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‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

theguardian.com

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Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#61

Post by etrautmann »

NickM wrote: post #11

I used to buy into this kind of stuff, but I've become more and more skeptical of the idea that you would still be yourself if your brain could be preserved/emulated/transplanted/whatever. Our nervous system extends into our bodies. We feel emotions in our bodies. People with certain kinds of brain damage that prevents them from feeling emotions normally also experience trouble making rational decisions. More recent…

As a neuroscientist working on brain computer interfaces, it's painfully clear to me that we are absolutely nowhere close to understanding the full complexity of the human brain in a manner required to simulate or reboot someone's consciousness. It's not even clear yet what level of abstraction is required. Do we need to map all of the synapses to get a connection graph, or do we need to map all synapses plus the synaptic proteins to assign connection weights too? This is ignoring other types of connections like gap junctions between cells, ephaptic coupling (the influence of local electric fields on neurons firing), mapping neuormodulator release, etc. On one hand, it feels like irreduceable complexity. On the other hand, however, you can lose about half of your neurons to neurodegenerative diseases before you start noticing a behavioral effect, so clearly not every single details is required to simulate your consciousness. It would be a MAJOR leap forward in neuroscience to even understand what level of abstraction is necessary and which biological details are essential vs. which can be summarized succinctly.

Anyone claiming to take your brain and slice it up and have a working model right now is currently selling snake oil. It's not impossible, but neuroscience has to progress a ways before this is a reasonable proposition. The alternative is to take the brain and preserve it, but even a frozen or perfused brain may have degraded in ways that would make it hard to recover important aspects that we don't yet understand.

It is, however, fascinating to do the research required to answer these questions, and that should be funded and continue, even if just to understand the underlying biology.

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#62

Post by amyjess »

Ultimately, I am going to quote one of my favorite writers [0] and say that I am not afraid of a life that ends.

I don't want to be a brain in a jar. Or in a computer either. I enjoy experiencing physical sensations and interacting with the world in meatspace. And if I can't enjoy either, then just let me die.

And I apply this to not just brain preservation, but any attempt to artificially prolong the quantity of my life at the expense of the quality of my life. I do not want to spend my last years in a hospital bed hooked up to machines and unable to move. That was how my dad died, and even then he was lucky enough his partner (who he had discussed this with before and who had the authority to make the decision) eventually agreed to switch him to palliative care in his final hours. Similarly, I have seen what chemotherapy does to people, and I have long since decided that if I ever get cancer, I will refuse chemo and let myself die. I am also having a living will drawn up that includes a DNR order, multiple scenarios where doctors will be ordered to pull the plug, and a prohibition against anyone amputating any of my limbs or sensory organs even if it's necessary to save my life.

I will make sure I die with my autonomy and my dignity intact.

[0] Al Ewing. He writes comics. Read his stuff, he's good.

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#63

Post by JohnFen »

nancybelowzero wrote: post #7
JohnFen wrote: post #2

I think that immortality would be a disaster, personally. That we die is a critically important aspect of life. I'd prefer that we work on ways to make the death process less traumatic.

>critically important aspect of life Nothing says "life" like being dead.

I meant "life" in the big picture, not on the individual level.

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#64

Post by rcarmo »

deadbabe wrote: post #33

I think it’s more likely we can preserve our ego rather than our consciousness. For instance, create an AI replica of yourself that accurately behaves the same way you do. Although you would be dead, your ego can carry on living and responding to changes in the external world, and people could have interactions with you that accurately simulate how you would respond to them long after you’re gone. And as your ego lea…

Cue Nixon in Futurama.

