My suspicions have been confirmed.. the likely path of AI, Robotics, and brain control.

A question that I have had for a long time now is this- How long could the cells of the brain and nervous system live and perform if they did not require a human body to sustain them? Depending on the answer, it could have very serious ramifications for the future of humans, technology, and society.



Death typically occurs when the body can no longer sustain the necessary requirements of feeding the human brain.
But how deeply connected is the brain to the body? Is it possible to remove the human brain and sustain it on a technological life support system? While we certainly do not have the technology to do this now, I guarantee we will have the ability to do this one day.

Well, the first of my questions has been answered in a sense.
Brain cells shown able to far outlive the lifespan of their host
Full Report

The scientists removed embryonic neuron precursors from mice and transplanted them into the developing brain of the longer lived Wistar rat. The siblings of the donor mice in the study lived an average of 18 months, whereas the Wistar rats lived an average of 30 months and up to 48 months. The mice neurons were labeled and the rats with transplanted nerve cells were followed for their entire lifespan. It was discovered that the mice neurons survived for the entire lifespan of the recipient rats, proving that brain cells are capable of far outliving their hosts.

So we have proof of concept. Neuron cells age much slower than the other cells in the body. This opens up a whole new avenue for AI, Robotics, and extreme longevity.

Forget uploading your brain into a computer. That is a dream that is unlikely to ever be true. Sure you could copy the exact state of the brain at any given moment, onto a digital medium. But that DOES NOT mean you are transferring the consciousness out of the body and into the machine. You may have a good replica of that personality, but these two systems would quickly diverge as a different set of experiences and perspectives drive this "feed-back loop" in different directions.

Here is my idea. I must warn you it is very different, futuristic, and not likely to come true for a very long time.

From the movie Avatar


When people reach an old age, give them the option to continue helping humanity and take part in this great experiment. The brain could be extracted from the body and then networked into an artificial robotic body (avatar). The nerve inputs for, say the eyes, can easily be synchronized with the visual input of the robot. And so forth with the arms, legs, ect. Through the wonders of wireless networking, the human brain could be maintained in an embryonic type environment, provided artificial blood, while remotely controlling a robot. From the conscious perspective of the human brain, they would feel as if they were in the body of the robot. They would not sense the fact that their brain is floating in this embryonic medium (the brain has no sense of feeling), their entire experience would be fed to them from their avatar.

Forget AI and the risk of a hyper-intelligent race of machines destroying the planet, a la terminator. Our robots could controlled by homegrown organic humans. This would also give another avenue for extreme longevity which has been a wish for many people.

We know it is possible to interface man and machine.

quadrapalegic controls robot arm through brain interface






Scary? Maybe. Possible? Yes! Will it happen? It's more likely than you think.
Imagine if the minds of our greatest scientists, philosophers, and engineers could continue helping the human condition for an additional 200 years? How effective, capable, and intelligent could these minds become after centuries of work and understanding? What if our first explorers into other star systems could be these individuals, rather than attempting to transport a living body across these distances. I am only touching upon a few possibilities. I am sure the members of ATS can come up with many more.

5 stars/flags and no replies? Don't be afraid to chime in ATS

Excellent thread, OP. Something that has been interesting to me for a long time.

Given that the body is simply a machine built around the brain, it's functions are simply keep everything alive, fed and reproduce. We've gone far beyond that in many ways, that everything is a luxury to most of us.

Imagine a world where the body is more like that in Surrogates - everyone plugged into a healthier, more able version of ourself. We break it, no worries, just get a new one.

It's a scary concept.

Would the tradeoff be worth it I wonder, to live in a world where you relied on the physical ability of others to ensure your continued existence, and be guaranteed painless physical existence? a brain in a jar is a pretty easily damaged thing, if no one is left around to make sure the nutrients are there. We have a bad enough time feeding the house plant, let alone grandma.. in her fit 18 year old body though, yeesh... oO

And what would become of emotion. It is felt tangibly within the body, would we still feel this? Hormones. Would we still have desires? How sterile is human emotion without the body to react to guilt, love, hate, lust..

I think we'd have to plug ourselves in first, to see. I doubt there will be many places willing to ask for terminal patients to offer their brains - if it goes awry, it could be unimaginable..

If, it were possibly to experience it, I'd do it... but then, I have taken my brain to many strange places on purpose. and the body is always a second thought when the brain is in full operation..

What is being proposed here is already the human condition. We are not in our bodies, the brain is a transceiver. Our souls are elsewhere experiencing life as a meat puppet.

