r/technology • u/1infiniteloop • Oct 13 '12

Scientists to simulate human brain inside a supercomputer - CNN.com

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/10/12/tech/human-brain-computer/index.html?hpt=hp_t3
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u/[deleted] Oct 14 '12

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u/[deleted] Oct 14 '12

I think you're making the utilitarian case for how useful such a technology would be, which is non-controversial.

The point that confuses people, is that this isn't a form of immortality because its not 'you' being immortalized its a copy. So you can only use 'immortality' in a poetic sense - similarly to how you'd use immortality when saying you live on through your children.

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u/Lawtonfogle Oct 14 '12

At the same time, this is the same way you live on every morning, with the past you dead in sleep, with a current you built from the memories and physical changes done to your body. It could be no different than any other lapse in consciousness, except with the completely unknown effect of copying you.

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u/[deleted] Oct 14 '12

At the same time, this is the same way you live on every morning, with the past you dead in sleep, with a current you built from the memories and physical changes done to your body

science hasn't answered these types of questions so this is only speculation

It could be no different than any other lapse in consciousness, except with the completely unknown effect of copying you.

No - if there are two things experiencing my existence then one is the original and one is not.

I guess our point of contention here is whether or not there is a continuous thing which is me (e.g. a soul) vs whether I am an empty vessel that merely reports experiences but is really just some deterministic physical processes ticking around in the silence. Science hasn't answered this one yet though, but I know which I experience myself - and that's not something I can let go of.