Re A start-up says it can back up your brain. However, there’s one small catch. - The Washington Post

["Dave Farber" <farber () gmail com>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Warren Gifford <warrensgifford () gmail com>
> Date: March 16, 2018 at 5:30:51 PM EDT
> To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
> Subject: Re: [IP] Re A start-up says it can back up your brain. However, there’s one small catch. - The Washington 
> Post
>
> Dave, for IP if you like,
>
> There is lots of science fiction on this topic, hint: it essentially never turns out well for the preserved 
> personalities (what does the future owe them anyway, unless perhaps you are Einstein  or Hawking). 
>
> One of my favorites is David Brin's Existence. He has personalities flooding the universe with shards containing 
> their electronic existence, and ... I won't spoil the story. It also contains a fascinating view of what "social 
> news" may turn into (or already is on the way to becoming?) with collaborative investigation.
>
> Brin has a good track record of predicting the future. Earth, another good read, written in 1990, and set 50 years in 
> the future, predicted the worldwide web as a news outlet with videos, email spam, reduction of privacy, etc. See 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_(Brin_novel) for a list of the 15 items he claims as good predictions.
>
> Peace, Warren Gifford
> WarrenSGifford () gmail com
>
> > On Fri, Mar 16, 2018 at 2:58 PM, Dave Farber <farber () gmail com> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> > Begin forwarded message:
> >
> > > From: "Bob Frankston" <Bob19-0501 () bobf frankston com>
> > > Date: March 16, 2018 at 12:58:51 PM EDT
> > > To: dave () farber net, "   'ip'" <ip () listbox com>
> > > Subject: RE: [IP] Re A start-up says it can back up your brain. However, there’s one small catch. - The Washington 
> > > Post
> > >
> > > The question with all this is the assumption that the process captures all the salient properties.
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > To use a trivial analogy imagine claiming to preserve a book by scanning all the pixels at high resolution. But it 
> > > turns out that the color of the text was vital to the meaning of the contents of the book and one didn’t even know 
> > > that the ultraviolet and infrared colors were even present. Or for mathematicians it’s like preserving the current 
> > > value but not the derivatives.
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > Now imagine all the other properties of the brain we’re not aware of as well as the vagus nerve and other factors … 
> > > it makes me more interested in why people take this venture seriously.
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > Bob Frankston
> > >
> > > http://Frankston.com
> > >
> > > @BobFrankston
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > From: Dave Farber <farber () gmail com> 
> > > Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2018 23:28
> > > To: ip <ip () listbox com>
> > > Subject: [IP] Re A start-up says it can back up your brain. However, there’s one small catch. - The Washington Post
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Begin forwarded message:
> > >
> > > From: Frank Wales <frank () limov com>
> > > Date: March 15, 2018 at 3:53:34 PM EDT
> > > To: David Farber <dave () farber net>
> > > Cc: ip <ip () listbox com>
> > > Subject: Re: [IP] A start-up says it can back up your brain. However, there’s one small catch. - The Washington Post
> > >
> > > Dave, for IP if you like.
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > As with any backup system, the real test is not how well the backup process works, but how well the recovery 
> > > procedure works. Wonder how they’re planning to test that? :-)
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > Of course, in this case, there is also the slight question of where one gets scratch brains to do the recovery into.
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > > Frank.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On 15 Mar 2018, at 16:20, Dave Farber <farber () gmail com> wrote:
> > >
> > >  
> > >
> > >
> > > https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-small-business/wp/2018/03/14/a-start-up-says-it-can-back-up-your-brain-however-theres-one-small-catch/?utm_term=.11ebe77c7ef4&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
> > >
> > > A start-up says it can back up your brain. However, there’s one small catch.
> > > By Gene Marks
> > >
> > > Storing dead brains is not a new business. There’s a company in Arizona that right now holds more than 150 bodies 
> > > and heads — including the head of Red Sox great Ted Williams — in liquid nitrogen with the hopes of a future 
> > > reawakening. But now there’s a start-up that says it can do all of this and better: it can make a complete backup 
> > > of your mind. However, there’s just one catch: you have to die first.
> > >
> > > The company, called Nectome, says its proprietary chemical solution can keep the brain intact for hundreds — even 
> > > thousands of years. “You can think of what we do as a fancy form of embalming that preserves not just the outer 
> > > details but the inner details,” Robert McIntyre, the company’s founder told the MIT Technology Review.
> > >
> > > But here’s the thing: the brain’s got to be fresh and the patient must be alive for its embalming chemicals to do 
> > > their job. For this to happen a patient must be willing to die in order for the process to complete. The product is 
> > > “100 percent fatal,” McIntyre admitted. “The user experience will be identical to physician-assisted suicide.”
> > >
> > > ...
> > >
> > >  
> >
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