56 replies to this topic

[bgwowk]

I happen to have a PhD in functional magnetic resonance imaging. All fMRI shows you (on a good day) is blood flow and oxygenation changes. It does not image consciousness. If neurologists tell you that brain areas identified with awareness and cognition no longer exist, your fMRI scan can light up like a Christmas tree and it will mean nothing more than smiles and groans do. There is a tremendous amount of pseudoscientific propaganda surrounding this case.

---BrianW

[swami17]

If I were at the helm of one of the cryonics companies, I would offer free cryonic preservation of Terri. It seems that they are missing out on what could be a great opportunity to stimulate new positive discussion about cryonics. Even those who don't believe preserved humans could ever be revived would have to admit that there's certainly no good reason NOT to preserve Terri. Even if the only thing it accomplished was to offer some hope and solace to those who would like to have her back someday. Handled correctly, this offer to Terri could result in increased funding for cryonic research.

[bgwowk]

Surely you are not disputing that fMRI can be used to provide information on:
- the presence,
- degree and
- location of brain function??!

fMRI can show hemodynamic changes (localized increased blood flow) in response to stimuli. The meaning of these changes depends on location and context. If neurologists say that what's left of Schiavo's brain is anatomically incapable of supporting cognition or awareness because the requisite brain areas are gone, then fMRI is academic. A spine can generate an fMRI signal, but nobody would say that a spine is conscious.

---BrianW

[bgwowk]

If I were at the helm of one of the cryonics companies, I would offer free cryonic preservation of Terri. It seems that they are missing out on what could be a great opportunity to stimulate new positive discussion about cryonics. Even those who don't believe preserved humans could ever be revived would have to admit that there's certainly no good reason NOT to preserve Terri.

Google Ted Williams and cryonics to see what the public thinks of cryonics done to someone WITH a brain. Now imagine how cryonics would be seen if it presented itself as a publicity-seeking vulture encirlcing an anguished family with no prior interest in cryonics, seeking to freeze someone for whom cryonics could not possibly work BY CRYONICISTS' OWN STANDARDS. Cryonics can't work without a brain to preserve! Might as well send the cloners or Raelians after Terri.

That's not say that cryonicists *with prior arrangements* shouldn't be cryopreserved under bad circumstances, but that's a completely different question.

---BrianW

[DJS]

Cosmos

In this case I disagree with Don, I don't think cryonics companies would scan and replicate your brain's information on an artificial substrate for one simple reason. Some cryonics patients object to such a procedure, yourself included. Instead, where possible, I think patients will likely be restored to their optimal human selves and then offered the option to pursue these more controversial procedures. Unless of course, the patients give consent for such procedures before they're cryo-preserved.

heh, I notice a few people disagreed with me on this one. Win some lose some I guess. I think part of this comes down to what you think will be the common belief about the nature of consciousness in the future. Barring explicit instruction to the contrary, I would argue that the default procedure for revival will be as I've stated. I should emphasize that this is my opinion.

As far as my final conclusions regarding the Terri Schiavo case (this is the last time I'm going to post to this thread - no use beating a dead horse ) I would argue that much of this comes down to various suppositions made by the individual about different technologies and their potential progression in the future.

Long winded posts aside...

What are the chances of Terri ever recovering -- close to zero (I think that is a fair assessment)

(Prometheus and Sonia's contention that life should be the default status) -- The more I think about it, the more I think that there is some merit to this argument. However slim, there is some chance of recovery. At the same time, keeping Terri alive may cause her brain to deteriorate further. I am also still skeptical that medical progress over the next 20 years will be sufficient to "cure" Terri.

My final answer: cryopreserve Terri. (and yes, this conclusion is grounded in my opinion about the chances of success regarding cryopreservation).

