I have to agree with Edward-M on this point:
There's no guarantee that today's money system will exist when you're revived, so why not spend that money now to help cryonics?
I hate to be pessimistic, but I believe the world's first successful cryopreservation has yet to be performed. And, given the past actions, (and inactions), of the cryonics organizations, I doubt it will be, for many years to come. I believe in “Information Theoretical Death,” as per Aubrey de Grey, and I think, thus far, those who haven’t undergone “Information Theoretical Death” prior to a standby team arriving, or arrival at a cryonic organization, have had it inflicted upon them by people who are not qualified to perform the required medical procedures. Sometimes, this lack of competence/proficiency may be the result of minimal funding, (which is understandable, to some degree), but on at least several occasions, I believe it was due to pure arrogance.
In my opinion, cryonics suffers from a plague of poor management decisions that are only compounded by even worse decisions, when attention is drawn to past errors. (So much for “learning from past mistakes.”) That’s “at best.” At worst, you may have opportunistic, somewhat clever, people who don’t have a proper understanding of existing medical procedures and equipment that could be adapted for use in cryonics, capitalizing on the ignorance and naiveté of others. Some of these people have been floundering around in cryonics for a couple of decades, without really accomplishing much, (other than, perhaps, wasting, or “earning,” a fairly large amount of money). Do you want to trust your money to these same people, or even to people associated with them? (This is not a comment on the new organization in Oregon, but a statement of the idea of cryonics organizations establishing these trusts, in general.)
Trying to "take it with you” seems like a really bad idea, to me, even if you plan on waking up, at some point in the future. Even if someone does a good job at protecting and investing the funds, who’s to say your “reanimation fund” won’t go the way of the retirement funds that were largely vested in tech stocks, or financial icons such as Bear Stearns? Or, worse yet, be stolen? Personally, I think the notion of keeping your wealth, while most of the people in the world consider you to be "dead" only perpetuates the appearance of cryonicists as narcissistic fools. As FD points out, even if you are fortunate enough to be revived in the future, there is no guarantee the world's financial system will be the same as it is now; that your dollars will still be where you left them; or, that they will actually be worth anything. Your money would most likely benefit you more, by being invested in cryonics, now, as Edward-M suggests.
People are going to want to reanimate cryonics patients, simply for the sake of being able to do it, and in the hopes of having this technology available to themselves. No doubt there will be a lot of money to be made via the press, book deals, movie deals, etc., upon the first reanimations, and no doubt the funds will come pouring in from people who want to be cryopreserved, once they see it can be done. Surely, the first people to be “reanimated” will be well-supported, and money will flow into the field of cryonics. At that time, people can begin to worry about setting up the types of individual trusts that have been discussed.
At this point, WAKING UP should be a cryonicist's main concern. If significant advances are not made in cryonics, SOON, today's cryonicists aren't likely to need their money after their “legal” death, as it will most likely be their final one. I believe Edward is right; the people working on so-called “wealth preservation” are setting up the field of cryonics for even more skepticism, criticism and ridicule.
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