Human brains implanted in robots

His ultimate goal is to make immortality possible by transplanting the brain and its personality into a robotic body.

The idea is based on work by US scientist Robert White. In experiments with chimps, White showed that a monkey’s brain can be taken out of the skull and plugged into a system that will keep it alive.

This definitely can be used to help disabled people. We already ran some experiments – a subject without a hand tried this technology. He said the hand worked for him. All it takes is to attach electrodes to the undamaged part of the arm so they can read the muscle activity

Source

This is very interesting. Imagine para- or quadriplegics, or people missing limbs, being able to make full use of those limbs again. Imagine never being sick or tired or hungry, and always having energy. Is implantation of the human consciousness into robotic bodies the next stage of our evolution? What downsides could there be? What are the moral objections?

Cyberman?

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Humanity 2.0

Its coming and sooner than we think.

Many of the problems with interfacing the brain and computers are being worked on as we speak.

I read about a virus they can use to make certain nerves cells photo sensitive, attach fiber optics and you get an input of some kind.

Thats one of the first major hurdles solved to making the line between humans and machine go away.

I think there is a doc on this on Netflix you can watch, Transhuman or something like that.

One downside I could see is how do you keep the brain from physically rotting? all organic matter rots overtime. I cant imagine a piece of meat lasting outside the body very long. Not matter what system of preservation they could come up with it would still have some sort of deterioration rate.

Originally posted by Foxy1
One downside I could see is how do you keep the brain from physically rotting? all organic matter rots overtime. I cant imagine a piece of meat lasting outside the body very long. Not matter what system of preservation they could come up with it would still have some sort of deterioration rate.

Well you could say the same about our skin... Skin cells are constantly dying and being "refreshed" so to say. I'd imagine the same thing happens to brain cells, unless I'm totally wrong. I'm not very knowledgeable about the specifics of the human brain, but if the brain cells were constantly "refreshing" themselves as our skin cells do, couldn't we keep our same, original consciousnesses indefinitely? Besides... We can already grow tissue in a lab, so I'm sure there would be a way around any potential deterioration.

reply to post by Foxy1


That's exactly what I thought. I don't think this is the way to immortality.

That's just one drawback I see. Sexual reproduction would be impossible and who would be in control of the off switch? This actually scares me because I can see it being used as a "prison", if you will, with executions just a matter of flicking a switch.

Originally posted by Viking9019
Cyberman?

Dr. Who, where are you?

reply to post by trollz


Genetic engineering will render this a moot point.

Enabling telemerasse in mature adults pretty much extends the natural life of the organism indefinitely, as the cause of age-related death is protein synthesis failure due to corrosion of the DNA.

The down-side to this is that cancer becomes an eventuality without serious attention being paid to engineering the immune system to better fight rogue cell populations within the body. But this should be little/no problem in the coming years - considering cybernetic interfaces will never be practical if surgically implanted. Nanite construction would be necessary for practical market applications - which, in itself, offers a solution to the cancer issue.

So, really - I don't see where this is going to really fit in with the course of modern technology.

But, there again - I would have never expected such overpriced, useless gimmicks such as Apple products to be successful in the market, either.... so it may end up being popular in spite of its frivolousness.

Now if only we could implant them into humans.

2nd

Although I can see many benifits to this, there are also possible dangers. As we all know, the more complicated an electrical, mechanical system is, the more prone it is to considerable damage, or service interuption when there is an electromagnetic event occuring.

Since the sun has proven time and again, that it is capable of churning out enough particles to aggitate the magnetosphere to the point where telegraph systems have been burned out, areas left without power, and more recently badly enough that phonelines and mobile telecoms were damaged, or rendered inopperative for a time, it stands to reason that a complicated electrical system like a cybernetic body would be at some serious risk from such a thing.

reply to post by trollz


When you don't feel pain anymore, you end up forgetting how it felt like and more prone to cause it to others beings. That cant be good with humans.

Plus imagine you would lose a lot of sensations, being in a metal body. Thats a choise to make but i cant be sure of what would happening to the mind of the people that choose to be transfered. If the brain is fully transfered without damages, i guess they would stay themselves and not lose their identities and their "souls". But if it is transfering the memory without keeping the physical flesh brain, im sure it wouldnt work. The brain being the link that keeps the soul bound to the body. Without it, it is free to go. So if you only transfer one's memory, admiting it is possible, you would end up with a machine that got the memory of a human. It wouldnt end well imo especially if it find out what it really is.

Originally posted by Viking9019
Cyberman?

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edit on 30/4/12 by Viking9019 because: (no reason given)

At first glance I would have said Daleks, scary thought either way.

reply to post by _damon


The thing with the human mind, is that in its developmental stage of growth, it lays down new pathways for itself, according to the chemcial and emotional stimuli to which it is exposed during maturation. Once these pathways are laid, the chances are that the persons reactions and likely actions will remain within a known range unless severe physical or mental trauma occurs. Now, although one could say that being seperated from the flesh mask we all wear, an inserted into a metal skin would be such a trauma, I think the odds are good that the person would remain largely themselves.

They would have to get used to the new body, its capabilities and short commings, the differences in tensile strength, gripping force, and so on, but the spirit does not reside in the body. A persons emotions are largely electrochemical signals sent by the brain, to the rest of the body which merely expresses these emotions. Of course physical sensation deprivation would cause an issue, but the reality is that if a metal body were to be constructed, it would pretty much HAVE to have delicate sensory equipment on its outer layer.

The reason for this is that so much of our understanding of movement and balance is related to not only our inner ears, but the responsiveness and sensitivity of our flesh. We feel the air move over the small hairs on our flesh when we walk, run, or move. We can feel our footing become more or less stable dependant on the camber of a given surface, or its structure, wether concrete, shale, mud, or grass. So much of our capacity for function in the world of our birth is related to sensation, that to remove or replace things like touch, taste, sight and hearing with anything less than amazing analogues, would cause a human mind to cease to function effectively after a time, due to lack of appropriate stimulus.

The mind can atrophy, somewhat like a muscle, if it is not used, not stimulated. As long as the mind is implanted in such a mechanical construct, as could recreate or better the stimulation level provided by mankinds normal interaction with his surroundings, then I do not see why the human/machine connection could not be a successful venture.

reply to post by trollz


Resitance is futile!!!!!

When i read the title one name came into my mind:BORGS.

I don't know if this will work,but the idea is scary.Everything on this planet has an expiration day,including humans.
Humanity and especially those in power are corrupted,even with the knowledge that they will die one day.They gather money and wealth and they know they are not going to take them with them.

Imagine the levels of corruption, knowing that they are going to live forever.

Maybe the original,noble goal to help diabled people,sounds great,but we all know that once succesful it will be used for other purposes.

Transhumanism is the push they are banking on. They are the ones who have spent so much time consructing a karmic soul trap school, hijaking and cheating, bending what they consider cosmic laws, appointing themselves school trustees and managers but using all the resources to fail the students and harm eveyrone's progression.

They've sort of sold this to their own children as playing the wolf side to help us, the HH message, but I think they must realize, they're not off the hook.

Transhumanism is their solution. Mimic creation. It's probably more false promises they've been given by their contacts too.

This has nothing to do with humans seeing vast improvements in living conditions, health, longevity, for there are many possibilities, but its just that their transhumanism has an agenda.