It seems to me they can image the synapses but I don’t see how they’re going to get the synaptic weights.
Take a look at the picture in the article. You’re really just getting the shape of the synapse at best.
A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
271–280 of 441 posts
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
Which one is the true consciousness?
Both, obviously.
It seems that way on the surface. Both will wake up with the view that they are the true consciousness.
Another variant is the concept that every decision we make we actually split into two universes, one making one decision and the other making the other decision.
But, anyway the scenario is set up, the question is why does that particular brain have that particular consciousness?
It is easier to see in the splitting scenario. Why do I end up being the consciousness that chose A instead of B? A materialistic view does not have a satisfactory resolution of this issue, whereas the common sense view that I actually am choosing A and not B and there is only one me easily accounts for the perception of such. It is only within a strictly materialistic worldview that common sense accounts run into opposition, which would be a good reason to look beyond materialism.
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#273Earlier quoted context omitted.
How then do you explain how physical injuries and external stimulation to the brain affect the brain's operation in ways that we increasingly understand? Not saying we're anywhere close to having it all figured out. But this is the sort of question you have to address to accept dualism. I'd certainly like to believe there's something more to my conscious existence than this perishable gray matter. I prefer to believe…
How do you explain being normal and having almost no brain at all: http://bigthink.com/paul-ratner/the-medical-mystery-of-a-man...
This argument works just as well (or badly) against the brain is just an antenna hypothesis..
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#274It seems interesting from the perspective of the customer, but the really interesting thing is that if this succeeds, they will have access to brain imaging data that no one else has. You can't normally get such detailed scans of a human brain, because it requires the human to die. It's a business model that allows them to accelerate the pace of research without the human rights violations that come from human experi…
They aren't scanning the brains. They are just plasticizing them. The electron microscope scan was just to demo that the plasticizing actually worked, but it required cutting up the brain into slices. That isn't part of the procedure as far as I can tell.
My mistake then. That's unfortunate, and less interesting then.
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#275Earlier quoted context omitted.
If the crypto network is still around then the balances can be publicly verified.
What if you claim to reveal the password once you're alive, but don't? Or can claim you don't know it even if you do? What will people do then - kill you off again?
This assumes that the crypto network will still be worth anything by then. Who says any of the coins in existence right now will be worth anything even if cryptocurrency takes over?
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#276If folks really want to make sure they come back from the dead, they might also think about setting up proper incentives for performing the potentially highly laborious process that resurrection might entail even 100+ years from now. It might be helpful to place a sort of back-to-life bounty on yourself, to be held in escrow, and only to be paid out upon successful resurrection. The bigger the bounty, the higher your…
"Highly laborious process": I guess if the technology was available to preform this process, then automating it would be relatively easy. The materials that make up a human are cheap enough. Edit: I read the article. So they are assuming in the future that they won't bother making a new human, but just load the brain state into a computer simulation, which would be even cheaper.
Computers have yet to match many of the capabilities of the brain. Heck I have better image recognition when I’m drunk than all of Google’s image recognition nodes combined.
Could a computer host a human mind to its full capacity?
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#277Any sufficiently advanced technology that is capable of resurrecting your brain/consciousness, is also capable of subjecting your digital consciousness to eternal torture worse than anything experienced by Man thus far. If you haven't already, check out Black Mirror's last episode: Black Museum. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, even if there's only an infinitesimal chance of it happening.
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#278If folks really want to make sure they come back from the dead, they might also think about setting up proper incentives for performing the potentially highly laborious process that resurrection might entail even 100+ years from now. It might be helpful to place a sort of back-to-life bounty on yourself, to be held in escrow, and only to be paid out upon successful resurrection. The bigger the bounty, the higher your…
This comment pairs great with the other top level comment that you could be subjected to inhuman amounts of torture.
Why bother resurrecting you fully?
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#279Any sufficiently advanced technology that is capable of resurrecting your brain/consciousness, is also capable of subjecting your digital consciousness to eternal torture worse than anything experienced by Man thus far. If you haven't already, check out Black Mirror's last episode: Black Museum. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, even if there's only an infinitesimal chance of it happening. https://en.wikipedia.or…
There's also a similar scene in Altered Carbon
Re: A startup is pitching a mind-uploading service that is “100 percent fatal”
#280Imagine the ego you could curate when you believe you can upload your mind for eternity. How special you are!