Thread: Would You Put Your Brain In A Robot Body?

Originally Posted by Bonsay

That's one of the most evil things I have ever seen. Poor monkeys...

Kind of scary to me .
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Evil? I don't get the big deal. I mean it isn't nice, but I am more amazed of the medical posibilities then by a little monkey-pain.

Originally Posted by becomingagodo

i just saw on the news about a chimp brain being put in a robot body scientist say human too robot body will be possible in ten years.
i was just thinking would you put your brain in a robot body? the robot body would have the strength of three gorillias. the problem is that you will only be three feet tall and if you try to take your brain out off your robot body it will go mental and kill you.
this raises some issue because if a war broke out between human and robots who would you fight for because your not technically a robot but if you fight for human your be screwed once they win and out in some camp because of danger. if this does happen you will have laser beam eye so you can see through clothes but not all the time because you would not like too look at granny naked and if you do get damaged your robot body is a brain surgeon so he will fix you. so would you put your brain in a robot body.
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I don't believe the thing about the chimp brain, but to answer would I do it? Fuck No! I am not turning myself into a superpowerful robot that could go evil at any moment. I wouldn't even agree to have a built in GPS system brain controlled cellphone thingy in me (if that existed), least of all put myself in a robot. Just think about the terrible things that could happen. Anyone who would put their brain in a robot is a sick little shit in my opinion (excuse my language).

I would but I wouldn't be the first one to try it heh. Thats really the kind of thing you have to wait and see. I probably wouldn't try untill its atleast semi common and might not even then unless I am going to die anyway, then might as well go for it. I have a good 50 years to wait and see. Might even be able to push 80 if I take care of myself. Who knows by then.

Im interrested in one thing primarily, and that would be the addition of new limbs. Would the brain be able to adapt to and control another 4 extra legs? What first came to mind was this: Imagine having your brain placed into a machine that was structured similarly to the body of a spider, for example. Would you forget what it was like to have normal human limbs? Would you be able to control this machine at all? Could your brain create the required centers in the parietal lobe for control of the new legs? I feel i'm being redundant here, but you get the idea. I'd me much more eager to discover the possibilities behind this than of anything else.

I will live in my human body for as long as possible. And if I manage to become wealthy and if the genetic cell science go well, I think it would be possible living in the same body for 200+ years. But if it would cease to work properly and if there would be no other human body available for me, I would gladly be put into a robot body.

this is a joke topic. i did to see if you actually read and think about the post and would question me because what im saying make nosense.[/b]

Altough you meant it as a joke, it will be possible to use robot bodies in the future. Using robot arms is already a possibility for instance.

I can agree that robot body going crazy and robots vs humanity didn't make much sense, though. But cyborgs going nuts and killing "normal" humans - and perhaps even each other - would be a possibility.

This is part of a larger subject I'm obsessed with: artificial intelligence and life extension.

If the technology was right and life would continue to be meaningful and fulfilling, I'd very likely transfer myself to a robot body in order to continue living. It's crazy to think this is a real possibility in my lifetime, but...in fact, I believe it is a possibility.

There is a growing amount of people and organizations talking about this. Many people predict it will be possible within our lifetimes. Many trends predict a point in the next 40-50 years where we will have created better-than-human intelligence. Once this has happened, this intelligence will only continue to become smarter than us. However, I use the term 'us' here loosely; most likely, we will merge our biological selves with intelligence-enhancing technologies.



I love seeing on this on here! Lucid dreaming and the Singularity/Life Extension/Artificial Intelligence are some of my biggest interests and passions.

Check out kurweilai.net for an overwhelming amount of information related to these ideas.

BTW I had not heard about a chimp brain being put in a robot body. Anyone have any references for this story?

Okay, now I see why I hadn't heard of this chimp brain to robot story... it was made up as a joke as this was supposed to be a joke topic. Hmm...Funny stuff... yea.

Anyway, let's keep the conversation going. I'd love to continue a meaningful conversation with those who are actually sincere about this topic.

The following story/analogy is from Peter Cochrane. I have used this without permission and with intent to educate and inform:
This writing is lenghty but pretty much hits the nail on the head regarding putting a human brain in a robot body:

Peter Cochrane
The journey had been uneventful as we drove the family down from Nottingham towards Ipswich on the great north road. I turned to my wife and said......



"Let's play a mind experiment. Suppose, I was dying of an incurable disease and all my mental faculties were complete, and you had the opportunity of transferring all of my mental awareness and capability into a computer. Would you do it?"

"Oh no," was the response. "It would not be you, it wouldn't be real and it would be artificial, I wouldn't like that at all."

"Oh! Well, suppose the transfer of me was into an android, a human like machine that had all the ambulatory and tactile qualities of me the real person, how would that do?"

"Oh no that would still not be you, that still wouldn't be real and I wouldn't like it at all, what a horrible thought!"

"OK, suppose in 10 minutes we have an accident and I lose my leg and have to have a tin leg fitted, could you get used to me with a tin leg?"

"Oh yes that would be OK."

"And if in a few years I was to lose an arm, you could live with me with a tin leg and a tin arm?"

"Yes that would be all right."

