This researcher wants to replace your brain, little by little. The US government just hired a researcher who thinks we can beat aging with fresh cloned bodies and brain updates.
This researcher wants to replace your brain, little by little. The US government just hired a researcher who thinks we can beat aging with fresh cloned bodies and brain updates.
The US government just hired a researcher who thinks we can beat aging with fresh cloned bodies and brain updates.
The final boss of subscriptions
Good lord, just let people DIE. Imagine what a rotten place this would be if people with outdated mindsets continued to control the world decades or even centuries after their expiration dates. People were already angry about 80 year old presidential candidates... what happens when they're 120, or 150?
There are two reasons he believes the neocortex could be replaced, albeit only slowly. The first is evidence from rare cases of benign brain tumors, like a man described in the medical literature who developed a growth the size of an orange. Yet because it grew very slowly, the man’s brain was able to adjust, shifting memories elsewhere, and his behavior and speech never seemed to change—even when the tumor was removed.
That’s proof, Hébert thinks, that replacing the neocortex little by little could be achieved “without losing the information encoded in it” such as a person’s self-identity.
The second source of hope, he says, is experiments showing that fetal-stage cells can survive, and even function, when transplanted into the brains of adults. For instance, medical tests underway are showing that young neurons can integrate into the brains of people who have epilepsy and stop their seizures.
“It was these two things together—the plastic nature of brains and the ability to add new tissue—that, to me, were like, ‘Ah, now there has got to be a way,’” says Hébert.
Very interesting. I've also seen research suggesting that the application of stem cells to damaged neural tissue within the spinal cord could repair it, so the idea that you could use a similar approach to actual brain health isn't such a big leap. But still, wow. I wonder how long it would take for the immature cells to develop into "adult mode" that's fully integrated into the patients cortex. In order to replace the entire brain, you'd have to do it in like, 8 parts, with years of recovery time in between each surgery. Also there would exist the potential for the new cells to develop into like, a second, smaller brain, if the connections sour or if the new material isn't stimulated the "right" way.
FROM THE MOMENT I UNDERSTOOD THE WEAKNESS OF MY FLESH IT DISGUSTED ME
President Joe Biden created ARPA-H in 2022, as an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, to pursue what he called “bold, urgent innovation”
I did not see Biden creating a cloning and immortality medical research arm of the government but I guess it's proof he already knew he was getting old before the debate and no wonder Trump wants back in the white house.
If you want a bit of a deeper dive, Sean Carroll's Mindscape gets into the science of aging and known workable remedies/treatments.
The good news is that Billionaires will not be living forever any time soon.
The bad news is that we've got a cellularly defined terminal limit and there's nothing we can do to simply reset the clock. "Cloned Bodies" for animals are dysfunctional bordering on nightmarish. The human brain's plasticity isn't something you can renew with a pill or a potion. Blood Boys don't work. There aren't trivially replaceable components in the human body.
Plenty of meat bags walking around now without a fully functioning brain. Can we use those?
Something something Doctor Who Cybermen.
Just like in the classic movie Bicentennial Man
I'm in, lets do this
zipbomb time
What's that I smell, is it the doctor for doctor death season 5?
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