X-Message-Number: 313
From att!csvax.cs.caltech.edu!symult!hal Mon Apr 22 11:25:45 PDT 1991
Date: Mon, 22 Apr 91 11:25:45 PDT
From: symult! (Hal Finney)
Message-Id: <>
To: whscad1.att.com!
Subject: cryonics #310 - Re: Motivation for Reanimation

I wrote:

>>One of the things I worry about for the future is the possibility that
>>people will be much smarter.  If they have all this control over DNA,
>>etc., wouldn't it make sense to use it to enhance intelligence?

Russell E. Whitaker replied:

>I see arguments such as this and wonder why certain implications don't 
>make themselves immediately evident to their proponents.  Hal 
>assumes that, while we're building ubermenschen, no one will 
>be designing system upgrades to the Mark I models.

I'm arguing that such upgrades may not be possible:

The brain is a complex organ, flexible and adaptable to a tremendous
degree.  There is evidence that, during development, the brain
actually adjusts itself physically to the sense organs and muscle
connections that it finds itself attached to.  Furthermore, it appears
that the specific pattern of neurons and synaptic connections is
largely established by accident.  There just isn't enough information
in our DNA for the whole brain's connections to be pre-programmed.

In view of this, I feel that the first few months and years of life
are a time for the brain to, in effect, learn to work; to learn how to
think, based on the connections that happened to have been set up
during neuron growth (growth which continues during these years), and
to learn how to perceive and control the environment based on the
sensory and motor neurons that happened to occur.

We don't know what are the sources of intelligence.  There may be some
evidence that it is related to faster neurons, or to a greater density
of neural connections.  My feeling is that it is probably more subtle
than this.

But whatever the cause, I question whether it will be possible to take
a mature, trained, adapted brain, and overlay greater intelligence
into it, keeping it "otherwise the same".  The brain matured in an
environment in which it worked a certain way; change its workings, and
all that learning may no longer be relevant.

On the other hand, arranging for smarter babies to be born avoids this
problem.  The infant brains will be adjusted to their greater
intelligence from the beginning; they will develop their neural
connections in accordance with the greater potential that they have.

Engineers are familiar with this phenomenon.  It is often the case
with complex systems that it is easier to start from scratch in
building a new, more capable system, than it would be to try to
upgrade an existing system.  As the complexity of the systems grows,
this problem becomes even more pronounced.

Of course, this is all speculative.  Maybe intelligence can be
upgraded.  Even if it's hard, it may not be impossible.  "Anything
that can be done, will be done."  Larry Niven's novel, Protector,
describes how it must be to awaken with greatly increased
intelligence.  The first thought is always, "I've been stupid."

Hal Finney


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