If cryopreservation isn't an option (Sonia's initial question to BJ)...man, that's really tough to say. I mean, this has nothing to do with any sort of belief that Terri has an immortal soul or anything like that. It really comes down to this fundamental question -- If there is even the smallest, most insignicant chance that someone's life could be saved, should we "keep hope alive"? I guess I would have to say yes. [glasses] (Don notes his second reversal on this issue... [lol] )

Two flip flops on one thread, man I must be losing it. [wis] [lol]

[bgwowk]

However, you would agree that it would provide an objective measure of the regional distribution of cerebral activity under various stimuli and when compared to known patterns of vegetative versus minimally conscious state and using population norms would generate superior diagnostic information compared to CT scans in the neurological function context.

Yes. Although without knowing more neurological background, I wouldn't be so quick to condemn the husband or courts for not ordering such tests. There are ways of ruling out MC without fMRI, such as if brain areas required for MC are anatomically non-existent.

---BrianW

[DJS]

Cosmos

My contention was that others would object and that it would be in their interests (the patients) not to default to this method of reanimation unless it's the only option available. Explicit consent should be required to be scanned and uploaded, not to insure otherwise where it is the default option.

I would probably give my consent to be scanned and uploaded (based on what I know at this point), any reserverations I have are largely (but not entirely) irrational.

What I am arguing is that in the future scanning, uploading and molecular reassembly will not just become common place, but the social norm for civilization. When you state that the "default" position for reanimation should be/ will be the reconstruction of the original brain, you are stating this from here -- in 2005 CE (with all of its accompanying social norms). When humanity's social norms change so will it's default positions. This is why I qualified my answer by saying "Barring explicit instruction to the contrary" and "I should emphasize that this is my opinion (ie, as a quasi-materialist)."

[DJS]

Elrond

You're obfuscating the real bone of contention here, and are also showing a lack of understand as to exactly what cryonics entails. Your head will never be "thawed out" if you are cryogenically preserved. At some point, in the distant future it would be scanned and replicated/recreated using still theoretical molecular nanotechnology. Your consciousness is all about the pattern -- the physical patterns -- in your brain. Once your brain was accurately replicated, the original frozen blob would be thrown in the trash.

Major disagreement with you here. If the original brain is not going to be repaired, but simply copied, don't bother with mine. You might as well just throw it in the trash before the replication. Either way I'll be dead. In your scenario you simply have a copy of me walking around in a couple hundred years, doesn’t do me any good.

Although I favor a materialist/physicalist position, I would by no means stake my life on it (valuing my life over my pride in having sound judgement is a recurring theme with me )

There is always the possibility that there is something to the "continuity of consciousness" argument. This is why it is my goal to never have to be cryopreserved or uploaded in toto to begin with (along with my reservations about the efficacy of the freezing process and our inadequate understand of how memory is encoded).

However, once you've committed to cryopreservation you have, by default , accepted the physicalist position. Why? Well, the continuity of consciousness argument is out the window. Obviously there is a dysjunction of consciousness in regards to cryopreservation. Subscribing to some form of materialism is the only position that is left. You're counting on the fact that cryopreservation has saved the unique (physical) pattern that is you. It necessarily follows that your actual physical brain is irrelevant from such a position -- it is the physical patterns encoded in your brain that are important. And it is for this reason that I argue that future society's will have complete molecular replication of the brain as a default position. To maintain that the actual original brain materials be utilized in the process of reanimation will probably strike future beings as just plain silly.

[bgwowk]

You could always give the revived person the option of knowing whether or not original atoms were used. If they opt to know, and the answer is that fresh materials were used, you can then ask them if they want a redo. [lol]

In the same vein, if someone wakes from a decades long coma today (as in the movie Awakennings) only to be told their original atoms have long since been flushed into the oceans, should we offer to try to find them?!?

---BrianW

P.S. Cryonics organizations do not have an official position on such matters, nor should they for the foreseeable future.

[DJS]

Changing social norms don't influence cryonically suspended patients. Even if the patients' beliefs are contrary to what science suggests about consciousness, where possible their wishes should be respected.

Ah okay, this is where we are having the miscommunication. Of course, yes, I agree with your above statement. If you look back, I clarified my original answer by saying "Barring explicit instructions to the contrary." What I am arguing is that, in effect, if a cryonaut does not leave a record of his/her beliefs or wishes, then his default position is dictated by the social norms of the society in which he/she is reanimated.

