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University Receives $5 Million Grant To Study Immortality
Hugh Pickens writes "Humans have pondered their mortality for millennia. Now the University of California at Riverside reports that it has received a $5 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation that will fund research on aspects of immortality, including near-death experiences and the impact of belief in an afterlife on human behavior. 'People have been thinking about immortality throughout history. We have a deep human need to figure out what happens to us after death,' says John Martin Fischer, the principal investigator of The Immortality Project. 'No one has taken a comprehensive and sustained look at immortality that brings together the science, theology and philosophy.' Fischer says he going to investigate two different kinds of immortality. One is the possibility of living forever without dying. The main questions there are whether it's technologically plausible or feasible for us, either by biological enhancement such as those described by Ray Kurzweil, or by some combination of biological enhancement and uploading our minds onto computers in the future. Second would be to investigate the full range of questions about Judeo, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, and other Asian religions' conceptions of the afterlife to see if they're theologically and philosophically consistent. 'We'll look at near death experiences both in western cultures and throughout the world and really look at what they're all about and ask the question — do they indicate something about an afterlife or are they kind of just illusions that we're hardwired into?'"
'People have been thinking about immortality throughout history. We have a deep human need to figure out what happens to us after death,' says John Martin Fischer,
Nothing, You're dead.
I don't want to achieve immortality through my work... I want to achieve it through not dying.
Woody Allen
I predict the only thing that will really happen here is that some "scientists" with questionable ethics burn through 5M! Despite their grand claims, there is zero research need here.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Already happening. Her name is Henrietta Lacks. She's recently turned 98 and will live forever in various labs around the world.
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
Why are they funding research that's already been published?
Principal Investigator
Results and Discussion
Sex Also!
I don't know who said it--when I heard it it was attributed to Mark Twain but that doesn't seem to be right. At any rate, someone asked a nonbeliever whether he wasn't terrified by the thought of nonexistence after death. He replied, "Not at all. I experienced nonexistence for eons before I was born, and I enjoyed every minute of it."
I wish them luck with their $5 million, but I don't think they'll be any wiser than Omar Khayyam:
With them the seed of Wisdom did I sow,
And with mine own hand wrought to make it grow;
And this was all the Harvest that I reap’d-
“I came like Water, and like Wind I go.”
Into this Universe, and Why not knowing,
Nor Whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing:
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not Whither, willy-nilly blowing.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Well, maybe not; but for those with a moderately open mind, you really should -- before concluding -- examine the works of two people. Dr. Lawrence LeShan and Dr. Daryl J. Bem have done some tremendous work on the subject of ESP. LeShan, in his early years went further, working with some extraordinary people, under genuinely scientific conditions. I simply can't imagine someone reading LeShan's The Medium, the Mystic, and the Physicist and having anything negative to say.
If ESP ever does prove itself an authentic protocol, then its tendency to allow the mind to accurately observe remote locations could suggest a breach in the presumed dependency of consciousness on the form. I also recommend visiting the CIA's CREST database and searching amongst the many thousands of Remote Viewing documents that have been released. Despite rational assumption, there's more than redaction lines to look at.
This is a fascinating subject and I am not telling anyone to make any assumptions either way, but please look at quality research that's available before making conclusions.
Forward! -- Emperor Norton, 2012
But there is room for reincarnation without the religious connotations.
No, there isn't. Without a mechanism to transfer information outside of the dying brain, it is simply destroyed, and anything else is merely wishful thinking.
Obviously, the body (brain) plays a part (for many the dominant part, it seems), but it is not enough to explain what is observable.
We already know that brain is a biological computer with multiple chemical and electrochemical interfaces to the rest of the body. This is understood very well, and was understood even before people had computers and therefore could not yet compress this explanation into such a short statement. The only things unknown about it are the structure and mechanisms, and it's extremely foolish to claim that it breaks the laws of nature known through Physics and Chemistry.
