this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2024
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[–] [email protected] 99 points 2 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 75 points 2 months ago (16 children)

This is the correct way IMO. "Uploading" your mind to a computer is making a clone/copy, but the original dies the same.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Maintaining continuity of consciousness is the only thing that would make me feel comfortable with converting myself to a machine intelligence.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I hate to break it to you, but our meat brains don't even have continuity of consciousness. We become unconscious all the time. The only real constant is the "hardware" our consciousness emerges from, but even that is always changing.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 2 months ago

Except our brains are still functioning. If they didn't keep functioning, we'd be brain dead. The point is that there's a common thread that connects every waking moment together.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I don't get the down votes. Did y'all forget about sleep? No one vividly dreams every night all night long. Often it's the fade to black going to sleep then the sudden awakening.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago (7 children)

You do not die every night.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (5 children)

Obviously not, but what is the functional difference? If you can't tell it's happening, does it actually matter?

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I think the only way we know it is us for sure is if we are conscious in both the original and clone at the same time. Like... okay... I know this is me in the new brain, I'll shut down the other one.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Like… okay… I know this is me in the new brain, I’ll shut down the other one.

the other one: i'm pretty sure you've got it backwards, pal

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

No, no... you misunderstood. We're just taking a trip to the brain farm up north. You'll be able to think with the other brains up there. It'll be fun.

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[–] [email protected] 60 points 2 months ago (19 children)

As long as it's made mandatory to cover with insurance so it's available to everyone. The last thing we need is an immortal ruling class.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Hoping real hard that Alternate Carbon is not becoming reality.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

I see that you too have heard the prophecy.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Don't worry, going by past history this will be available to any and....uhh, [checks notes] oh, uh-oh.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Oh at this point it seems like we're treating dystopian science fiction as a guidebook instead of a warning.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago

Let the death of Saburo Arasaka be a lesson to us all: even 150+ year old bastards can get choked the fuck out

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago (2 children)

On the plus side an immortal ruling class might actually start caring about climate change.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Sure, in the most dystopian way possible.

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 months ago (3 children)

We don't need immortal billionaires sucking up everyone's oxygen.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

If you haven't, you should watch and/or read Altered Carbon.

If you choose to watch, it is my opinion that it's primarily the first season that's worth watching.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah it's not like the rest of the population ever benefits from advances in technology... Oh wait...

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 2 months ago

The final boss of subscriptions

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Good lord, just let people DIE. Imagine what a rotten place this would be if people with outdated mindsets continued to control the world decades or even centuries after their expiration dates. People were already angry about 80 year old presidential candidates... what happens when they're 120, or 150?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago (1 children)

For $10 a month you can get the brain implant without ads.

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I’d rather not enact the highest stakes ship of Theseus

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago

Probably the best description I've seen of this lmao

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 months ago (5 children)

I want a brain update and a penis upgrade please! Yes 275Tb of ram for my penis and 6" of brain 🧠!

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I don't want my penis remembering that much.

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 2 months ago (1 children)

There are two reasons he believes the neocortex could be replaced, albeit only slowly. The first is evidence from rare cases of benign brain tumors, like a man described in the medical literature who developed a growth the size of an orange. Yet because it grew very slowly, the man’s brain was able to adjust, shifting memories elsewhere, and his behavior and speech never seemed to change—even when the tumor was removed.

That’s proof, Hébert thinks, that replacing the neocortex little by little could be achieved “without losing the information encoded in it” such as a person’s self-identity.

The second source of hope, he says, is experiments showing that fetal-stage cells can survive, and even function, when transplanted into the brains of adults. For instance, medical tests underway are showing that young neurons can integrate into the brains of people who have epilepsy and stop their seizures.

“It was these two things together—the plastic nature of brains and the ability to add new tissue—that, to me, were like, ‘Ah, now there has got to be a way,’” says Hébert.

Very interesting. I've also seen research suggesting that the application of stem cells to damaged neural tissue within the spinal cord could repair it, so the idea that you could use a similar approach to actual brain health isn't such a big leap. But still, wow. I wonder how long it would take for the immature cells to develop into "adult mode" that's fully integrated into the patients cortex. In order to replace the entire brain, you'd have to do it in like, 8 parts, with years of recovery time in between each surgery. Also there would exist the potential for the new cells to develop into like, a second, smaller brain, if the connections sour or if the new material isn't stimulated the "right" way.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago (4 children)

No thanks. We don't need rich people living forever.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Might be the only way to get them to give a shit about the environment.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

I doubt it. They will just dump shit further away. If their solution default is to make things "somebody else's problem" there's no reason to believe they will stop thinking that way.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago

FROM THE MOMENT I UNDERSTOOD THE WEAKNESS OF MY FLESH IT DISGUSTED ME

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago (5 children)

I don't want to live longer, fix my fucking knees and back.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Millennials and Gen Z: *bond over their death wish Scientists: *ETERNAL LIFE

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

Could they have at least waited for the boomers to go first, they’ll never give up power now

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

"Millennials are ruining the death industry!"

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (6 children)

The brain renewal concept could have applications such as treating stroke victims

If this can restore functions to stroke victims again, it's absolutely amazing.
If this is vastly successful which remains to be seen, there might be a path format to the longevity part of the idea.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago

President Joe Biden created ARPA-H in 2022, as an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, to pursue what he called  “bold, urgent innovation”

I did not see Biden creating a cloning and immortality medical research arm of the government but I guess it's proof he already knew he was getting old before the debate and no wonder Trump wants back in the white house.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago (4 children)

I am not renting my corporeal existence from a megacorporation. There is no way this is ever affordable to the masses without some pretty huge caveats

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago (1 children)

From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh...

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (8 children)

If you want a bit of a deeper dive, Sean Carroll's Mindscape gets into the science of aging and known workable remedies/treatments.

The good news is that Billionaires will not be living forever any time soon.

The bad news is that we've got a cellularly defined terminal limit and there's nothing we can do to simply reset the clock. "Cloned Bodies" for animals are dysfunctional bordering on nightmarish. The human brain's plasticity isn't something you can renew with a pill or a potion. Blood Boys don't work. There aren't trivially replaceable components in the human body.

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