Published on KurzweilAI.net Feb. 17, 2003. The author will present a talk based on this article on Feb. 21 at Time magazine's "The Future of Life" conference.

Sex has already been largely separated from its biological function.  For the most part, we engage in sexual activity for intimate communication and sensual pleasure, not reproduction.  Conversely, we have multiple methodologies for creating babies without physical sex, albeit most reproduction still does derive from the sex act.  Although not condoned by all sectors of society, this disentanglement of sex from its biological function has been readily, even eagerly, adopted by the mainstream. 

So why don’t we provide the same extrication of purpose from biology for another activity that also provides both social intimacy and sensual pleasure, namely eating? We have crude ways of doing this today.  Starch blockers, such as Bayer’s Precose, partially prevent absorption of complex carbohydrates; fat blockers, such as Chitosan, bind to fat molecules, causing them to pass through the digestive tract; and sugar substitutes, such as Sucralose and Stevia, provide sweetness without calories.  There are limitations and problems with each of these contemporary technologies, but a more effective generation of drugs is being developed that will block excess caloric absorption on the cellular level. 

Let us consider, however, a more fundamental reengineering of the digestive process to disconnect the sensual aspects of eating from its original biological purpose: to provide nutrients into the bloodstream that are then delivered to each of our trillions of cells.  These nutrients include caloric (energy-bearing) substances such as glucose (from carbohydrates), proteins, fats, and a myriad of trace molecules, such as vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals, that provide building blocks and facilitating enzymes for diverse metabolic processes. 

An Era of Abundance

Our knowledge of the complex pathways underlying digestive processes is rapidly expanding, although there is still a great deal we do not fully understand.  On the one hand, digestion, like any other major human biological system, is astonishing in its intricacy and cleverness.  Our bodies manage to extract the complex resources needed to survive, despite sharply varying conditions, while at the same time, filtering out a multiplicity of toxins. 

On the other hand, our bodies evolved in a very different era.  Our digestive processes in particular are optimized for a situation that is dramatically dissimilar to the one we find ourselves in.  For most of our biological heritage, there was a high likelihood that the next foraging or hunting season (and for a brief, relatively recent period, the next planting season) might be catastrophically lean.  So it made sense for our bodies to hold on to every possible calorie.  Today, this biological strategy is extremely counterproductive.  Our outdated metabolic programming underlies our contemporary epidemic of obesity and fuels pathological processes of degenerative disease such as coronary artery disease, and type II diabetes. 

Up until recently (on an evolutionary time scale), it was not in the interest of the species for old people like myself (I was born in 1948) to use up the limited resources of the clan.  Evolution favored a short life span—life expectancy was 37 years only two centuries ago—so these restricted reserves could be devoted to the young, those caring for them, and those strong enough to perform intense physical work. 

We now live in an era of great material abundance.  Most work requires mental effort rather than physical exertion.  A century ago, 30 percent of the U.S. work force worked on farms, with another 30 percent deployed in factories.  Both of these figures are now under 3 percent.  The significant majority of today’s job categories, ranging from airline flight attendant to web designer, simply didn’t exist a century ago.  Circa 2003, we have the opportunity to continue to contribute to our civilization’s exponentially growing knowledge base—incidentally, a unique attribute of our species—well past our child-rearing days. 

Our species has already augmented the "natural" order of our life cycle through our technology: drugs, supplements, replacement parts for virtually all bodily systems, and many other interventions.  We already have devices to replace our hips, knees, shoulders, elbows, wrists, jaws, teeth, skin, arteries, veins, heart valves, arms, legs, feet, fingers, and toes.  Systems to replace more complex organs (for example, our hearts) are beginning to work.  As we’re learning the principles of operation of the human body and the brain, we will soon be in a position to design vastly superior systems that will be more enjoyable, last longer, and perform better, without susceptibility to breakdown, disease, and aging.

Artist and cultural catalyst Natasha Vita-More pioneered a conceptual design for one such system, called Primo Posthuman, designed for mobility, flexibility and superlongevity. It features innovations such as a metabrain for global-net connection with prosthetic neo-neocortex of AI interwoven with nanobots; smart skin that is solar protected with biosensors for tone and texture changeability, and high-acuity senses.