Any alternative to the above is LESS LIKELY TO BE TRUE than "we are all in The Matrix" or "We are in a dream of a sleeping God" hypotheses, what means that it can not be a part of any realistic philosophy and should be relegated to the realm of fiction. All support for this nonsense comes from superstition and nowhere else.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
No, there is experimental data as well. Lobotomies are a result of "change the brain, change the intelligence/personality" experiments. There is direct experimental data, not just external observation.
Learn to love Alaska
Most of the great geniuses of recorded history lived when not professing a belief in an afterlife would get you to that afterlife (or lack thereof) more quickly.
Learn to love Alaska
The _only_ scientific connection between consciousness, intelligence and the brain is external observation. That is not even enough for a reasonable theory. You should read up on your science.
LOL. By definition of science, external evidence is both the only source of evidence and sufficient for a theory.
This topic cannot really be studied scientifically, because science is limited to the physical human senses. For those who only believe that what is physical, touchable, viewable etc., this is a great waste of time and money. Whether there is life after death can only be grasped by faith.
Jesus Christ came and made the claim that he is God. The people of his day, especially the religious ones were unbelievably upset by this claim. They were torqued out of shape enough to conspire with the Roman governmental authorities to have Jesus executed. Jesus proved his claim to deity by resurrection from the dead. All religions, but one, are human efforts to reach God. There is only one faith that makes an exception to this. That is the Christian gospel where God becomes a human being in order to make it possible for him to confer eternal life to all humans who are simply willing to believe this. God reaches down to man, rather than man reaching up to God.
Anyone who studies the biblical record of the resurrection appearances of Jesus Christ, will realize that Jesus is a physical being, capable of all the normal physical activities normal humans are able to do. There were however also activities which show that Jesus existed not only on the earthly plane, but also a higher spiritual level or dimension. He was no longer subject to time and space in the same way that we are right now. He could materialize in and out of our time–space dimension, which is a technology that most scientists can't even talk about, because they don't believe in any dimensions beyond our own. When he finally ascended into “heaven”, he did not need a thundering rocket, but was quietly lifted up from the earth and disappeared into a cloud. He promised that everyone who believes and trusts him, will at some point in time inhabit a body just like his resurrection body. This body is no longer subject to entropy or decay or death.
A sufficiently advanced simulation is indistinguishable from reality.
You assume consciousness is an emergent property of the brain. That is a bit like assuming what is shown on a TV screen is generated in there. A good first assumption, but not more than an assumption. The currents state of scientific research is that it is completely unknown what consciousness is and what intelligence is. Both can be described by their effects, but to speculate on where they reside and whether they are generated there is very much premature at this time.
So, no, we do not understand that "the brain is a biological computer". Actually we do understand that human minds can do things that computers cannot do, and that is currently fundamental, i.e. not a question of the power of the computer, but a lack of any implementable theory that could make a computer do these things. I have been following the state of AI research for quite some time (and know some people in it personally), and this is what comes out when you ask people on the side or actually read the papers. Nobody knows how strong/true AI could be built, yet every healthy human being has strong/true Intelligence. (Never mind the BS some researchers publicly say to get funding.) This is actually a rather strong indicator that either the brain is far more than a "computer" or that intelligence and consciousness are not generated solely/fully by the brain.
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Not any type of proof. If you damage part of a TV set, it stops to exhibit all of its features, for example may stop to display color. That still does not mean the picture is generated in there. So while the brain plays a part like any good interface does, it is not enough to explain the overall thing.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Yeah, usually decomposition, and depending on the humidity levels, mummification. But you won't be around to experience any of that, being dead. You'll have exactly the same point of view as you had before you were conceived. You remember all that stuff from the beginning of the universe until you were born? No. Well that's exactly what will happen after you die, until the end of the universe...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Not necessarily.
Necessarily. Having been dead for quite a few minutes myself, but being lucky enough to have been reanimated, I can assure you absolutely nothing happens. No white lights. No angels. Nothing. But then again who are you going to believe - me, who is not trying to sell you anything, or the guys/gals who want you to a) buy their book or b) donate money to their church?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Mentally and physically the person in my baby picture is already dead. But somehow most people would insist that that baby is me!
