X-Message-Number: 8573
Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 08:03:44 -0700
From: "Joseph J. Strout" <>
Subject: Re: Uploading & Excitement

In Cryomsg #8571, Olaf Henny <> wrote:

>>What makes you think this?  If we can upload a brain at all, implementing
>>emotions, hormones, neuromodulators, etc. will be almost trivial subparts
>>of that problem.  Uploading will not be successful until these problems are
>>solved, and there is no reason to suppose they are unsolvable.
>
>And how do you suggest this will work?

Model neurons will have receptors for model neuromodulators and hormones.
Some of them will also have secratory capability, for generating the model
neuromodulators and hormones.  The spatial position of neurons is obviously
known from scanning, and if vasculature is important, that will be recorded
too.  So when (say) the cells which release adrenalin are caused to fire
quickly, it will release (simulated) adrenalin which will follow its course
to other cells, and affect them just as in the biological brain.  I don't
know exactly what part of the process you're having difficulty with; feel
free to ask for more detail on whatever steps confuse you.

>Now: I ski down a mountain; eyes signal steep cliff ahead; brain
>concludes: possibly more than I can handle sends signal to
>adrenal glands; defenses get fired up heartbeat increases,
>reaction times reduces; I am getting an incredible turn-on; I
>feel competent and powerful.  Admittedly all these signals of
>cause and effect are processed through the brain and can
>conceivably be simulated there.

Right.  There's nothing magical about these effects; ultimately you are
aware of them because they affect the firing of neurons in your brain.  As
I said previously, these effects are likely to be far simpler than the more
subtle problems of neural dynamics.

>I lie in my cyber-bed or whatever will equate for a position of
>comfort then.  I send a signal to my cyber-brain: Get me to the
>edge of systems breakdown (with a specified safety margin of
>course) and convey to me all the sensations of exhilaration and
>joy.  Somehow this does not seem quite the same.

So don't do this.  Instead, strap on skis and start down a mountain.  Your
eyes will signal steep cliff ahead, perhaps all the more vividly because
they are artificial and (perhaps) can see more clearly through the blowing
snow.  You may know intellectually that your life is not in serious danger,
because your brain is nearly indestructible and you've made a fresh backup
anyway.  But your instincts (provided you haven't tampered with them) will
kick in anyway, and you'll feel the same "fight-or-flight" response.  If
that's what thrills you, I say go for it!

>I hope you are right, but somehow I cannot imagine a state
>machine, which will clearly include all the advances of today's
>technology, timid as they may seem by the standards of the day,
>to contain or even tolerate the uncertainties and ficklenesses of
>the human brain.

I think you're attributing some magical quality to the brain, much like the
magical "life force" once thought to animate living things.  When you look
closely enough -- say, at the activities of individual neurons -- the magic
goes away; one can see that they are lawful little (analog) computers.

And an artificial brain will not necessarily be a state machine; it may
well be composed of analog elements as well.  In fact, researchers in
neuromorphic engineering are already building analog neural chips, and they
work quite well considering the primitive state of this technology.

>I like the SF concept of computer link to bio-brain to allow
>retrieval from an information library, but 'uploading' would
>suggest to me an integration of the two.

The notion of a computer link to a bio-brain is very science fictional
indeed.  It is likely to be much harder than uploading.  The brain is not
designed for direct input and output; its only inputs are the sensory
nerves, and its only outputs are the motor nerves.  There are NO inputs and
outputs directly accessing the memory system, for example (to the extent
that "memory system" even has any sensible meaning).

>Where do 'I' stop, and where does the rest of the world start?

Haven't philosophers been asking this question for millenia?  Answer
however you wish.  A simple answer that works in practice is this: if I can
will it to move,  or feel it when it's stimulated, it's me.  Otherwise,
it's not-me.


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