"Even if that leg and arm were more that just a piece of tin, suppose technology had reached the point where it felt and looked like real skin and it was fully functional?"

"Oh that would be even better!"

"Interesting. Then if I was to have a pace maker you would be happy with that?"

"Yes."

"Plus an artificial kidney?"

"Yes."

"How about an artificial pancreas, after all they are now experimenting with prototypes and it won't be too long before we will be able to afford one?"

"Well I suppose that would be OK too."

"Now at the University of Sheffield there is Professor working on artificial eyes, these are totally electronic. Who knows, one day they might be implantable, so as my eyes fail if I have to have my eyes repaired with electronic replacements would that be OK?"

"Well, I suppose so."

"I noticed the other day that Jack Ashley the MP had an electronic inner ear fitted to restore his hearing after many years of being deaf, so I suppose if my ears fail you will be quite happy to see me with an electronic ear?"

"Well yes."

"Suppose my liver fails and I have to replace this too?"

"Well OK."

"My stomach and my spleen and ...... "

"Just a minute, I am not having you dying by instalments!"

"Well at what point are you going to say it is not me inhabiting this amalgam of flesh, blood, metal and electronics, at what point is it not me? Is it when we make the final step of transferring my biologically developed brain to an electronically developed brain? Is that the break point when it isn't me?"

"I don't know, but I don't like it and if I had the choice I wouldn't do it!"

"So lets just scroll this experiment back a little, at what point would I be acceptable to you? You have already said that you would accept me with a prosthetic arm and leg and pancreas and heart, etc."

"It is not something I want to think about any more!"

This discussion was a re run of an earlier mind experiment I had tried with my mother some years after my father had died. I had suggested to her that we might have been able, in the future, to have lifted his very consciousness from his frail and dying body, that was just able to support a still fully functional and very active brain into some super computer. Similarly, she objected quite vehemently at the very thought of transferring a loved one into a machine form. Interestingly my reaction to the proposal was that I would have done anything to have maintained contact with that intellect, that being, that person who had first initiated my life. That entity that had nurtured, taught and loved me from the moment I was born until we finally said good-bye. His physical manifestation mattered less to me than his very great loss. I would have done anything to have maintained contact with him in whatever form. Unfortunately I never had the courage to ask of him in his dying years the same question and which decision would he have made. I suppose as I age this question will be a re-occurring one and who knows it might even become pertinent to me. If not pertinent for me, then it will certainly be pertinent for my son or my son's son or whoever. At some point in the development of our technology it is almost certainly going to be the case that we will be able to transfer human minds, and beings, into some machine form. At our present rate of progress less than 20 years will see super computers with an equivalent processing and storage capability to the human brain. Granted they will be physically larger and probably have no ambulatory capability, but this is just a start. Within 30 years the development of such machines should have reached our desk top or even pocket. Whether such machines will be capable of supporting new life forms, or imbibing existing ones, remains to be seem. Probably the key challenge is the understanding and access to the human mind itself. We do not understand how the human brain works as we have not yet unravelled its unbelievable complexity. Perversely, with the assistance of super computers, it might be possible for us to create sufficiently good models to achieve a full understanding.

What kind of world will it be where no one ever has to die, or for that matter suffer unbearable sickness and failure of health? A world where we can live inside a static machine, communications network or inhabit some android or robotic form? The answer of course is totally different to what we have experienced so far. Probably the only inkling we are able to gain of what might be possible, is currently available through the use of virtual reality. Experiments with the incredibly shrinking scientist, able to wander around atomic structures and feel the forces combining the nucleus and electron by merely putting out their hand at one extreme and at the other, our ability to wander throughout the galaxies and tamper with the influence of black holes in a virtual cosmos. Being able to go anywhere and do anything at any time and any place will soon be with us through the magic of telepresence, VR and tremendously increased computing powers and an ability to communicate over vast distances at virtually zero cost. The next logical step is the transfer of mind itself into machines away from all the limitations imposed on us by our present biological form and that of our currently limited electronics. A billion fold increase in computer power, coupled with a similar increase in communications ability and information storage, looks likely to be realised in 30 years. Perhaps our only chance of making full use of such technology is to become an integral part of that technology itself! The advantages are almost unthinkable.

Space and time travel would be conceivable over eons - vast distances and time - certainly into the future. However the reverse direction is still in doubt! Multiple branch point decisions, multiple lives, multiple experiences - duplicate copies of ourselves, back up copies at regular intervals pending any form of disaster - true time capsules, perhaps forever would all be possible. We could be everything, be everywhere, be everyone, experience everything! No disease in the conventional sense, but software bugs, viruses and parasites threatening our multiple lives perhaps! A computer storage and capacity shortage - instantaneous teleportation by radio and light beams. Beyond the moon in 2 second, the sun in 8 minutes, the galaxy in 100,000 years.......

