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Strategic Sustainable Brain
The human brain faces a challenging future. To cope with accelerating nanotech- and biotech-based developments in an increasingly complex world, compete with emerging superintelligence, and maintain its performance and sustainability as people live longer, the fragile human brain will need major enhancements: a backup system, eliminating degenerative processes, direct mind-linkup to ubiquitous computing networks, error-correction for memory, and a global Net connection with remote neural access.
Originally published in Nanotechnology
Perceptions: A Review of Ultraprecision Engineering and Nanotechnology,
Volume 2, No. 1, March 27 2006. Reprinted with permission on KurzweilAI.net
March 31, 2006.
Concern: Convincing society that the brain needs to keep up
with the changes ahead.
Each one of us has been entrusted with the care and nourishment
of what might be the most extraordinary and complex creation in
the universe. Home to mind and personality, the human brain
archives cherished memories and hopes for the future. It arranges
and coordinates the elements of consciousness that gives us purpose,
passion, motion, and emotion.
But the brain is too fragile. It is far too vulnerable to be allowed
to continue in its current state. In order to properly sustain the
brain, we need to know what it likes, the challenges it craves,
the rest it requires, and the protection it deserves. In short,
the brain must have a strategy for its future.
But is it really necessary to take action now? I submit that if
events have altered the day-to-day operations of the brain, affecting
how it performs its operations and whether it can sustain for the
long haul, then now is the right time to take action.
Recently, there has been a series of technological events causing
irrevocable changes in the external environment of the brain. People
are living longer; there is a notable increase in the number of
activists supporting life extension technologies; economic reporting
predicts an increase in research and development of molecular manufacturing
and nanotechnology; programming engineers are reveling in the increase
in research and development of superintelligence; and conservative
organizations are publishing warnings indicating an increased awareness
of the potential threats of superintelligence. These events will
directly or indirectly affect the brain, resulting in a set of expectations
for the brain to function over a longer period of time and operate
at a higher level of quality than it has ever achieved in the past.
To keep pace and sustain itself for the long haul, the brain needs
a strategy that takes into account the present circumstances and
what the future may hold. Currently, the brain is challenged by
a demand to produce better cognitive capabilities more quickly and
efficiently for a longer period of time. Simultaneously there is
an increased rate of neurological degeneration of brain cells resulting
from increased longevity. And even though it is not a current threat,
soon there will be a need to keep up with the acceleration of competitive
superintelligence.
Developing a strategy for the brain requires a balance of several
elements: a compelling vision for its future, strategic goals, an
action plan, and a means for measuring the success of the plan.
But before we can develop a strategic plan for the brain, we have
to know more about the brain's ability to meet the needs of
the contemporary mind. This may seem like an abstract project
because it would require us to separate the brain as a functioning
organization of cells, or agents, from the mind. Nevertheless, an
effective way to do this is to fictionalize the brain—make
it a character or a business entity.
If the brain had an executive statement, for example, it might
read something like this:
Executive Statement of the Brain
The mission of the brain is to serve its cells by adopting the
advantages of emerging technologies to ensure a smart, safe and
sustainable environment.
The brain develops best practices for cognitive and creative
processes. The brain's central operating system is located
in the neocortex, and has connections through the internal and
external communications network.
The brain's quality services are unique and exclusive, and
its target supply chain is nerve cells and synapses with upper-end
job-related responsibilities. The brain's competitive "intelligence"
edge is that its services are 100% man-made, unlike competitors,
such as superintelligence and friendly artificial intelligences.
By this fact, the brain's mind hopes to attract inventors
and investors that value the artistry of producing neurological
connections and their emergent properties such as critical thinking,
imagination, day-dreaming, problem-solving, humor and intellection.
Since the brain's responsibilities are mostly to serve the
day-to-day functions of the mind, as well as to elaborate networking
and communications assistance for the mind and body, it is considered
to be in the communications market, although some mental personas
use the end-result products, such as ideas, for themselves.
In the year 2006, the brain plans to develop strategic initiatives
to protect its future and gain a competitive edge in the "intelligence"
marketplace. Over the past few decades, the brain's longevity
has increased along with its competitors, necessitating a reevaluation
of its position and its future.
The brain's future is uncertain due to advancing cogitative
systems such as AI and superintelligence. Adding to the external
environment of the brain is the fact that new intelligence enterprises
entering the marketplace are drawing business away from the brain.
Encephalitis and other invasive viral infections, as well as dementia
and neurological breakdowns, are eating away at the resources
of the brain's affiliates. This pending shortage has created
an immense demand for increased memory.
Regardless of some of the internal flaws of the brain, there
is great potential for its continued success. The brain will improve
faltering memory by adding a backup system; will expand to direct
mind-linkup ubiquitous computing networks; will add error-correction
memory replay and a global Net connection with remote neural access,
guarded by security protocol. The brain plans to support its entire
system by eliminating degenerative processes that impede the ability
for a healthy, vital life in its goal to keep up with the many
changes ahead.