Introducing Human Body Version 2.0

We won’t engineer human body version 2.0 all at once.  It will be an incremental process, one already well under way.  Although version 2.0 is a grand project, ultimately resulting in the radical upgrading of all our physical and mental systems, we will implement it one benign step at a time.  Based on our current knowledge, we can already touch and feel the means for accomplishing each aspect of this vision. 

From this perspective, let’s return to a consideration of the digestive system.  We already have a reasonably comprehensive picture of the constituent ingredients of the food we eat.  We already have the means to survive without eating, using intravenous nutrition (for people who are unable to eat), although this is clearly not a pleasant process, given the current limitations in our technologies for getting substances in and out of the blood stream. 

The next phase of improvement will be largely biochemical, in the form of drugs and supplements that will block excess caloric absorption and otherwise reprogram metabolic pathways for optimal health.  We already have the knowledge to prevent most instances of degenerative disease, such as heart disease, stroke, type II diabetes, and cancer, through comprehensive programs of nutrition and supplementation, something which I personally do, and will describe in an upcoming book (A Short Guide to a Long Life, coauthored with Terry Grossman, M.D.).  I view our current knowledge as a bridge to the full flowering of the biotechnology revolution, which in turn will be a bridge to the nanotechnology revolution. 

It’s All About Nanobots

In a famous scene from the movie, The Graduate, Benjamin’s mentor gives him career advice in a single word: “plastics.”  Today, that word might be “software,” or “biotechnology,” but in another couple of decades, the word is likely to be “nanobots.”  Nanobots—blood-cell-sized robots—will provide the means to radically redesign our digestive systems, and, incidentally, just about everything else.

In an intermediate phase, nanobots in the digestive tract and bloodstream will intelligently extract the precise nutrients we need, call for needed additional nutrients and supplements through our personal wireless local area network, and send the rest of the food we eat on its way to be passed through for elimination. 

If this seems futuristic, keep in mind that intelligent machines are already making their way into our blood stream.  There are dozens of projects underway to create blood-stream-based “biological microelectromechanical systems” (bioMEMS) with a wide range of diagnostic and therapeutic applications.  BioMEMS devices are being designed to intelligently scout out pathogens and deliver medications in very precise ways. 

For example, a researcher at the University of Illinois at Chicago has created a tiny capsule with pores measuring only seven nanometers.  The pores let insulin out in a controlled manner but prevent antibodies from invading the pancreatic Islet cells inside the capsule.  These nanoengineered devices have cured rats with type I diabetes, and there is no reason that the same methodology would fail to work in humans.  Similar systems could precisely deliver dopamine to the brain for Parkinson’s patients, provide blood-clotting factors for patients with hemophilia, and deliver cancer drugs directly to tumor sites.  A new design provides up to 20 substance-containing reservoirs that can release their cargo at programmed times and locations in the body. 

Kensall Wise, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Michigan, has developed a tiny neural probe that can provide precise monitoring of the electrical activity of patients with neural diseases.  Future designs are expected to also deliver drugs to precise locations in the brain.  Kazushi Ishiyama at Tohoku University in Japan has developed micromachines that use microscopic-sized spinning screws to deliver drugs to small cancer tumors. 

A particularly innovative micromachine developed by Sandia National Labs has actual microteeth with a jaw that opens and closes to trap individual cells and then implant them with substances such as DNA, proteins or drugs.  There are already at least four major scientific conferences on bioMEMS and other approaches to developing micro- and nano-scale machines to go into the body and bloodstream. 

Ultimately, the individualized nutrients needed for each person will be fully understood (including all the hundreds of phytochemicals) and easily and inexpensively available, so we won’t need to bother with extracting nutrients from food at all.  Just as we routinely engage in sex today for its relational and sensual gratification, we will gain the opportunity to disconnect the eating of food from the function of delivering nutrients into the bloodstream. 