Philosophically, you exhibit "perdurance". If you were unchanging for a while, you would be exhibiting "endurance". Even if you can't understand it, you sure can label it.
Actually, the other way round. I am just saying we do not know either way at this time. You are claiming we do. That places the burden of proof on you.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
You assume consciousness is an emergent property of the brain.
"Emergent property" is in a non-hand-wavy language is known as "information processing". It's what computers do.
That is a bit like assuming what is shown on a TV screen is generated in there.
No, it's not. TV receives images using a well-known mechanism that is based on well-known properties of electromagnetic waves. TV is not special in being able to receive electromagnetic waves, and TV station produces known and observable electromagnetic radiation that is processed by TVs. Even a person who knows nothing about TVs, TV standards and protocols, can easily discover that there is a big tower on a hill that produces electromagnetic waves with wavelengths between tens of centimeters to meters, and all TVs with antennas display pictures carried by changes in parameters of those electromagnetic waves -- it can be studied by blocking those waves, passing them through a filter, adding noise, etc.
With more sophisticated tools, a person may learn about details of how the images are encoded and how signal is modulated, but the most fundamental piece of knowledge -- that TV receives radio waves that contain encoded pictures -- is immediately evident to any person who is willing to perform research using basic knowledge of Physics, even if such person knows nothing about TVs.
With the brain, there is no BIG TV TRANSMITTER IN THE SKY that has all matter completely unaffected, except for EXTRA-SPECIAL HUMAN BRAINS BECAUSE THEY ARE SO SPECIAL. Things don't work that way.
So, no, we do not understand that "the brain is a biological computer".
Not only we do understand that as a result of rigorous scientific research, it's such an important piece of knowledge that a person who "disagrees" with it, should be considered to be unqualified for any kind of discussion related to science or brains, in the same way as a person who believes that Earth is flat is unqualified for any kind of discussion related to geography or astrophysics.
Nobody knows how strong/true AI could be built
I do! There are over 7 billions of examples of it currently in use! They even occasionally assemble new instances! The only question is, how it can be built USING SOMETHING OTHER THAN EXISTING BRAIN CELLS. And obviously, it's important to understand how it works. However fundamental processes are known very well -- neurons, electric pulses carried by changes in relative concentration of ions, various chemicals involved in the process either directly or indirectly regulating the speed and intensity. On top of that, there is plenty of math, however the same can be said about any computer.
Can you produce a Nintendo 64 starting from sand crystals and ending with playing a Mario game? Will I have to do it personally on my desk over this weekend, for you to believe that there is nothing magical about it? And if no, then what the hell do you want from scientists to do about a much more complex and much more weird computer, so you will shut up about your religious nonsense?
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Sorry, but you really do not know the current scientific state of the art. The mind-body problem is currently unsolved by science. Your view is that of a "physicalist". It may or may not be correct, there is no convincing evidence either way. (No, there really is not, ask an expert. I am just an amateur in this game.) Most scientists active in neurology and related areas are not touching the topic, because there is really no evidence either way.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Only an Anonymous Coward would endorse Mitt Romney.
On a side note - We aren't all living forever, but this election season is making it feel like forever.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Will his consciousness cease to exist or will his ability to show us it exist cease?
That's sort of a serious part of the question. Does someone's consciousness really cease to exist or just our ability to perceive it.
So, I died and went to Heaven. When I arrived, St. Peter looked me up in his great book. "I see you haven't been entirely good when you were alive. It seems you killed a kitten when you were young. But don't worry. That's not enough to keep you out. However, as punishment, you will have to pleasure this woman for the rest of eternity." At this point, he introduces me to a fat, ugly, smelly old hag. I almost got sick. But hey, I made it to Heaven!
A few months later, with this hideous broad in tow, I ran into CowboyNeal. And he was walking arm in arm with Megan Fox. "Not fair!" I thought. I knew CowboyNeal when he was alive. And I don't see how he rates such treatment. So I want to see St. Peter. St. Peter dusted off his great book and looked at several entries. "It seems", he said, "Megan killed a kitten when she was on Earth as well."
Have gnu, will travel.
That's not an answer. And I think you know it as well as I do.
