Could preserving brain data bring people back to life?
Salon - 16-Dec-2024This raises debates about whether revived identity would be genuine or a replica
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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston writing about that we'll one day be able to abolish death
A brilliant young neuroscientist explains how to preserve our minds indefinitely, enabling future generations to choose to revive us
Just as surgeons once believed pain was good for their patients, some argue today that death brings meaning to life. But given humans rarely live beyond a century – even while certain whales can thrive for over two hundred years – it’s hard not to see our biological limits as profoundly unfair. No wonder then that most people nearing death wish they still had more time.
Yet, with ever-advancing science, will the ends of our lives always loom so close? For from ventilators to brain implants, modern medicine has been blurring what it means to die. In a lucid synthesis of current neuroscientific thinking, Zeleznikow-Johnston explains that death is no longer the loss of heartbeat or breath, but of personal identity – that the core of our identities is our minds, and that our minds are encoded in the structure of our brains. On this basis, he explores how recently invented brain preservation techniques now offer us all the chance of preserving our minds to enable our future revival.
Visit website: https://www.arielzj.com/the-future-loves-you
See also: Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston - Neuroscientist and Research Fellow at Monash University
Details last updated 29-Nov-2024
Abolishing Death with Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston
This raises debates about whether revived identity would be genuine or a replica