Not to talk about immortality, how do we think about thinking transplant

Human beings have a kind of obsession with immortality. From ancient times, the emperors indulged in alchemy, and the development of AI, genetic engineering, and frozen human body in modern society seemed to express people's longing for life.

How do humans realize life immortal? In addition to the gene cloning program provided by modern technology, American Martina also put forward the idea of ​​"thinking humans" - digital traces (thinking files) that people keep on computers and the Internet, including chats, photos and videos. Based on the data, the human consciousness that is similar to the human being through the replica "thinking software" that has the same function as the human brain is the thought of being cloned.

In other words, through the transplantation of thinking, people can live forever. Recently, a company has been involved in this field. NECTOME, a US startup technology company, tried to “upload the brain” through surgery to preserve the digital preservation of the mind. At present, 25 people have already paid a deposit of 10,000 US dollars to book the service.

There is no doubt that if memory can be uploaded and thinking can be transplanted, it will have a very profound impact on human society. When the movie plot of Memory Master is mapped to real life, how should we view this technology?

Terminator of brain dementia

Using thinking transplants will benefit all patients with advanced and chronic diseases. The separation of thinking and body means that people's consciousness will last longer, and the dead will have the cost of waiting for medical progress, similar to frozen human body. The difference is that the beneficiaries of the thinking transplant can continue to interact with the society after the body is not self-directed. Therefore, this technology is particularly important for patients with dementia.

Alzheimer's disease has taken away the normal intelligence of many elderly people, but it does not damage the old man's body. If such patients are able to distribute their thoughts to the computer, they can maintain self-awareness during the treatment.

This is somewhat like an artificial heart that separates the work of the patient's heart, and the artificial heart maintains the patient's life until a new heart donor is found. In the end, Alzheimer's patients can re-transfer their thinking to the brain that has been cured. Even if the body is still being treated, the patient can continue to interact with the family.

It benefits not only Alzheimer's patients, but also children with intellectual disabilities. In China, the number of newborns with intellectual disabilities is about 1.1 million per year, and the “marginal mental retardation” between mentally retarded and normal (generally with IQ below 70) is even larger, with tens of millions of people.

In general, there are four causes of mental retardation. That is, genetic factors, genetic mutations such as congenital metabolic disorders belong to this category; prenatal damage, including intrauterine infection, hypoxia, etc.; birth injury during childbirth, including asphyxia, intracranial hemorrhage, premature infants, etc.; Including meningitis, encephalitis, cranial trauma, cerebrovascular accidents, etc.

For irreversible brain damage, there is currently no good treatment in the medical field. If it is possible to strip the patient's consciousness and then use regenerative medicine to restore brain damage, it seems to be a good choice to re-edit the gene in the body using gene editing.

Thinking space travel

Elon Musk, CEO and Chief Technology Officer of Spacex Space Exploration Technologies, said, "History can be divided into two paths. The first is that we will always be confined to the Earth until we face some extinction. One is to become a space species, a multi-planetary species. I think the second road is a more exciting future."

It has been more than half a century since humans first flew into space, but so far only a very small number of people have entered space. At present, individuals who want to go into space must pay a high of 20 million US dollars (about 137 million yuan), which is difficult for ordinary people to bear.

At present, some companies are working hard to develop space travel projects, so that many ordinary people can realize the dream of traveling in space. However, sending people into space is still subject to multiple factors, such as gravity, the oxygen that people rely on, the food and excretion in space, and how to return.

In fact, we don't have to be so troublesome. If the mind can be transplanted, we can completely enter the space with a "pose" and let our consciousness go up first.

It is easier to bring a chip carrying certain information into space than to bring people into space. NASA's detector InSight will land on Mars in November 2018, while 2,429,807 names are also taken into space. And bringing these names to Mars is a 0.8-centimeter-centre silicon wafer that is formed into a line of letters by an electron beam.

Where is God's assist?