First, I'm quite familiar with computability and Godel's incompleteness theorems, and they have nothing at all to do with the question. There is absolutely nothing in them that implies AI is a fundamentally unsolvable problem. In fact, most AI researchers probably understand those subjects far better than you do - and they still consider AI to be a worthwhile problem to study.
Second, the current state of the art in AI is irrelevant. You didn't just say there were things computers can't currently do. You said there are things no computer can ever do, no matter how powerful. That claim needs to be justified.
Third, AI has actually been making dramatic progress in recent years. After decades of following paths that didn't lead anywhere, researchers have finally found some techniques that enabled major breakthroughs. If you want to see practical applications of that, just look at Watson or Siri or the like. A mere five years ago, both of those would have been science fiction. Today they're real.
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
The medical definition, which is quite easy for me since I'm also a physician. Death can be reversible or non reversible. The legal definition of death is the minute I put my signature to the death certificate. Either way clinical death is defined as lack of pulse, blood pressure, breathing deep tendon reflexes, etc. It is identical in both reversible and non reversible cases, which is why efforts are usually taken to reanimate a recently dead person, especially if the death happens in front of medical staff and is not obviously irreversible (example, decapitation, a body that is obviously cold/stiff to the touch, etc).
but we know the brain doesn't 'die' immediately.
The tissue does not "die", however it stops working almost immediately when blood flow stops. The brain consumes huge amounts of oxygen and will immediately deplete any oxygen present in the blood. That's the reason people will suffer "transient ischemic attacks" (sort of like a mini-stroke) even with partial blockages of their carotid arteries - because there is a momentary disruption of blood flow. Now you could argue that a cell that is still alive in that it can maintain the permeability of its cell membrane for the moment, is not technically dead and you are correct. However that cell, at that moment, is not "working". All remaining ATP is being used to try to keep the cell alive, and it has no energy spare to do things like depolarize and transmit signals.
Maybe the angels, lights and funny guy with the beard show up later.
Buddy you are free to believe whatever you want. For me I just remember not finishing a sentence in the ER, and then being ventilated with a crowd of colleagues and nurses around me a few minutes later. There was no passage of time. There was no pain. There was no suffocation. In fact when I "came to" it took me a while to realize what had happened, with the obvious disbelief that it was happening to me. I do remember a certain disconnect from my body and it took a few minutes to register all the poking and prodding that was going on as IV lines were inserted, etc. And after a few minutes the incredible pain from the burns I had from the defibrilator started to be felt. But it's an amazing feeling to not have to do your own breathing. But I wouldn't read more into it than that. At least now I know that death is completely painless, and I'm not afraid for next time. I was taken completely by surprise, so now I figure that no one realizes when they are going to die. Oh they might feel really ill, or they might realize they are in real danger. But there's no "I'm dying" sensation. It just happens, quite suddenly, and just like the exact moment when you fall asleep, you have no idea exactly when it happens. But all the religious stuff I chalk up to people making shit up because they want/need attention, or they have to justify their beliefs to others in order to convince themselves that it's "true".
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Well, that is sort of the question now isn't it?
I mean forget about all this mumbo jumbo on spirit and soul or afterlife, if a person is clinically dead, can they still think or experience something on any level? If so, to what extent and should we reconsider how we treat these people?
On the other hand, we do not bother to much with restoring cognitive brain function in traumatic head trauma cases where the brain is damaged significantly. We do attempt to retrain them if possible to make use of other parts of the brain for the same type of skills and function. I know a guy who laid a bike down and impaled his head, through the helmet, on an Iron rod sticking out the side of a telephone pole. They said he is a 1 percent'er, as generally only one percent of people survive something like that and he made a decent recovery. Still has issues with balance sometimes and is a complete ass at times, but he was a prick before the accident too. His mother says he's changed, I think he's more of an ass more often, but most people can't tell the difference outside him constantly bringing the subject up and almost falling two or three times an hour If not sitting.
So if the consciousness is there even though the ability to express it isn't, then perhaps we could recreate this ability and perhaps end some suffering from situations like that where people damage or destroy the ability to express their consciousness.
