Re: Mind's Eye Re: Brain Transfers

well there are a lot of brainless people running around in politics
both sides of the ocean..
but it is interesting
Allan

On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 10:11 PM, archytas <nwterry@gmail.com> wrote:
> I don't know about this case Vam - but generally in such cases there
> is a brain squashed to lower regions than expected.
>
> On 3 Nov, 04:15, Vam <atewari2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> "...human brains and the minds that emerge from them have
>> allowed us to create culture and civilisation..."
>>
>> Do you know of anencephaly - a condition when a baby is born with only a
>> brain stem, but without a brain !
>>
>> Read up this story about Nickolas Coke of Colorado who lived without a
>> brain for 3 years and died recently. The boy survived without special
>> medical equipment and his grandmother recalls him *laughing *as he *played*among pumpkins.
>>
>> http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?From=...
>>
>> Is this consistent with the primacy you hold the brain in ?
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Saturday, November 3, 2012 6:53:03 AM UTC+5:30, archytas wrote:
>>
>> > The world around us is now full of knowledge (at least if we can
>> > operate disinformation filters). Potentially, we could see in 16
>> > colours with some gene-splicing from a prawn and even 'see' dark
>> > matter with something similar with an alien life-form evolved to
>> > detect thermodynamic radiation rather than light. There are sharks
>> > off Greenland that live blind (due to an infection) that have
>> > developed other perception.
>>
>> > Scientists are working on transferring brains to non-brain
>> > substrates. human brains and the minds that emerge from them have
>> > allowed us to create culture and civilisation. We humans have always
>> > augmented ourselves in the face of challenges, creating artefacts from
>> > clothing to cellphones to cochlear implants. As ever, human survival
>> > will depend on us being ever more adaptable.
>>
>> > Fortunately, we may be on the brink of fundamentally surpassing our
>> > limits: there is no reason why the complex information processing at
>> > the core of human experience should continue to be unique to one
>> > biological implementation. Moving the functions of minds from brains
>> > to other types of materials, other substrates, to become substrate-
>> > independent minds (SIMs), would be an extraordinary adaptation.
>>
>> > At a survival level, a SIM could be embodied in a variety of ways, and
>> > so would perhaps be better able to survive potential societal
>> > collapse. At a human level, the goal would be continued existence of
>> > personality, individual characteristics, a manner of experiencing and
>> > a personal way of processing experiences. Continuity of self could be
>> > assured, despite minds having novel embodiments. This could even be
>> > 'life after death'.
>>
>> > Most SIM work is based on "whole brain emulation". Researchers are
>> > trying to create a synthetic brain by reverse-engineering the
>> > mammalian brain down to the molecular level, drawing on statistical
>> > data from many animals. Such a vast undertaking has to be broken down
>> > into much smaller pieces: there are many things we need to know. For
>> > example, can we get good enough resolution of neurons - individual
>> > electrically spiking neurons, morphologically detailed neurons, or the
>> > molecular processes going on in synapses - to make emulation truly
>> > feasible. We aretrying to build artificial neural cells, initially to
>> > act as an implanted prosthesis for people who have lost brain cells to
>> > diseases such as Alzheimer's.
>>
>> > If we tried to fine-tune and correct the parameters of the billions of
>> > neurons in the human brain without a high-resolution map of the
>> > "shape" of how they fire, we would probably be computing until the end
>> > of time. Instead, we must break the problem down, which is why our map
>> > combines both brain structure and function measurements at large scale
>> > and high resolution. In this field, millimetres of tissue or anything
>> > beyond a few hundred neurons is considered large. Quite amazingly, a
>> > programme to achieve whole brain emulation is emerging.
>>
>> > I doubt I can interest the group with the science - most is being done
>> > on nematode worms - but what would a brain made by humans be? After
>> > all, we usually lay claim that what makes us 'human' comes from the
>> > brain.
>
> --
>
>
>



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|_D Allan

Life is for moral, ethical and truthful living.


I am a Natural Airgunner -

Full of Hot Air & Ready To Expel It Quickly.

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