Originally posted by xizd1
What is being proposed here is already the human condition. We are not in our bodies, the brain is a transceiver. Our souls are elsewhere experiencing life as a meat puppet.

If someone operates on your brain, your soul seems to change personalities.

Why is that?

Well, IMO i wouldn't be surprised if the government or another super secret high tech group already has the ability to keep a brain alive with no body. The brain needs oxygen and the precious spinal fluid that circulates from your brain and circulatory system, thats how it gets it nutrients, which is sweet. So, in a nutshell we need oxygen and nutrients (a sizeable amount of glucose i think thats the sugar in there, not a 100% on what kind).

The challenging part would be like you said, the actual interfacing between the two systems. The brain interperts electrical impulses so synchronizing the two is possible. They have already developed a "bionic" eye for vision. Quadrapalegic patients can control an arm.

You know what, i wouldn't be surprised if a prototype, a la Avatar, is walkin around right now. The tech, experts, and doctors are avaible now. We just need a billionare philantrophists and "subjects". Hehe

NOTE: The following will not be popular... it contains elements of faith.

I think we are, as a species, something like a... chip off the old block. Our creator made us in His image and we... without actually always knowing it, seek to be like Him and create in OUR own image. The difference is that we were created... in this physical universe as imperfect creature that act like robots, housing our souls that spend a lifetime learning how to gain control of our lives.

We, on the other hand, are following the same drive to recreate in OUR image except, we are doing so from that imperfect platform. The outcome will be not so easily defined.

As creatures that evolved from apes that fell from trees, we might be driven to recreate in that sense. But, while we deny God, we seek to be that god ourselves in recreating ourselves.

Okay, I'm done.

reply to post by winofiend

And what would become of emotion. It is felt tangibly within the body, would we still feel this? Hormones. Would we still have desires? How sterile is human emotion without the body to react to guilt, love, hate, lust..

This is an interesting thought experiment. I know that emotions can have chemical analogs. But is that necessary? I dont really think so. After a lifetime of human existence, our brains will have firmly created the neural networks to process such emotions. I believe the chemical analogs may just force the firing of that specific network.

I cannot see why you would all of a sudden be unable to feel jealousy or guilt or anger, or at least recognize a situation where that emotion would be likely. Now pain on the other hand, that might just be lost .

When contemplating what it would be like to lose your organic body and be receiving input from a machine, I dont see how you would immediately change. Of course overtime as you get more used to a "computer" related interface, I believe your mind would change in a sense. Imagine if you could go a question at any given time? while I can typically do this at any time, there are still times when i cannot. How would your thought process change when you always have immediate access to any information available on the web?

Thanks for the reply!

Well it appears my thread has now been moved to the bunk and garbage forum known as skunk works, even though it is discussing proven scientific research..

My thread is now in the same category as threads talking about beyonce being demon possessed....
Thanks Admin

Brown University creates first implanted wireless brain computer interface.

Researchers at Brown University have succeeded in creating the first wireless, implantable, rechargeable, long-term brain-computer interface. The wireless BCIs have been implanted in pigs and monkeys for over 13 months without issue, and human subjects are next.

Nice thread. Good move OP. This mind control technology is amazing.

You make a good point about where things are headed.

But don't discount AI just yet. If the brain is discrete then there's no reason to think that someday it couldn't be entirely synthetic. Copying biological to synthetic may be imperfect, though.

We're probably at a stage where some things are just impossible.

I do think we will model intelligence based on earth creatures, including ourselves. So AI will share some things in common with us. But it won't be the same as us.

Consider this OP. If we can replace arms and legs with prosthetics, why can we not also replace areas of the brain with synthetic counterparts? Like an artificial Cerebellum? Impossible? Why? Maybe oneday we will be able to send in nanobots that go to a damaged area of the brain and rebuild. Or perhaps it will be something we create with a field that concentrates on an area of hte brain in 3d while leaving the rest of the brain untouched. Evenso we could probably also inject special cells that would regenerate areas of the brain. However, it might be that in certain cases artificial components would be better than biological. Why should you or I or anyone rule this out?

You state that neurons can live for a long time. But what if it becomes more practical to implant artificial brain components that will not just last 800 years but will instead last 80,000?

The reason I state this is because I'm aware that there're researchers modeling areas of the brain and that they're, even at this early stage, arriving at some amount of success.

I'm not saying we can replace the whole brain with an artificial one. Nor am I saying we can transfer ourselves onto computers reliably. This is not true. I am merely wondernig whether you've considered the possibility of artificial replacements for certain areas of the brain.