While the executive statement is a fictionalized story, it does
contain tangible elements. The reality is that our brains need to
be protected and improved upon. The brain's future depends upon
how we want our brains to perform in the coming years and how much
augmentation is actually needed, both invasively and noninvasively,
to satisfy this end. Since our brains contain our memories, and
our memories build our identities, this is a serious matter. But
because we cannot see it as clearly as we see our expanding or shrinking
bodies, the brain is dismissed while our mind presses for more immediate
attention, forgetting the hard fact that unless the brain is in
good physical shape, the entire system will falter.
Today the brain is vulnerable. It is vulnerable because the axial
skeleton's skull that encloses and protects the brain is not
built from impenetrable material; its command-and-control center,
including the white matter in between, is in constant danger of
breakdown, infection, and disease; and its cognitive processes are
subject to loss of information.
Trends five to ten years in the future suggest an increase in technologies,
including biotech and nanotech, for building better brains to operate
with better bodies in meeting the needs of people living longer.
Further future trends suggest people opting for the synthetic brain
over a biological brain. Markets point to an expected increase in
neurosurgery, neuroinformatics, neuromarketing, biotechnologies,
and human performance enhancements with an explicit focus on nanotechnology.
But the consequential inclination is that of machine intelligence
challenging human intelligence. Lurking in the foreground of the
future is whether or not the brain will be able to keep pace with
new technologies that will otherwise outperform it.
Based on potential threats and opportunities, and on the brain's
mission to serve its cells by adopting the advantages of emerging
technologies to ensure a smart, safe and sustainable environment,
the brain's strategy narrows down to: (1) enhancing its performance
and sustainability in order to satisfy the needs of people living
longer; (2) competing with emerging superintelligence; and (3) enhancing
its cognitive capabilities in order to deal with the problems of
an increasingly complex world.
With these issues on the table, the brain needs a practical approach
hedged by a strong vision that helps society understand the opportunities
and the threats that await all of us. This is not just an abstract
discussion; it includes everyone, not a select few. It is not simply
a matter of being smarter or more capable; it is a matter of healthy
and vital living. It is a matter of being prepared for the challenges
of the future, and a measurable goal of convincing others to be
prepared as well.
Convincing people is not an easy task, especially when minds have
already been made up. But I think that we must work toward convincing
society that the brain needs to accelerate with the rate of technological
change, as our vision and audition have through innovative corrective
technologies, and our arms and legs have with robotic prosthetics,
and as other parts of our bodies have transformed and renewed in
working together to keep us alive.
© 2006 Natasha Vita-More
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Mind·X Discussion About This Article:
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Artificial Brain in 25 years.
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I agree with this article that we should be prepared for migration of our mind from biological brain to a new nanotechnological platform. The extrapolation of price of computation and the accuracy of scanning of the brain activity suggests that it should be possible within 25 years. The only problem that seems to exist is the problem of our internal consciousness 'Is human mind cloneable?'. If a copy of my mind is going to be prepared and I will wake up, what I will be, at what copy I will wake up? This are probably wrong questions, they do not make sense, they are probably like a question 'What is the color of the time?'. Our consciousness is rather like a flame generated by the burning of a candle, it is a phenomenon generated by a process, by a process connected with the working of the brain. When the information-related processes that go on in the brain will be reproduced then the consciousness related to that processes will be reproduced.
When the technology to make the migration available will be available in 25 years without any dedicated projects. The price of computing power will decrease as effect of need to produce more capable information processing devices. The scanning of the brain will be improved for medical and research purposes. Should we start dedicated processes to make it faster, to integrate the brain with electronic devices now (or in 5 or 10 years)?
We could backup our brain by being creative, by making notes about the most important issues in our lives, by making notes about what happened in our every day live. By creating such kind of notes we are creating part of our mind outside our brain. When this information is well organized, easily available to access via various electronic platforms, we feel like it is a part of us. When this information is backuped every day in several different places, when it is possible to roll-back the changes that have been done by accident you may feel quite comfortable that your memory will not easily disappear.
More than 5 years ago I have created such kind of system of notes, the notes have been describing each almost day. I have been writing my feelings. At the beginning the system contained small portion of my live-related information, bet when it was growing it became more and more useful. Recently I have been adding to the system the dairy I have been writing 15 years ago. Sometimes I have the feeling that system contains more details about the past that my memory, but it is obviously not true, the system contains references to days. The system contains statements, but my mind contains feelings and images, but my mind and the system have created a new quality. For me this is the first step to migrate the mind to new nanotechnological platform.
Let's come back to question what is the consciousness? Imagine yourself 10 years ago. During recent 10 years everyone of us have changed so much that we could say that the me from 10 years before disappeared and a new was created. The contents of the consciousness of me from 10 years before the seems to not exists any more, but such consciousness could come back when reading detailed notes written 10 years ago. It could come only for some moments but it could come. If we would create a copy of you during a sleep in what body would you wake up? There would be two entities claiming that they are You. But where would you really be. This is wrong question. Why this is wrong question? This is wrong question because we could not extend consciousness to a future. The flame of a candle may disappear in the future.
You may ask where is that flame, where I may find it. Or the flame of may be moved to a better candle where it will not disappear so soon.
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