This technology should be reasonably mature by the 2020s.  Nutrients will be introduced directly into the bloodstream by special metabolic nanobots.  Sensors in our bloodstream and body, using wireless communication, will provide dynamic information on the nutrients needed at each point in time. 

A key question in designing this technology will be the means by which these nanobots make their way in and out of the body.  As I mentioned above, the technologies we have today, such as intravenous catheters, leave much to be desired.  A significant benefit of nanobot technology is that unlike mere drugs and nutritional supplements, nanobots have a measure of intelligence.  They can keep track of their own inventories, and intelligently slip in and out of our bodies in clever ways.  One scenario is that we would wear a special “nutrient garment” such as a belt or undershirt.  This garment would be loaded with nutrient bearing nanobots, which would make their way in and out of our bodies through the skin or other body cavities. 

At this stage of technological development, we will be able to eat whatever we want, whatever gives us pleasure and gastronomic fulfillment, and thereby unreservedly explore the culinary arts for their tastes, textures, and aromas.  At the same time, we will provide an optimal flow of nutrients to our bloodstream, using a completely separate process.  One possibility would be that all the food we eat would pass through a digestive tract that is now disconnected from any possible absorption into the bloodstream. 

This would place a burden on our colon and bowel functions, so a more refined approach will dispense with the function of elimination.  We will be able to accomplish this using special elimination nanobots that act like tiny garbage compactors.  As the nutrient nanobots make their way from the nutrient garment into our bodies, the elimination nanobots will go the other way.  Periodically, we would replace the nutrition garment for a fresh one.  One might comment that we do obtain some pleasure from the elimination function, but I suspect that most people would be happy to do without it. 

Ultimately we won’t need to bother with special garments or explicit nutritional resources.  Just as computation will eventually be ubiquitous and available everywhere, so too will basic metabolic nanobot resources be embedded everywhere in our environment.  In addition, an important aspect of this system will be maintaining ample reserves of all needed resources inside the body.  Our version 1.0 bodies do this to only a very limited extent, for example, storing a few minutes of oxygen in our blood, and a few days of caloric energy in glycogen and other reserves.  Version 2.0 will provide substantially greater reserves, enabling us to be separated from metabolic resources for greatly extended periods of time. 

Once perfected, we will no longer need version 1.0 of our digestive system at all.  I pointed out above that our adoption of these technologies will be cautious and incremental, so we will not dispense with the old-fashioned digestive process when these technologies are first introduced.  Most of us will wait for digestive system version 2.1 or even 2.2 before being willing to do dispense with version 1.0.  After all, people didn’t throw away their typewriters when the first generation of word processors was introduced.  People held onto their vinyl record collections for many years after CDs came out (I still have mine).  People are still holding onto their film cameras, although the tide is rapidly turning in favor of digital cameras. 

However, these new technologies do ultimately dominate, and few people today still own a typewriter.  The same phenomenon will happen with our reengineered bodies.  Once we’ve worked out the inevitable complications that will arise with a radically reengineered gastrointestinal system, we will begin to rely on it more and more. 

Programmable Blood

As we reverse-engineer (learn the principles of operation of) our various bodily systems, we will be in a position to engineer new systems that provide dramatic improvements.  One pervasive system that has already been the subject of a comprehensive conceptual redesign is our blood.  

It will be interesting to see how this development is dealt with in athletic contests.  Presumably, the use of respirocytes and similar systems will be prohibited from Olympic contests, but then we will have the specter of teenagers in junior high school gymnasiums routinely outperforming Olympic athletes. 

 Freitas envisions micron-size artificial platelets that could achieve hemostasis (bleeding control) up to 1,000 times faster than biological platelets.  Freitas describes nanorobotic microbivores (white blood cell replacements) that will download software to destroy specific infections hundreds of times faster than antibiotics, and that will be effective against all bacterial, viral and fungal infections, with no limitations of drug resistance. 

I’ve personally watched (through a microscope) my own white blood cells surround and devour a pathogen, and I was struck with the remarkable sluggishness of this natural process.  Although replacing our blood with billions of nanorobotic devices will require a lengthy process of development, refinement, and regulatory approval, we already have the conceptual knowledge to engineer substantial improvements over the remarkable but very inefficient methods used in our biological bodies. 

