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| Left: Don Laughlin's staute Right: Recent photo of a black hole |
Don Laughlin's estate was apparently worth a billion dollars... Where did it go? Alcor cryonics? or South Dakota Perp Trust black hole? by rick_potvin@yahoo.com
Now I might be able to associate Dave Pizer's email to me asking where Doug Platt is with the point in time that Laughlin transitioned to the frozen state. I think it might have been around that time that he queried me on that. I told Dave I hadn't talked to Doug in years and had no idea where he was other than seeing an occasional updated photo of him on searches here and there on the image search column of Yahoo.
I myself am still in a non-cryonics-prepared modality since around 2010 or so. I feel like a man walking a high-wire across the old Trade Towers in New York in 1965: One false move and my physical existence which COULD have been permanent and forever will be wiped out forever. If it were not for my new interests in ASCENDANCE via chakras/energy states and REINCARNATION, I'd be worried for myself right now like I used to be when I was younger. I'm actually more worried about my libido and about ten gray hairs than anything as grandiose as my ultimate physical existence lately, however. I haven't had time to consider the irrationality of my current beliefs... if they're that. Covering my bills and running around doing this and that sucks up all the oxygen of my life.
Enough about me, let's consider Don. Here's Don in a red shirt 10 years ago. Nice teeth. You'd think a billionnaire would dye his hair however. I dye mine if I see gray--- when I can. There's a little pencil-brush doodad I use to hide those grays. Somehow, men's faces become more ghost-like when gray and white hair sets in. Dave Pizer still sports coloured hair, I've noticed. Good for him. For the cost of a little toxicity in the dye, you can at least look younger than you are as a protest against this short lifespan we've been saddled with.
Secrecy is currency for the wealthy...
but I believe John F. Kennedy was right when he said something like--
Americans don't like secrecy.... so let's expose Don Laughlin's (and Dave Pizer's) secret plans.
Originally, I thought of cryonics as an every-man's way (oops-- every PERson's way) ... of taking a shot at blowing off that stupid human condition of limited lifespan. I bought life-insurance I could not afford while at McMaster University from a dopey kid named Mark Lang in Ancaster and assigned the proceeds to C.I. (Cryonics Institute). I figured I'd worry about the details later. I was inspired by Ettinger's Prospect of Immortality which I picked up for $2 at a used book library sale in that town, Ancaster.
Long story short-- it turns out that cryonics is run by wealthy dudes like Saul Kent (where in the heck is he, lately, anyway?)... who sock their dough away in perp trusts. (I've seen Bill Faloon doing his Immortality
Church on Youtube--- interesting! though Bill looks a bit bug eyed... good hair however! ) There used to be a RULE against perps but that's falling apart like everything else lately. So it turns out-- that Don Laughlin, who had a private cryonics lab on the top floor of his hotel -- got frozen in secret AND stashed his dough in S. Dakota in a perp trust never to be used again (if cryonics doesn't work).
South Dakota is the only asset protection state that has a total seal on trust information forever. Clearly, this is also an important factor to consider when determining where to place an asset protection trust.
I don't know where I originally discovered that Laughlin was hiding his money in S. Dakota. It'll be a long time before I get the time to look at that. The fact of the matter, however, is that PERP TRUSTS exist... that wealthy cryonicists like it... and that S. Dakota is one state where it's legal. My DEDUCTION (or is it induction logic) LOGIC says that Don L. stashed his cash in a Perp friendly state of the U.S. union.
So what?, one might ask.
Well... the so in the what is that PERP TRUSTS are ONLY legal in certain states but ILL eagle in other states... think on that for 3 seconds and you might be hit with the idea "why?". Why are they illegalized in some states?
Well... because they suck money out of the economy like newly expunged bathtub drain. The sucking sound Ross Perot talked about is amplified 1000x. Can you hear it? I'd post an mp3 but maybe later. You can probably attempt your own sound effect with your own mouth. I did. It adds to my writing skill. Skill. Yes, that's exactly what I'm exhibiting here. Writing... skill. Okay. Let's move on.
UPDATE #1 on Monday, April 15, 2019 by Rick Potvin @ 61
I managed to locate a few posts I made several years ago about cryonics financing and where the technology is. I'll repost the salient part of it here...
