Mortality and the Copying Experience
Michael Roy Ames
On morning I woke up and realized that I wanted to live forever, or as close to 'forever' as I could get. So, not being one to beat around the bush, I immediately tried to figure out what was preventing me from doing so. Laid out here are some of my thoughts, written in first person, present tense.
***
The major obstacle, of course, is my mortality. My body and brain *will die* due to accident or disease, and I consider 'aging' to be a disease. Therefore, sooner or later, I will have to vacate this body and brain unit and move into another if I want to continue my existence. To persist, I will have to find a way to copy myself into another unit, be that a homo sapiens sapiens biological unit or some other model. Many researchers are working on technologies to accomplish exactly this sort of copying. Research into the brain, genetics, human biological systems, computing, and nanotechnology, all contribute to our understanding of the universe, and will eventually result in giving us the ability to make copies of ourselves. When the ability to copy a human mind is obtained, there will be many new questions to be faced by humanity. Ever the impatient one, I choose to face those questions now, and try to come up with some useful answers, and contingency plans, for my hoped-for copying experience.
First the basics. If you make a copy of your self then you become two, and both versions will be you, and the versions will diverge. "Oh dear!", I hear you say. "So which one will be me then?" The answer is that both versions will be you - different versions of you. If one version dies, then that *you* will have died... even though the other you is still alive. This will be little consolation to the dead one... and *that* is a serious problem. You see: copying alone does not provide an individual, a unique stream of consciousness (SOC), with immortality. Why then would a person want to copy themselves if copying provides no immortal benefits?
One of the main things that bothers people about the idea of making a copy is its seeming *lack of utility* because, if one of the copies dies, then that copy will have died, and there is no getting around the fact that the copy will probably not have wanted to die. Even though the copy is you, it is not the *same* you as the original. Therefore, it seems obvious, that copying does not give a particular SOC immortality. Further reflection confirms this initial assessment, but I will not expand on that question here... here I'm looking for solutions to the problem of human mortality. So, to restate, even an exact copy of a being will immediately start diverging from the original, and therefore will be a separate person, a unique SOC. The only way I can see around this is if the *copy* is static (not running), and is continuously updated after every mind 'tick' (a 'tick' being the smallest detectable mental process). Then, if the original were to have a terminal accident, the copy could be started up at the very last saved 'tick'... and the unique SOC would continue. Contemplation of this type of event is profoundly disturbing to many people, but the fact is that: if there is no detectable difference between a copy and an original SOC, then the *stream* would not have been broken, and the individual 'self' would continue. I imagine experiencing the physical demise of ones own fully-and-continuously-backed-up-unit to be an "extreme sport" of the future. It could even be fun... well, in a twisted kind of way :-} This 'static' idea is certainly one way of continuing an SOC, but it requires a very high degree of synchronization between the running unit and the static backup(s). This would make it vulnerable to malicious attack, and also to accidents. Is there, perhaps, a more robust way of achieving the same thing? I think so - but we require some different techniques - we will need: Multiplexing and Reintegration.
Multiplexing is the ability to operate multiple SOCs while retaining identity as a single being. Does that seem counter intuitive? Does it read like gibberish? Well, I can see how it might. No one has ever been able to operate multiple SOCs before... or have they? Have you ever been thinking about two things at once? How about three? Know anyone else who says that they have had that experience? I know several people who are certain that they frequently operate several 'trains of thought' simultaneously. Indeed, when first hearing this question I wondered if I ever did this. After a moment's reflection, I realized that I did! In fact I found that I operated multiple SOCs most of the time. Currently I find my thoughts limited to two or three self-detectable streams. But others report being able to track even more threads of thought than that. Whether this self-analysis turns out to be an accurate perception of reality, or just an illusion, doesn't matter much because it is the *idea* that multiple SOCs operating in a single "mind" could regard themselves as being part of a single being. This is what counts. If one identifies ones 'self' (that ineffable kernel of existence that really really wants to continue to exist) as being a single SOC... then one is welcome to do so. For the rest of us who are open to the idea of multiple SOCs making up the 'self': Multiplexing seems to provide a good path to immortality.
Imagine if you could have two brain units, mentally joined together in real time, thinking two, three - even ten different things at the same time, and yet be a single person. Why shouldn't this be possible? If you accept the fact that a single individual can have multiple SOCs, then why couldn't each SOC run on a different unit? And if that is reasonable, then why not build those units with non-trivial physical capabilities, and I/O? Separate brains *and* separate bodies. Verner Vinge imagined a version of this sort of multi-unit configuration in his novel: "A Fire Upon the Deep", where he had small groups of dog-like creatures acting as a unified self when in close proximity. For me, this depiction of an alien race, was the most useful idea extrapolation in the whole book (and the book is filled to the brim with useful idea extrapolations!). Dividing your 'self' over multiple units would provide redundancy, and protect against many types of accident or attack. A being, composed of a couple of thousand units spread over an area of a billion-or-so cubic kilometers is going to be quite difficult to kill. But what if some parts of the mind become separated from the rest? What would you do about that? For that problem, a solution would be Reintegration.
Reintegration is the process of taking multiple beings having multiple SOCs, and combining them into a single being having multiple SOCs. This could be done on-line or off-line, awake or 'asleep', but I imagine the parties involved will want to be very-wide-awake during the reintegration process. I only have very tentative ideas how this might be done. I would think that it will be a complex and time-consuming process, but, that said, I have heard nothing that would make me think it would be impossible. The difficulty of the process would depend largely on the amount of difference between the beings that are to be combined. If they were originally a single being, but were separated for a short time due to some accident, then I postulate the reintegration will be possible will relatively little effort. If the beings shared no past experiences, then a reintegration - or in this case an *integration* - would involve much larger amount of processing, and mental re-organization. For those of you who may be repulsed by this image of mental integration - think on this: The resultant multi-source-being might be significantly more aware, intelligent and *alive* than a single-source being. Multi-sourcing might be a *very* desirable and sought-after action for compatible beings!
In this short thought-adventure I have journeyed all the way from merely 'not dying' to becoming ever 'more alive' as a multi-sourced-being. I am certain the story won't end there...
Michael Roy Ames
(How curious! My name seems to imply that I am three already.)
[B)]