Have a Heart, or Not

The next organ on my hit list is the heart.  It’s a remarkable machine, but it has a number of severe problems.  It is subject to a myriad of failure modes, and represents a fundamental weakness in our potential longevity.  The heart usually breaks down long before the rest of the body, and often very prematurely.

Although artificial hearts are beginning to work, a more effective approach will be to get rid of the heart altogether.  Among Freitas’ designs are nanorobotic blood cell replacements that provide their own mobility.  If the blood system moves with its own movement, the engineering issues of the extreme pressures required for centralized pumping can be eliminated.  As we perfect the means of transferring nanobots to and from the blood supply, we can also continuously replace the nanobots comprising our blood supply. 

Energy will be provided by microscopic-sized hydrogen fuel cells.  Integrated Fuel Cell Technologies, one of many companies pioneering fuel cell technology, has already created microscopic-sized fuel cells.  Their first-generation design provides tens of thousands of fuel cells on an integrated circuit and is intended to power portable electronics. 

With the respirocytes providing greatly extended access to oxygenation, we will be in a position to eliminate the lungs by using nanobots to provide oxygen and remove carbon dioxide.  One might point out that we take pleasure in breathing (even more so than elimination!).  As with all of these redesigns, we will certainly go through intermediate stages where these technologies augment our natural systems, so we can have the best of both worlds.  Eventually, however, there will be no reason to continue with the complications of actual breathing and the requirement of having breathable air everywhere we go.  If we really find breathing that pleasurable, we will develop virtual ways of having this sensual experience. 

We also won’t need the various organs that produce chemicals, hormones, and enzymes that flow into the blood and other metabolic pathways.  We already create bio-identical versions of many of these substances, and we will have the means to routinely create all biochemically relevant substances within a couple of decades.  These substances (to the extent that we still need them) will be delivered via nanobots, controlled by intelligent biofeedback systems to maintain and balance required levels, just as our “natural” systems do today (for example, the control of insulin levels by the pancreatic Islet cells).  Since we are eliminating most of our biological organs, many of these substances may no longer be needed, and will be replaced by other resources that are required by the nanorobotic systems. 

Similarly the organs that filter the blood for impurities, such as the kidneys, can also be replaced by nanorobot-based elimination services. 

It is important to emphasize that this redesign process will not be accomplished in a single design cycle.  Each organ and each idea will have its own progression, intermediate designs, and stages of implementation.  Nonetheless, we are clearly headed towards a fundamental and radical redesign of the extremely inefficient and limited functionality of human body version 1.0. 

So What’s Left?

Let’s consider where we are.  We’ve eliminated the heart, lungs, red and white blood cells, platelets, pancreas, thyroid and all the hormone-producing organs, kidneys, bladder, liver, lower esophagus, stomach, small intestines, large intestines, and bowel.  What we have left at this point is the skeleton, skin, sex organs, mouth and upper esophagus, and brain. 

The skeleton is a stable structure, and we already have a reasonable understanding of how it works.  We replace parts of it today, although our current technology for doing this has severe limitations.  Interlinking nanobots will provide the ability to augment and ultimately replace the skeleton.  Replacing portions of the skeleton today requires painful surgery, but replacing it through nanobots from within can be a gradual and noninvasive process.  The human skeleton version 2.0 will very strong, stable, and self repairing.

We will not notice the absence of many of our organs, such as the liver and pancreas, as we do not directly experience their functionality.  The skin, however, is an organ we will actually want to keep, or at least we will want to maintain its functionality.  The skin, which includes our primary and secondary sex organs, provides a vital function of communication and pleasure.  Nonetheless, we will ultimately be able to improve on the skin with new nanoengineered supple materials that will provide greater protection from physical and thermal environmental effects while enhancing our capacity for intimate communication and pleasure.  The same observation holds for the mouth and upper esophagus, which comprise the remaining aspects of the digestive system that we use to experience the act of eating. 