I added in my last post that if scanning and uploading is the only option for reanimation, then it should be pursued.

I also have materialist/physicalist leanings like yourself, and accept uploading as very likely retaining one's self (one's pattern), but I'm arguing on behalf of those who think otherwise and don't want this procedure forced upon them. Those who choose nano-reconstruction and inloading only.

Another thing that I should point out is that the term "uploaded" is being used rather loosely in our conversation (by both of us). There is upload; as in the complete transfer of ones consciousness from a biological substrate to a synthetic one. Then there is upload in the sense that we are using; a detailed mapping of the human brain that is stored as data and used to reproduce an identical biological replica of the original person. IOW, I'm not talking about converting people over to silicon, I'm talking about the process by which their brain will be reconstructed/recreated.

For the record, I would never argue that someone's substrate be altered against their wishes.

[DJS]

Cosmos, it should also be noted that my original statement did not include the term upload (though I fell into using in it later...but only after you did [tung] --hehe, just kidding). I think a more appropriate term may be (and I'm not sure about this) inloading. I need to do some more research before I'm certain about this one. [thumb]

[DJS]

Cosmos again though, and to reiterate my previous point:

DonSpanton

once you've committed to cryopreservation you have, by default , accepted the physicalist position

And I'll leave it at that.

[DJS]

Inloading, as nefastor used the word (his definition), is the slow and steady replacement of the brain with an artificial substrate.

Oh yeah, that's who I heard using the term. Couldn't quite recollect where I'd heard the term before.

[bgwowk]

I hope others realize this when/if they sign up for cryonics.

Or aneurism surgery.

Anyone who thinks patternism (you are your pattern, not your molecules) is still an open question in philosophy or neuroscience needs to read this:

"How do you persist when your molecules don't?"

http://www.sci-con.o...s/20040601.html

The issue of molecular turnover is starting to hit home in neuroscience, especially now that the latest research techniques such as fluorescent tagging are revealing a far more frantic pace of activity than ever suspected. For instance, the actin filaments in dendrites can need replacing within 40 seconds, making microtubules look like positive greybeards (Star et al, 2002). A turnover time of five days for NMDA receptors seemed pretty steep when it was reported a few years back. (Shimizu et al, 2000). But recently Michael Ehlers at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina, reported that the entire post-synaptic density (PSD) – the proteinpacked zone that powers synaptic activity - is replaced, molecule for molecule, almost by the hour. Ehlers had expected the turnover to take days and when he found no labelled protein on his first 24 hour assay, he thought he must have mucked up the experiment (Ehlers 2003).

...But on the kinds of figures that are coming out now, it seems like the whole brain must get recycled about every other month. And certainly everything points to the synapses as being about the most dynamic part of the whole system.

The question is closed. You ARE a pattern. There is nothing else to hang a continuity hat on. Nothing.

---BrianW

[bgwowk]

Once again, patternism is not the same as uploading. Patternism simply says that "you" are a paticular pattern of molecules, not specific molecules themselves. Patternism means that it's okay if we replace molecules during repairs (as the above reference shows, our brain already does this with astonishing speed). Patternism also suggests that off-board repairs are okay, since it's hard to philosophically distinguish between installing new molecules within an old brain and assembling those same new molecules in the same pattern outside an old brain. Therefore patternism has implications for duplication.

However uploading (or inloading)-- the belief that our awareness can be sustained within hardware of a different physical type by isolating certain behavioral aspects of natural brain operation --as another leap entirely. I'm sympathetic to this view, but it cannot be defended by patternism alone.

---BrianW

[swami17]

Hey you guys, I'm a new Full Member, as of a couple weeks ago, and I'm really glad to be a part of such a great group of people. I have a question: The Terri Schiavo situation has made me realize the importance of arranging for Cryonics now. Apparently, the way to do is is to take out a life insurance policy and make one of the cryonics providers the beneficiary on the policy. Does anyone have any information that might help me decide between Alcor and The Cryonics Institute? Or is there a 3rd provider that I don't know about yet? I would want to preserve my whole body, not just the head.