QUOTE
Recently, I determined that perpetual trusts are a financial showstopper for cryonics, but now the connectome crisis is the showstopper for all of cryonics-- the nail in the coffin of cryonics-- that creates a new prospect of mortality for us all and all existing cryonics patients/cryonauts.
KEN HAYWORTH INTERVIEW with NIKOLA DANALYOV is required viewing for EVERYONE in cryonics today if you haven't already seen it... it's 1 hr. and gives us a NEW way to think about chem pres... as br has argued but there are severe problems with that too. More immediately important, he explains that 21st CM is having trouble proving connectome survival and if connectomes can't be proven to survive, then cryonics is over for him-- and for the cryonics industry. Recently, I detemined that perpetual trusts are a financial showstopper for cryonics, but now the connectome crisis is the showstopper for all of cryonics-- the nail in the coffin of cryonics-- that creates a new prospect of mortality for us all and all existing cryonics patients/cryonauts.
Perpetual trusts destroy cryonics financially. On a macroscale, bad perfusion has made current cryonics impossible to trust and on a microscale, the avoidance of a cryoconnectome proof destroys cryonics technically. Those elements, on top of Alcor's reneg on grandfathering, churning, labelling members underfunded, rising dues and Falloons call for still more insurance for reanimation, considered a separate function now from preservation make cryonics now seem impossible even to long time advocates like me. To bypass these cryonics show-stoppers, we should seriously reconsider the case for chemical preservation as suggested by Ken Hayworth who is at Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
Perpetual trusts were outlawed for centuries because they were considered dead hands that hampered living society. Now, wealth preservation conferences in cryonics promote something even worse... self-aimed perpetual trusts for the wealthy cryonicist which will result in dead frozen hands that currently hamper and will suffocate reality based cryonics.
Cryonicists call a PERPETUAL TRUST a "revival trust".... as explained in this paragraph.
The inheritance loophole was originally devised for America's 19th-century industrial dynasties, such as the Rockefeller and Carnegie families. Concerned that their fortunes would be consumed by taxes, they created long-term trusts to preserve their estates. Personal revival trusts simply name the deep-frozen corpses as a beneficiaries, treating them, for legal purposes, as unborn grandchildren.
source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/3336065/Rich-freeze-their-assets-for-chance-to-live-again.html
Maybe Don Laughlin's billion dollars did NOT go to cryonics after all. Laughlin left only $5 million in his revival trust.
Don Laughlin, 75, a Nevada casino owner, has decided to leave his preserved remains $5 million, estimating that he has "a better than even chance of coming back". At least a dozen other such trusts are thought to exist.
source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/3336065/Rich-freeze-their-assets-for-chance-to-live-again.html
This TELEGRAPH.CO.UK article shows that Dave Pizer is putting more into his revival trust than Don Laughlin did... $10 million,
David Pizer, a holiday resort owner in Arizona, has made arrangements to be frozen along with his wife and their favourite dogs. He also plans to preserve the couple's fortune, estimated at about $10 million. Using a personal revival trust, Mr Pizer, 64, who is in good health, hopes that his wealth will have shown spectacular growth when he comes back to life.
I've never looked Jakob Canady's case but apprently his children are battling his estate-- a common theme in cryonics...
Jakob Canady, a Florida investor who died two years ago, left millions in a trust to be paid when his "human remains are revived and restored to life". His daughters have since produced a second will, claiming that the fortune should have been left to them, and are preparing for a court battle
Only certain states allow perp trusts...
quote...
They are permitted in 20 American states and are attracting interest from financial institutions such as the Wachovia Corporation, which has at least one client.
source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/3336065/Rich-freeze-their-assets-for-chance-to-live-again.html
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| Perpetual trusts will kill us all. |
WEALTH PRESERVATION TRUSTS SIGNAL THE END OF CRYONICS -- ONLY A CRYONICS INSURANCE FUND WILL SIGNAL ITS RESUMPTION.]
