Artifical neurons have been invented that are exactly like real human’s neurons, except that no energy is required to maintain their connections, so the only way to kill someone whose brain is entirely made out of these implants is massive head trauma or some malfunction of the hardware. If their body dies you can transplant the brain to another body.
And here is where it gets really unbelievable Let’s say that the only way to get these implants is to have them replace existing neurons.
Now, if all of your neurons were simultaneously replaced, it seems obvious to me you wouldn’t stilll be you, but rather someone who thinks they are you, and you’d cease to exist.
But what if you had the option of replacing the neurons gradually, over a period of say a day to a year? After all, your neurons repair themselves constantly, so you don’t have the same atoms you had a year ago, why should whole neurons be any different?
Would you let them replace your neurons? How slow would you want them to do it to be comforted that you will not disappear?
Or would you decide not to get the replacement? Would it be:
– A religious objection?
– A metaphysical objection, i.e. you wouldnt be 100% certain that you would not cease to exist?
– Not wanting to live forever for a secular reason (for instance, the possibility to be captured and tortured forever?)
– Some lingering doubts about the process, e.g. security, hardware malfunctions. Assume that scientists assure you that the artifical neurons are just as secure as real neurons and last for dozens of years on average before replacement.
I myself would opt for replacement over 5 to 6 months. Any shorter and I’d be worried that I would not be the same being at the end and my stream of consciousness would cease to exist, any longer and I’d be afraid that an accident would happen to me before I could entirely get replaced.
I’d go for it, assuming there had been all the proper tests and trials and so forth. As for how fast; I’d want to read some of research they’d have on the nature of the brain first; obviously people who could do this would know far more than we.
I’d go for it, but I’m still pretty young (24) - so I’d prefer to space out the process over several years, even a decade or so. Maybe replace twenty percent of my brain over the course of a year, then sit back and wait for a year to make sure everything is working all right, then another one-year/20% round of neuron replacement, and so forth.
I guess I’d probably go for it - I think the notion that I would cease to exist, bit by bit, being replaced by someone else - is false - or rather, it’s true, but it’s what has happened to me all of my life so far anyway. I’m not the same person I was when I was five years old, or ten, or even twenty - those people are gone now, but are they dead? What does ‘dead’ even mean in this context?
That’s my thoughts on it too. I’m not really the same person I was 5 to 10 years ago, in more than just a metaphorical sense. While that person isn’t “dead”, you couldn’t say that the person I was as a child “exists” any more.
Even if the neurons were not complete replacements for pre existing neurons, but additional ones that I would have to “train” by interacting with my brain over the course of a year or so, at the end of the process I would still exist, because consciousness is a process. So if Alzheimer’s kicks in and I am mostly artificial neurons, it would be as if I suffered brain damage but I’d still have enough left that the process of my consciousness would not be disrupted.
Even though those extra neurons were not “me” of 20 years ago. The ones I have now do not represent the me of 20 years ago, either, so no big whoop.
Sign me up! I’d just have it done all in one procedure rather than drag it out. As long as I think I’m still me then as far as I’m concerned I am still me.
Let’s say that the only way to get these implants is to have them replace existing neurons.