Redesigning the Human Brain

The process of reverse engineering and redesign will also encompass the most important system in our bodies: the brain.  The brain is at least as complex as all the other organs put together, with approximately half of our genetic code devoted to its design.  It is a misconception to regard the brain as a single organ.  It is actually an intricate collection of information-processing organs, interconnected in an elaborate hierarchy, as is the accident of our evolutionary history. 

The process of understanding the principles of operation of the human brain is already well under way.  The underlying technologies of brain scanning and neuron modeling are scaling up exponentially, as is our overall knowledge of human brain function.  We already have detailed mathematical models of a couple dozen of the several hundred regions that comprise the human brain. 

The age of neural implants is also well under way.  We have brain implants based on “neuromorphic” modeling (i.e., reverse-engineering of the human brain and nervous system) for a rapidly growing list of brain regions.  A friend of mine who became deaf while an adult can now engage in telephone conversations again because of his cochlear implant, a device that interfaces directly with the auditory nervous system.  He plans to replace it with a new model with a thousand levels of frequency discrimination, which will enable him to hear music once again.  He laments that he has had the same melodies playing in his head for the past 15 years and is looking forward to hearing some new tunes.  A future generation of cochlear implants now on the drawing board will provide levels of frequency discrimination that go significantly beyond that of “normal” hearing. 

Researchers at MIT and Harvard are developing neural implants to replace damaged retinas.  There are brain implants for Parkinson’s patients that communicate directly with the ventral posterior nucleus and subthalmic nucleus regions of the brain to reverse the most devastating symptoms of this disease.  An implant for people with cerebral palsy and multiple sclerosis communicates with the ventral lateral thalamus and has been effective in controlling tremors.  “Rather than treat the brain like soup, adding chemicals that enhance or suppress certain neurotransmitters,” says Rick Trosch, an American physician helping to pioneer these therapies, “we’re now treating it like circuitry.”

A variety of techniques are being developed to provide the communications bridge between the wet analog world of biological information processing and digital electronics.  Researchers at Germany’s Max Planck Institute have developed noninvasive devices that can communicate with neurons in both directions.  They demonstrated their “neuron transistor” by controlling the movements of a living leech from a personal computer.  Similar technology has been used to reconnect leech neurons and to coax them to perform simple logical and arithmetic problems.  Scientists are now experimenting with a new design called “quantum dots,” which uses tiny crystals of semiconductor material to connect electronic devices with neurons. 

These developments provide the promise of reconnecting broken neural pathways for people with nerve damage and spinal cord injuries.  It has long been thought that recreating these pathways would only be feasible for recently injured patients because nerves gradually deteriorate when unused.  A recent discovery, however, shows the feasibility of a neuroprosthetic system for patients with long-standing spinal cord injuries.  Researchers at the University of Utah asked a group of long-term quadriplegic patients to move their limbs in a variety of ways and then observed the response of their brains, using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).  Although the neural pathways to their limbs had been inactive for many years, the pattern of their brain activity when attempting to move their limbs was very close to that observed in non-disabled persons. 

We will, therefore, be able to place sensors in the brain of a paralyzed person (e.g., Christopher Reeve) that will be programmed to recognize the brain patterns associated with intended movements and then stimulate the appropriate sequence of muscle movements.  For those patients whose muscles no longer function, there are already designs for “nanoelectromechanical” systems (NEMS) that can expand and contract to replace damaged muscles and that can be activated by either real or artificial nerves.

We Are Becoming Cyborgs

We are rapidly growing more intimate with our technology.  Computers started out as large remote machines in air-conditioned rooms tended by white-coated technicians.  Subsequently they moved onto our desks, then under our arms, and now in our pockets.  Soon, we’ll routinely put them inside our bodies and brains.  Ultimately we will become more nonbiological than biological.

The compelling benefits in overcoming profound diseases and disabilities will keep these technologies on a rapid course, but medical applications represent only the early adoption phase.  As the technologies become established, there will be no barriers to using them for the expansion of human potential.  In my view, expanding our potential is precisely the primary distinction of our species. 