This could have applications outside of mortality. But I guess is brain dead really dead could be the question.
"Emergent property" is in a non-hand-wavy language is known as "information processing". It's what computers do.
No, "emergent property" is a term co-opted from complex systems research that if you have enough agents with fairly simple rules (say, termites laying down pheromones) you can get some astonishingly complex macroscopic behaviours (say, termite nests). It gets co-opted and used in some hand-waving to try to explain away consciousness as an "emergent property" (and abstraction) of there being lots of neurons in the brain.
Unfortunately, it also entirely misses the point -- consciousness is not an abstraction, it is atomic (as you sit staring out of your eyes -- which by definition is the only way you have of knowing that you have a consciousness -- you experience only the consciousness and not the neurons).
Not only we do understand that as a result of rigorous scientific research, it's such an important piece of knowledge that a person who "disagrees" with it, should be considered to be unqualified for any kind of discussion related to science or brains, in the same way as a person who believes that Earth is flat is unqualified for any kind of discussion related to geography or astrophysics.
Your rhetorical bluster merely suggests you don't understand of how science works. There is no such thing as "unqualified for any kind of discussion" -- when you submit a paper for review you will never be asked your qualifications or whether you agree with a prescribed set of opinions. Certainly I am yet to contact the author of any paper I have ever reviewed to say "Before I read your paper, I just want to check you're fundamentally opposed to dualism..."
Moreover the way we choose to define science (necessarily third party observational) makes this question inaccessible as it is necessarily first party observational. The philosophical question has always been "I am" not "my neurons fire in a particular way", nor even "you are" or "he is".
Nobody knows how strong/true AI could be built
I do! There are over 7 billions of examples of it currently in use!
You are aware of what the "A" stands for in AI, aren't you?
On top of that, there is plenty of math, however the same can be said about any computer.
Nope, we've found out since the '60s that things work remarkably differently than a computer, and AI is no longer slavishly attempting to replicate theories of human cognition in algorithmic form.
Philosophy is like math but without rigor, or even an equal sign.
Jesus Christ! It's like you're purposefully ignorant! Philosophy is ridiculously rigorous. Maybe you should try reading the literature. Hell, read wikipedia. Anything is better than ignorance.
This is why I don't bother trying to offer corrections -- idiotic posts like this can only come from someone so unfamiliar with the subject that I'd need to write a fucking textbook one post at a time before I could even begin to explain how moronic the post was!
If you don't know anything about the subject, just shut the fuck up. Spreading bullshit like this isn't helping anyone. You know what it's like? It's like listening to a creationist talk about evolution -- pure, unadulterated, willful ignorance.
Now go find an undergrad textbook and start learning. You've got a long way to go.
Required reading for internet skeptics
'People have been thinking about immortality throughout history. We have a deep human need to figure out what happens to us after death,' says John Martin Fischer,
Nothing, You're dead.
Not necessarily. Obviously the religious fairy-tales are just that, i.e. whatever people need to hear to strengthen the meme-infection. But there is room for reincarnation without the religious connotations. Consciousness and life itself are still not understood at all, so there is room for speculation. Obviously, the body (brain) plays a part (for many the dominant part, it seems), but it is not enough to explain what is observable. Still, no need to do "immortality" research, everybody finds out sooner or later what happens. I guess these 5M just show that quite a few rich people live pathetic lives and know it.
Here's an interesting concept... not quite sure if I accept it or not, but it's something which has had me thinking a bit recently.
Assuming the following things:
1) Existence (I hesitate to use the word "universe" given the various theories of multiple "universes") is infinite in either direction, time or both.
2) Randomness exists
3) Consciousness is caused by a specific arrangement of the make-up of our brains and could also be caused by similar specific arrangements of other things
Assumption 1 is very debatable; however certainly not outside the realms of reason. Assumption 2 is, in my understanding, pretty strongly confirmed - although there's still those who'd argue against it. Assumption 3 seems quite logical and reasonable in general.