Last month, scientists in Guangzhou discovered the password of cell fate, which allowed cells to “rejuvenate” and return cells from the adult somatic state to the pluripotent stem cell state that can be directed to differentiate, providing a “seed” source of cells for regenerative medicine.

The advantage of regenerative medicine is that by improving the regenerative microenvironment, patients are guided to regenerate with their own regenerative repair capabilities, and the regenerated tissue is part of the body itself. Just this year, Ms. Fang, a 34-year-old patient with premature ovarian failure, gave birth to a healthy male baby at Nanjing Gulou Hospital. This is the world's first infant with a stem cell composite collagen scaffold for the treatment of premature ovarian failure.

The development of regenerative medicine has made the transplant of medicine a medical foundation. In the future, with the continuous advancement of regenerative medicine technology, human tissue is likely to be regenerated as long as the appropriate micro-environment is constructed - which means that people who are thinking transplants can get a healthy brain.

Artificial intelligence has also contributed to this field. How is human tissue regenerated? Scientists always look for entrances on the bodies of different creatures. Such as the planarian. The planarian is a tiny insect with an unimaginable ability to regenerate. When it is cut off by the waist, it can re-exist the whole body. This ability makes them a popular research object in regenerative medicine.

But the huge amount of data makes scientists very tired. Inspired by evolution, scientists at Tufts University in the United States have developed an AI system that helps to fully exploit the vast experimental data of developmental biology and establish a comprehensive model to explain this phenomenon.

Recently, scientists have begun to use artificial intelligence to observe the behavior of leeches. Otter is a tiny animal associated with jellyfish and corals. In the past, the researchers studied the animal's nervous system and found out which parts of its brain contributed to its behavior. Now researchers use AI to track all of these behaviors.

The team used the AI ​​algorithm to automatically annotate the behavior of the leeches, including all swings, pivots, stretches, and bends. They learned that regardless of environmental conditions, such as light, temperature, or the amount of food nearby, these species actually participate in only six basic behaviors.

Finally, the researchers found that even if the surrounding environment changes more complicated, the leeches can continue to work as usual. Using this, if we can find out how the nervous system of the leeches is connected to behavior, we may be able to subject the brain that has been stripped of consciousness to a better extreme treatment environment. Including refrigeration technology, power stimulation and more.

Heavy barriers to thinking transplant

It is undeniable that the transplantation of thinking will involve ethical issues. In the existing medical field, the human body test on BCI (brain machine interface) includes informed consent, interest, risk analysis and other aspects, but there is no suitable ethical norms and laws to regulate the various problems after the widespread application of BCI in the future.

The transplantation of thinking will also face challenges such as security, privacy, "reading mind" and "memory manipulation". Especially in the process of thinking implantation, whether consciousness can maintain its integrity is also a question to be considered. In the movie "Master of Memory", the protagonist caused a series of storms because of the wrong memory.

What is even more frightening is that in order to maintain the integrity of thinking and memory, such a conscious stripping operation, the brain seems to have to maintain a fresh state, and once it is separated, the body without consciousness is still not a piece. What is true life? And stripping consciousness in a living state seems more like a euthanasia with high-tech color.

NECTOME attempts to preserve human memory through surgery, which requires an injection of a deadly chemical when the brain survives. That is to say, the participants were undergoing surgery while they were alive, a neurologist commented. “It looks like the company is trying to induce suicide in order to store the brain.”

In addition to ethical issues, there are medical problems. At present, there is not enough evidence to show that memory will exist in dead human tissue. Martina also throws a question in the book "Virtual Man". If the human body dies, is it possible for thinking to continue to exist, thus realizing the immortality of thinking?

Finally, the theory of intelligent relativism also wants to say a philosophical question. Is it really necessary to preserve our brains and thinking? The idea that truly deserves to be immortal will be revealed in the torrent of historical torrents. Cao Xueqin “has lost his life and lost his family.” Li Bai’s “natural material will be useful, and thousands of gold will be returned.” It is not a sign of their thoughts. If we can use technology to preserve our thoughts, how can we relish the cultural heritage of our predecessors?

Text | Yan Wei

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