Moreover, all of the underlying technologies are accelerating.  The power of computation has grown at a double exponential rate for all of the past century, and will continue to do so well into this century through the power of three-dimensional computing.  Communication bandwidths and the pace of brain reverse-engineering are also quickening.  Meanwhile, according to my models, the size of technology is shrinking at a rate of 5.6 per linear dimension per decade, which will make nanotechnology ubiquitous during the 2020s. 

By the end of this decade, computing will disappear as a separate technology that we need to carry with us.  We’ll routinely have high-resolution images encompassing the entire visual field written directly to our retinas from our eyeglasses and contact lenses (the Department of Defense is already using technology along these lines from Microvision, a company based in Bothell, Washington).  We’ll have very-high-speed wireless connection to the Internet at all times.  The electronics for all of this will be embedded in our clothing.  Circa 2010, these very personal computers will enable us to meet with each other in full-immersion, visual-auditory, virtual-reality environments as well as augment our vision with location- and time-specific information at all times. 

By 2030, electronics will utilize molecule-sized circuits, the reverse-engineering of the human brain will have been completed, and bioMEMS will have evolved into bioNEMS (biological nanoelectromechanical systems).  It will be routine to have billions of nanobots (nano-scale robots) coursing through the capillaries of our brains, communicating with each other (over a wireless local area network), as well as with our biological neurons and with the Internet.  One application will be to provide full-immersion virtual reality that encompasses all of our senses.  When we want to enter a virtual-reality environment, the nanobots will replace the signals from our real senses with the signals that our brain would receive if we were actually in the virtual environment. 

We will have a panoply of virtual environments to choose from, including earthly worlds that we are familiar with, as well as those with no earthly counterpart.  We will be able to go to these virtual places and have any kind of interaction with other real (as well as simulated) people, ranging from business negotiations to sensual encounters.  In virtual reality, we won’t be restricted to a single personality, since we will be able to change our appearance and become other people. 

Experience Beamers

“Experience beamers” will beam their entire flow of sensory experiences as well as the neurological correlates of their emotional reactions out on the Web just as people today beam their bedroom images from their web cams.  A popular pastime will be to plug in to someone else’s sensory-emotional beam and experience what it’s like to be someone else, à la the plot concept of the movie “Being John Malkovich.”  There will also be a vast selection of archived experiences to choose from.  The design of virtual environments and the creation of archived full-immersion experiences will become new art forms. 

The most important application of circa-2030 nanobots will be to literally expand our minds.  We’re limited today to a mere hundred trillion interneuronal connections; we will be able to augment these by adding virtual connections via nanobot communication.  This will provide us with the opportunity to vastly expand our pattern recognition abilities, memories, and overall thinking capacity as well as directly interface with powerful forms of nonbiological intelligence. 

It’s important to note that once nonbiological intelligence gets a foothold in our brains (a threshold we’ve already passed), it will grow exponentially, as is the accelerating nature of information-based technologies.  A one-inch cube of nanotube circuitry (which is already working at smaller scales in laboratories) will be at least a million times more powerful than the human brain.  By 2040, the nonbiological portion of our intelligence will be far more powerful than the biological portion.  It will, however, still be part of the human-machine civilization, having been derived from human intelligence, i.e., created by humans (or machines created by humans) and based at least in part on the reverse-engineering of the human nervous system. 

Stephen Hawking recently commented in the German magazine Focus that computer intelligence will surpass that of humans within a few decades.  He advocated that we “develop as quickly as possible technologies that make possible a direct connection between brain and computer, so that artificial brains contribute to human intelligence rather than opposing it.”  Hawking can take comfort that the development program he is recommending is well under way. 

© 2003 Ray Kurzweil.