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#65

Post by lm28469 »

I love how people have wet dreams about living forever by uploading their mind to a computer but put absolutely 0 fucking effort actually increasing their health/life span in real life, and/or waste their days/week/years doing stuff they hate to "enjoy life" later (when their body is already half way rotten). As long as it's sci fi and they have 0 effort to provide they'll suck every single drop of hope but as soon as there is something actually actionable they recoil in horror

imho if you're not lean and exercising every day you have no business talking about living longer, you've already refused the only magic pill there is. It makes all the difference between having one foot in the grave at 60 or still chopping your own fire wood at 80, and all it takes besides a bit of luck is to move your ass 45 minutes a day

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#66

Post by [deleted] »

amyjess wrote: post #62

Ultimately, I am going to quote one of my favorite writers [0] and say that I am not afraid of a life that ends. I don't want to be a brain in a jar. Or in a computer either. I enjoy experiencing physical sensations and interacting with the world in meatspace. And if I can't enjoy either, then just let me die. And I apply this to not just brain preservation, but any attempt to artificially prolong the quantity of my…

[deleted]

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#67

Post by dtagames »

selimthegrim wrote: post #21
dtagames wrote: post #3

Like so many scientific pursuits, this one has its roots in science fiction. A terrific trashy futuristic novel from the 70's by Lawrence Sanders called The Tomorrow File [0] features preserved heads that are kept around to spout ideas in the future, when they might become useful, among many other Brave New World -type concepts. [0] https://archive.org/details/tomorrowfile0000sand_t5i1

I was really hoping this was gonna have one of those so bad it’s good science-fiction cover artworks

That internet archive version is particularly boring, isn't it. The novel is his best, if you ask me. His detective fiction didn't ever rise to that level and this was the only one he wrote in the sci-fi genre. Perhaps being relegated to the dime store novelist category in his other books prevented this from getting the attention it deserves, but it was wonderfully smarmy and prescient.

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#68

Post by latexr »

amyjess wrote: post #62

Ultimately, I am going to quote one of my favorite writers [0] and say that I am not afraid of a life that ends. I don't want to be a brain in a jar. Or in a computer either. I enjoy experiencing physical sensations and interacting with the world in meatspace. And if I can't enjoy either, then just let me die. And I apply this to not just brain preservation, but any attempt to artificially prolong the quantity of my…

> (…) and a prohibition against anyone amputating any of my limbs or sensory organs even if it's necessary to save my life.

> I will make sure I die with my autonomy and my dignity intact.

Amputees have autonomy, dignity, and rich lives. To believe that the loss of a limb is so severe that death is preferable is absurd and insensitive.

What if instead of requiring an amputation, he loses faculties by accident like suffering from parosmia due to COVID or having a weight crush a body part? Did he suddenly lose his dignity? He certainly lost some autonomy. What’s the next step then?

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#69

Post by ryandvm »

ericmcer wrote: post #10
JohnFen wrote: post #2

I think that immortality would be a disaster, personally. That we die is a critically important aspect of life. I'd prefer that we work on ways to make the death process less traumatic.

Why? We have already decimated any semblance of natural selection so death is no longer a necessity from an evolutionary standpoint. Maybe immortal humans would be more beneficent because they wouldn't be scrambling to get ahead in their short time here. If I didn't only have 30-40ish productive years to achieve whatever I will in this life it would be much easier to donate money or time to charitable pursuits.

> If I didn't only have 30-40ish productive years to achieve whatever I will in this life it would be much easier to donate money or time to charitable pursuits.

Spoiler: The haves are not going to get any more generous when they've got thousand year lifespans. You would just have end up having to spend hundreds of years grinding away at the bottom of the ladder instead of 30 or 40.

Re: ‘With brain preservation, nobody has to die’

#70

Post by latexr »

kerblang wrote: post #16

As usual, it must be warned that living forever means you can be tortured forever. Interesting that an article on Dante is getting upvotes today...

Eternal life doesn’t necessarily mean being impervious to harm. If you live indeterminably because your flesh brain was preserved or there’s a digital copy of you on a hard drive, a simple drop on the floor could terminate your existence.

And if we’re talking about fiction, there’s no obligation to make those lives unbearably immortal either.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlcxokM970M

> Our flesh is indestructible. Our lives are never ending. But not even in the dumb vampire way where after a while you hate it and you can’t die. We can die whenever we want. We just don’t have to.

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