonics organizations come online, they will tend to marginalize the ones we have now, especially that duct-tape operation founded by Robert Ettinger up in Michigan, unless the leaders in the older organizations can find the resolve and the resources to improve their services and stay competitive.
From a technical standpoint, how hard is it to learn cryogenics? Is it the sort of thing you'd have to attend a few years of school for? Or could you it be a DIY job, if you had enough money?
(Title is tongue-in-cheek, "preservation" would've been more appropriate but less catchy)
With [news like that](http://news.discovery.com/history/preserved-brain-bog-england-110406.html), how hard can it be when you actually do want to preserve a brain:
> A human skull dated to about 2,684 years ago with an "exceptionally preserved" human brain still inside of it was recently discovered in a waterlogged U.K. pit, according to a new Journal of Archaeological Science study.
> The brain is the oldest known intact human brain from Europe and Asia, according to the authors, who also believe it's one of the best-preserved ancient brains in the world. (...) Scientists believe that submersion in liquid, anoxic environments helps to preserve human brain tissue.
Unfortunately for the poor guy / brain, we killed his survival prospects. He did go with the cheap option of just saving the head. Speculating, if he got found another few centuries from now, he might've been a patient, not "archeological remains".
On a more serious note, I'd like the perspective of someone signed up for cryonics on this:
With people signed up for cryonics nowadays - I hear it even comes with a necklace! - I wonder what role the signalling aspect (to others, more importantly to oneself, feeling safer from death) plays versus the actual permanent-death-evading.
Having been present for (mouse) brain slice experiments done immediately after extraction, being confronted with the rapidly progressing tissue decay, the most important aspect that could easily be optimised - apart from research into other methods of preservation - was the time from the extraction to the experiments. Each minute made a tremendous difference. Not a surprise: as the aphorism in neurology (stroke therapy) goes, "time is brain".
What leads me to somewhat doubt the seriousness of the actual belief in brain preservation, versus the belief in belief that's based on minimising existential angst, is that the obvious idea of "when death is approaching with an ETA of less than X, commit suicide with cryonics on immediate standby" is not an integral part of the discussion. X may be weeks, or even years, based on how serious you take cryonics.
The above incidentally contains a way of betting to indicate the strength you assign to the actual prospects of cryonics, versus the role it plays for you psychologically. Isn't betting on your beliefs encouraged in this community? (NB: the "suicide" is just included to avoid legal ramifications.)
Regardless of future technological advances, orders of magnitude less brain damage will certainly pose less of a problem than the delay caused even by a couple of hours. A couple of hours = your brain tissue is already a scorched battlefield! Both necrosis and apoptosis get started within minutes.
Measuring your actual belief in the success of cryonics (for someone signed up for cryonics), waiting for death by natural causes doesn't indicate a lot of confidence when even a few weeks of life seem to be measured more highly than a tremendous increase in the actual prospects of cryonics working.
Or do you have above mentioned plans in place for when your life expectancy is less than X months/years (for whatever reason)?