Download Your Brain

Nicholas Roussos writes "Futurologist Dr. Ian Pearson predicts that death will be avoidable in the year 2050 by downloading your brain to a computer. Unfortunately, he is also predicting that the process will be only available to the wealthy for years after its release. I guess we should all start saving our pennies now."

Comments

He's wrong.

[podperson]

Making a copy of yourself doesn't avoid death for you, it just means ongoing life for a copy of you.

This is not a subtle point.

Anyone who cannot grasp this either hasn't thought deeply about a subject, or is an idiot. Anyone who uses the title "futurologist" is likely the latter.

Re:He's wrong.

[Eric Smith]

How do you know when you wake up in the morning that you are really the same person that went to bed the previous night? You don't have continuity of consciousness through the entire night. Maybe the "you" of yesterday died, and you are just a copy; how would you know? ("I'd know the difference." "No you wouldn't, you'd be programmed not to.")

If you went to the "uploading clinic", and they put you under a general anaestheic, uploaded you, and terminated the leftover hunk of meat, how would that be different than simply going to sleep and waking up (albeit in a new "body")?

As you said,

This is not a subtle point.

Anyone who cannot grasp this either hasn't thought deeply about a subject, or is an idiot.

News?

[TripMaster Monkey]

I thought this was supposed to be 'News for Nerds', not 'Speculation for Halfwits'...

From TFA:

He thinks that today's younger generation will benefit from the advances in technology to the point that death will be effectively eliminated. He explains his logic with a simple example.
"The new PlayStation is 1 per cent as powerful as a human brain," he said. "It is into supercomputer status compared to 10 years ago. PlayStation 5 will probably be as powerful as the human brain."

OK...so where does that put the Xbox?
Seriously, this 'explanation' of his 'logic' leaves much to be desired...but there's more.
Also from TFA:

It [Pearson's AI] would definitely have emotions - that's one of the primary reasons for doing it. If I'm on an airplane I want the computer to be more terrified of crashing than I am so it does everything to stay in the air until it's supposed to be on the ground.

Hmm...but what if the AI is a thrillseeker? Suicidal? Psychotic? What if it suddenly develops acrophobia? If we're going to have a true AI with emotions, these are issues that need to be addressed, don't you think?
Here's another few nuggets from TFA:

"You need a completely global debate. Whether we should be building machines as smart as people is a really big one. Whether we should be allowed to modify bacteria to assemble electronic circuitry and make themselves smart is already being researched."

Well, that 'completely global debate' should be ready by the release of PlayStation 5...

'We can already use DNA, for example, to make electronic circuits so it's possible to think of a smart yoghurt some time after 2020 or 2025, where the yoghurt has got a whole stack of electronics in every single bacterium. You could have a conversation with your strawberry yogurt before you eat it.'

'Smart yoghurt'? Sure I guess it's possible to think of that...about as possible as it is to think of magical elves, unicorn-riding gnomes, and smart futurologists.

One thing conspicuously missing from this article is speculation over the possible legal status of either a true AI or a downloaded brain. Apparently, that paragraph got bumped in favor of 'smart yoghurt'.

In short, this is the dumbest thing I've heard all day (and I work in IT support). I'm sure that if Dr. Pearson didn't already have such a sweet position as 'head of the Futurology unit at BT', he could make good money writing speculative fiction...or reading palms.

Re:It's a copy

[mrdaveb]

Conciousness is so poorly understood that I don't think you can even say that for sure. Am 'I' the matter or the data in my brain? If I go into a teleporter, do 'I' come out the other end?

Re:The obvious question...

[m50d]

What makes you the same person who went to sleep last night? Your conscious experience wasn't continuous, all that really makes you who you are is the things in your brain, the memories and personality and so on. If it's a perfect replica of your brain, the experience will be the same. If you were killed in your sleep last night and a replica made and put in your place, how would you even know?

Re:It's a copy

[SpectreBlofeld]

Every cell in your body dies and is replaced over a scale of seven years or so. You're not the original you, having been replaced multiple times with a 'copy'. Care to redefine your idea of conciousness?

Re:Soulless

[bill_mcgonigle]

Uh, your memory engrams may be downloadable, but your consciousness and soul will die right along with your body.

Doesn't that imply your soul is organic? I thought the point of a soul is a mechanism for an afterlife?

Here's an interesting thought experiment. Say you have very good prosthetic and nanotechnology available. As you age your natural body starts to fail. You have organs, limbs, bones, even blood replaced over time. As your skin fails a nice polymer replaces it (with excellent nerve replacements of course so you don't notice a difference).

Do you still have a soul at that point?

OK, now your body is failing even more. Over another couple decades you've replaced everything in your body except for your brain with mechanical systems.

Do you still have a soul at that point?

Now, your nerves start to degenerate and your brain isn't signaling well. You get some nano-bots in there to replace the dendrites and get the neurons signalling right again.

Do you still have a soul at that point?

Finally the neurons are starting to go and you get some more nanotech in there that can replace failing ones on the fly as they go with more stable structures. Over the next 20 years all of your neurons are slowly replaced by nanotech, but it's very gradual so you don't ever notice it.

Do you still have a soul at that point?

The trick in this experiment is picking the point at which you don't have a soul, if ever, and identifying the change that caused the soul. Of course, if you can identify the change that lost the soul, it follows you've identified the temple of the soul.

Discussion encouraged.