Perhaps sex would take on a new form - the merging of our new entities, the coming together, not through the transient physical coupling of two nervous systems, but through the merging of two compete bodies of intelligence and experience. Ultimately. Perhaps even the merging of all human life forms into a single ethereal being supported by an organic hardware with both growing and developing like some cosmic jellyfish, Or perhaps as a wave of energy propagating throughout the universe looking for a host machine or entity - perhaps even seeking others of a similar nature. Could it be the very creation of the ultimate life force - a oneness throughout all of time and space? Let there be light, but the really super computer first!
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Personally though...To live is to experience death, and if i'm going to hang around this earth for this long, I want to see what the final curtain call is all about.

Wow.

Why don't you just do it in a dream?
lol.

I probably wouldn't unless I was about to die... Then I would like, have myself put into a spacecraft and just explore space with people. I would have an android body with pleausre receptors... hehe..

^^ = LOL

Meh... I dunno... sounds dangerous

Nice story 'confirming non-confirmist.' I've read quite a few similiar analogies but this one is a better introduction to the idea to those who have never come across it before. It puts the point in perspective nicely... there's no black and white answer here.

-Ben

If I knew there wasn't a risk of me dying in the process Id do it in a second, but I would like my brain/consiosness to be downloaded so that my brain would not spoil and kill me.

Originally Posted by BenQ

Nice story 'confirming non-confirmist.' I've read quite a few similiar analogies but this one is a better introduction to the idea to those who have never come across it before. It puts the point in perspective nicely... there's no black and white answer here.

-Ben
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Hell, for an aparent "joke topic" that made no sense, i thought that story put the right spin on it. I guess too many people, (perhaps the person who started the joke thread) assume that technology will just one day out of the blue come full circle and bring us all the wonders that years, decades, perhaps even centuries of thought and dedication wil bring. Every bit of technology is bulit on a smaller but equally important piece, much like ideas and theories.
Imagine just waking up one day and without any kind of influence come up with a grand unified theory of the universe and have that become fact!
I couldn't agree more with you re:there being no black and white answer here. I wonder especially about the worldly moral arguements that would arise from human/robot co-existence if we as humans ever stop killing ourselves before we reach that point. It would put the lingering abortion arguement to shame!

As long as my normal body was healthy and young, probably not. But if I was incapacitated in some way, or got older, I might. I'm just not sure if it's possible to transfer the brain and soul like that... We'll see.

Also, it would have to be an AWESOME body... not some clunky POS.

Originally Posted by Conforming

This writing is lenghty but pretty much hits the nail on the head regarding putting a human brain in a robot body:
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That argument carries no weight. In that theory the real brain is not put into a robot body; a copy in computer format is.

Incorrect.
Please Read the story again.
It is the story of a human becoming a robot in installments, hence leading to a body composed of all artificial parts EXCEPT for the brain (in the absolute end, the final most important organ to be reproduced as a computer or mechanical part before completely becoming a full robot is the brain...). If you didn't catch the message: it speaks of the obvious transistion from human to robot if our technological prowess is allowed to follow the route that it is leading now. Step by step we would create ourselves a new way of preserving all that is "us":, the brain.
Read again and try to have a bit less objective of a view about this Science -Fiction, as it is only a STORY and not Science-Fact.

Thanks

nah..no thanks. if you want to, go ahead. Iit doesnt interest me becuase I do not feel wire and metal can replace the power of flesh - this amazing substance that can heal itself.

I do believe in a soul - but this isnt an argument of an afterlife. rather I feel we have an energy or a life force that streams all over our body. You can even call this chakra or karma if you want. The human body in its own right is already like a robot, or in some weird way we have modeled robots after us. I mean, computers are essentially brians. But unlike metal and wires, there is something about organic matter that allows this energy to generate in ways it doesnt through non-organic material. It is a great vessel for this energy, and a natural producer of it.

This allows our body to do amazing mind blowing acts, and we still have monks today who can testify how strong the human body is, becuase of the energy that can flow through it. I think we can all use this energy, and it can affect everything from healing, creativity, thought, to performing great physical acts

Sex is one thing, though I am sure we can build pleasure sensors. But what about sending and recieving emotions? A lot of people have felt negative or positive energy from another person, without touch, from rooms or even objects. I do think the human body is capable of recieving information via the form of energy and responding to it, and we make decisions "I like this person" "I dont like this person" "I like this place" "I dont like this place". And part of responding I believe would also be sending information also in the form of energy letting all those around us how we feel in response to the original energy we were sensing. (I have felt the effects of bad and good energy in a room and how it made everyone either feel good or down)

Of course, a lot of people are probably going to argue against me "THIS ENERGY ISNT REAL" thats nice and all but I think science CAN one day prove this energy system in our body and its profound effects on the human body and mind, so I am not asking you to believe in something that is impossible to prove - like God or heaven. I think we can study it.

I feel that this energy, whether you like to think of it as life-energy, chakra, karma, soul energy - I dont care , is important to the human condition and influences our perception of life. Without a body that can accurately produce, recieve or send this energy I think it will negetive effects on the human being. They might feel empty, like they cant really 'connect' to people or anything else. They might find a forest breathtakingly beautiful but still feel - nothing - since their robotic body can not recieve the energy from the life forms of the forest that they find so beautiful.

But then again, modern humans are fat and lazy and have probably naturally destroyed much of this energy system and dont even know what it feels like at its full potential - so maybe they wont miss it at all....