X-Message-Number: 7864
Date: Sun, 16 Mar 1997 07:46:29 -0800 (PST)
From: Joseph Strout <>
Subject: Re: timescale of cryonics & uploading

In msg #7857, Arkady Elgort <> wrote:

> As Thomas Donaldson mentioned, even massively parallel computers cannot 
> model anything like human brain. Therefore uploading into some unknown 
> machine has no scientific grounds whatsoever.

I don't believe Thomas said anything quite like that.  Perhaps he said
that *today's* massively parallel computers can't model the brain, which
of course is true by wide margins.  But this is different from saying that
no computer could model the brain.

And I think your conclusion is unfounded.  The scientific grounds for
uploading is quite solid.  Briefly, it goes like this: neurons can be
emulated.  The brain is composed of neurons (and glia, and a few other
things, which I assume we can also model).  Therefore, the brain can be
emulated.  Today's computers are not well suited to the task; certainly
emulating an entire brain would take specialize hardware, but what of it?
There's already a growing field that works on this; do a Lycos search for
"neuromorphic" and you'll turn up a hundred interesting links.

We still have a LOT of details to work out, both in the science (details
of how neurons work individually and collectively, etc.) and the
engineering (better emulation hardware, faster technology, etc.).  But the
foundation appears solid.  If you can see some fundamental problem I have
overlooked, please let me know.

> Brain repair after suspension also could prove impossible, but at least
> we KNOW that biological brains do (sometimes) work.;) 

Yes.  And biological brains are computers, are they not?  So we know our
consciousness (etc.) can be supported by at least SOME computers...

Regards,
-- Joe

,------------------------------------------------------------------.
|    Joseph J. Strout           Department of Neuroscience, UCSD   |
|               http://www-acs.ucsd.edu/~jstrout/  |
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