-----------
The Failure of Cryonics Finance-------
Alcor set up for the rich?-----
Problem is bigger than Alcor--------
Comprehensive Cryonics Insurance & Credit Corporation-------------
Google blogsearch on "cryonics"----------
I quit.------------
My Conversion to CI-----
Bostrom-Sandberg-Vincent on Perp Trusts PDF must read-----
A Negative Seung Test would end cryonics.-------
[Cryoconnectome proof tracking]-----
-Cryoconnectomics needs to be proven as the industry's next step]
Cryonics is currently on self-destruct like the Enterprise in an episode of Star Trek.. a magnificent concept is going down.. as a result of self directed perp trusts being made worse with robo trusts and Faloon's call for yet more life insurance to be bought by wealthless ordinary cryonicists for reanimation... instead of calling for redirecting bequests of wealthy cryos to a Cryonics Insurance Fund.
I'm horrified by this turn of events since about 2006 in cryonics... as horrified and saddened as the original crew of the Enterprise watching their ship streak through the sky, burning up as she goes down. Despite the financial crash of cryonics, there is still a hard core group of perp trusters but if the Seung Test proves negative, even they will find cryonics impossible to carry forward. The Seung Test is the new gold touchstone test or acid test for cryonics-- and it hasn't been done yet. Do the wealthy cryonicists fear what they may find-- connectome destruction in cryovitrified brain slice? [Destruction of Star Trek Enterprise 1 min video]
If Don Laughlin left only 5 million to his future self, where is the other 995 million?
Universities have funds called ENDOWMENTS that have accumulated billions, if not trillions of dollars-- while students struggle to pay off tuitions. It's a real disaster since those endowments ought really be used to educate students the way they were intended by those who left the universities the bequests. Instead, the money is tied up and never used.
Similarly, it now appears that wealthy cryonicists leave their money tied up bequests to their future selves using PERPETUAL TRUSTS. However, in Laughlin's case, it appears only 5 of the 1000 million ended up in his own trust. Pizer has stated that his entire 10 million will be in his own PERPETUAL TRUST. How can this be? Only the money-management people in Alcor and CI know for sure and to this end, we'll have to look at those cryonics "wealth-management conferences" as well as how funding takes place. This quickly becomes an onerous and impossible task (for me at least) since I don't have the time, and increasingly lack the inclination.
SOURCES for possible future investigation on where Don Laughlin left his money:
1. https://www.google.com/search?q=what+are+university+funds+called%3F&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
How do university endowments work? - Investopedia
2. Universities Are Becoming Billion-Dollar Hedge Funds With Schools ...https://www.thenation.com/.../universities-are-becoming-billion-dollar-hedge-funds-w...
Mar 8, 2016 - People are calling it a hedge fund with a university attached. ... of the Responsible Endowment Coalition, calls this a “rage-inducing picture.
3. Alcor endowments
https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=Awr9NEmkx7VcNmAAuBuJzbkF?p=alcor+endowments&fr=sfp&fr2=p%3As%2Cv%3Ai%2Cm%3Apivot&stype=web
4. Alcor vs. Cryonics Institute - LessWrong 2.0
www.lesswrong.com/posts/PdcpEih96tqrt2waM/alcor...
Alcor also costs substantially more, with its neurosuspension option alone running ~$80k, compared with CI's whole-body preservation cost of ~$30k. While Alcor has received far more publicity than CI, much of it has been negative.
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PdcpEih96tqrt2waM/alcor-vs-cryonics-institute
5. "Some Alcor members have wondered why rich Alcor members have not donated more money to Alcor. The major reason is that rich Alcor members are rich because they know how to manage money, and they know that Alcor traditionally has managed money poorly. Why give any significant amount of money to an organization that has no fiscal discipline? It will just spend it, and put itself right back into the same financial hole it’s already in.
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PdcpEih96tqrt2waM/alcor-vs-cryonics-institute
Such an acknowledgement, though appreciated, is frankly disturbing, considering that members depend utterly on these organizations remaining operational and solvent for decades, perhaps even centuries, after they are deanimated.
More later. Or sooner. Sooner than later is what I meant.
Rick Potvin -- circa 2000 A.D. (the future) -- just before attending an Alcor board meeting as a member-observer. BELOW-- Rick playing drums at a retirement center in 2018 Dec. A.D. (now dubbed C.E. for common era instead of anno domini).
