Even if you “digitize” your brain, it won’t be you. It might be a perfect copy of you, but it won’t be your consciousness. You’ll still be dead. At best you’re signing up to be replaced by an immortal clone.
I loved SOMA, and it introduced an even more interesting twist on this.
SOMA plot
Simon had his brain scanned in 2015 as part of an experimental treatment for his head injury, and the WAU rebuilt him from the 90 year old brain scan it had sitting in its digital training data. That scan wasn’t even a perfect copy of Simon like the other scans the WAU was working from, it was only an approximation that could be used to test treatments. The treatments, notably, didn’t work and the original Simon died soon after. It’s notable because Simon seems really mentally inflexible, he just doesn’t get how the digital uploads are copies and that he doesn’t get to escape to the ARK, which leads to him having a meltdown in the end. Is that because of the brain damage and it transferred to his copy? Or is it because he’s actually just a chatbot trained on Simon’s brain scans?
This is what SOMA was about.
Even if you “digitize” your brain, it won’t be you. It might be a perfect copy of you, but it won’t be your consciousness. You’ll still be dead. At best you’re signing up to be replaced by an immortal clone.
to be fair if I was close to death the idea of an immortal clone following in my footsteps would be quite a bit of solace to me.
I loved SOMA, and it introduced an even more interesting twist on this.
SOMA plot
Simon had his brain scanned in 2015 as part of an experimental treatment for his head injury, and the WAU rebuilt him from the 90 year old brain scan it had sitting in its digital training data. That scan wasn’t even a perfect copy of Simon like the other scans the WAU was working from, it was only an approximation that could be used to test treatments. The treatments, notably, didn’t work and the original Simon died soon after. It’s notable because Simon seems really mentally inflexible, he just doesn’t get how the digital uploads are copies and that he doesn’t get to escape to the ARK, which leads to him having a meltdown in the end. Is that because of the brain damage and it transferred to his copy? Or is it because he’s actually just a chatbot trained on Simon’s brain scans?
I think that particular sticking point hinges on him
spoiler
literally having brain damage