Assumptions 1 and 2 lead to the idea that anything that can happen eventually will. Adding assumption 3 leads to the idea that after our consciousness stops in our brains (death), it will eventually spring up again somewhere else including all of the memories from our lives before.
It's also worth keeping in mind the idea that your consciousness is only aware of the present - the past is accessed through memories. Therefore it seems quite acceptable to say that there's no fundamental difference to waking up in the morning as a "different consciousness" today than the one you were yesterday whilst still retaining all the same memories versus actually remaining the same consciousness. You can't prove it one way or the other and it makes no difference whatsoever. Therefore this new consciousness that awakes a trillion trillion years from now that has all your memories IS just as much your consciousness as you are now.
Like I said, I'm not sure I accept this general idea or not (I certainly wouldn't go so far as to say I "believe" it); but it definitely is food for thought for me, and I would like to hear others' (reasoned) opinions on it.
My book about LSD and Self-Discovery
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That's not an answer. And I think you know it as well as I do.
First, I'm quite familiar with computability and Godel's incompleteness theorems, and they have nothing at all to do with the question. There is absolutely nothing in them that implies AI is a fundamentally unsolvable problem. In fact, most AI researchers probably understand those subjects far better than you do - and they still consider AI to be a worthwhile problem to study.
Second, the current state of the art in AI is irrelevant. You didn't just say there were things computers can't currently do. You said there are things no computer can ever do, no matter how powerful. That claim needs to be justified.
Third, AI has actually been making dramatic progress in recent years. After decades of following paths that didn't lead anywhere, researchers have finally found some techniques that enabled major breakthroughs. If you want to see practical applications of that, just look at Watson or Siri or the like. A mere five years ago, both of those would have been science fiction. Today they're real.
Ironically, the recent advances in "AI" were largely through stopping thinking about AI as building an artificial version of human cognition, and instead doing something with far fewer philosophical claims: statistically mining the heck out of big data.
What hostility, what unasked question? I've been pondering this stuff since I'm a teenager, I'm just not easy to surprise.
As I said, everything is everything... the "problem" with that is, it doesn't make much sense to speak of individuality then, either.
My point was, even though everything that can be learned about neurology seems to utterly destroy most notions we have about ourselves and our decisions, we still have them. We go further and further away from just being, and coming up with objecties and properties to "possess", and "narratives" and all that nonsense. So yeah, let's ponder our mortality. I have great trust we won't fatfinger it. We already applied our rational brain to economics and politics, let's do this now.
From the summary:
"including near-death experiences and the impact of belief in an afterlife on human behavior."
Notice what they have in common? Both are about living people. The latter is actually a joke. Why not include "the history of folkore about immortality?" That's also "studying an aspect of immortality". I'm not opposed to questions, I'm opposed to shallowness :P
from the article:
"If you believe in reincarnation, how can the very same person exist if you start over with no memories?"
You see, even comedians are more insightful than that.
"I suppose it would be nice if reincarnation were a reality, but I have problems with the math. At some point, originally, there must have been a time when there were only two human beings. They both died, and presumably their souls were reincarnated into two other bodies. But that still leaves us with only two souls. We now have nearly six billion people on the planet. Where are all the extra souls coming from? Is someone printing up souls? Wouldn't that tend to lower their value?" - George Carlin
There. Done. Tomorrow we'll talk about Noah's Ark.
Everything is everything, and there is no hostility in that. The notions we have, what we call humans and how we consider ourselves - that won't disappear, because it never existed in the first place. A needle isn't hostile to a bubble, the tension in the bubble is hostile to reality.
Death is the cessation or permanent termination of all biological functions that sustain a living organism." Cessation; not interruption.
This is an exceptionally silly definition, because how exactly do you determine permanency?
To give a simple example with GP. Suppose the people around him decided to not reanimate him. What, precisely, would be the moment of his death? Is it when he lost consciousness (since that's where "termination of biological functions" began, and it was "permanent" since he didn't get reanimated)? Or the moment when they decided to do nothing? Or the moment when they could have still done anything with non-zero chance of success, regardless of whether they did or not? What if that happened when defibrillators didn't exist, did death occur earlier back then?