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   Mind·X Discussion About This Article:

		hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 11:16 AM by hippocampus	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Many of the functions of the brain depend on hormonal feedback from the body. For example, the adrenal and sex hornomes provide feedback to the pituitary. Also, as Dr. Antonio Demasio mentions in his books, the brain's conrol of homeostasis in our bodys is at the foundations of consciousness, the sense of self, and emotions. So my point is that hormones and organs can't be substituted by artificial systems unless they provide the same feedback mechanisms to the brain, and interact with it the same way our brain interacts with our organs. (The brain also interacts with the immune system.) Nanosystems and nanobots will have to be able to interact with the brain and exchange information with it. I think that the development of the human body v. 2.0 will have to start with the brain, and not with the organs of digestion and metabolism.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 1:24 PM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	So my point is that hormones and organs can't be substituted by artificial systems unless they provide the same feedback mechanisms to the brain, and interact with it the same way our brain interacts with our organs. The hormonal feedback systems can be replaced with electronic feedback systems. Information is information no matter what medium it is transmitted through.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 4:22 PM by hippocampus	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Ray said: "These substances (to the extent that we still need them) will be delivered via nanobots, controlled by intelligent biofeedback systems to maintain and balance required levels, just as our "natural" systems do today (for example, the control of insulin levels by the pancreatic Islet cells). Since we are eliminating most of our biological organs, many of these substances may no longer be needed, and will be replaced by other resources that are required by the nanorobotic systems. " if the nanobots deliver the requited feedback, then I suppose they could fool the brain into thinking that the original organ was still there. But I dont' agree that many of these substances would not be needed, because the brain would still be expecting them. If the metabolic, homeostatic, and immune functions of the body are replaced by artificial ones, then the artificial systems will either have to totally emulate the organs for the brain, or else the brain itself would have to be redesigned to work with those artificial systems. In which case, would it still be a "human" brain ? That is the question that I have with respect to the idea that our minds could be uploaded into computers. A large part of our mind is built upon the brain's control of homeostatis of our body's functions. How can our mind exist without our body ?

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 4:52 PM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	itself would have to be redesigned to work with those artificial systems. In which case, would it still be a "human" brain ? I think that is the whole point...to go beyond the imprecision limits of raw chemical (pharmaceutical) interfacing with the human brain. That is the question that I have with respect to the idea that our minds could be uploaded into computers. A large part of our mind is built upon the brain's control of homeostatis of our body's functions. How can our mind exist without our body ? The mind will always need a hardware substrate and an external input/output of one sort or another. I personally would not forsake a freely roaming body for an existence inside a computer utopia (if it is possible). I think the 'upload' process will be more of a gradual transformation of the brain into a more controllable, modular and higher resolution/frequency substrate. This transformation will happen via a gradual replacement of the functional components with more efficient and controllable components and control/interface architectures. When the mind is sufficiently upgraded it can interface directly with 'computer' architectures. At such a point the computer could download the network pattern of the mind and run it through some simulations while outputting the data back into the mind. I don't think the mind would really go inside a computer, per se, because I don't think many people will be tempted to destroy the original once a copy of the mind is downloaded to the computer.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 8:04 AM by maxmore	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	The mind will always need a hardware substrate and an external input/output of one sort or another. I personally would not forsake a freely roaming body for an existence inside a computer utopia (if it is possible). I detect an either/or assumption here. Currently we are isolated within a single, fragile meat body. The future envisioned by Ray, Natasha, myself, and others along these lines involves an EXPANSION of choices for incarnation. Of course we will initially start this process (we have already) by extending our senses and by adopting virtual personas. If we can escape the confines of our brains, we can "roam around" in any number of physical bodies of any kind by downloading or linking, or in any number of virtual bodies. Far from forsaking a freely roaming body, we would escape the highly confined condition that we have today. I put down some thoughts on this for a conference in Germany in 1997: http://www.maxmore.com/virtue.htm Onward! Max

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 11:14 AM by hippocampus	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	I don't seem to be getting my point across: "If we can escape the confines of our brains" a mind that exists outside of our brains and bodies, may no longer be "my" mind. if "we" escape our brains, how do we know that we are still "we" ? my notion of self is based on the biology of my brain and my body. if you replace my organs and body parts with other systems that work very differently than my original body, then you will alter that self. "I" will no longer be "I". That new being will not have the same patterns of emotional response that I have, therefore it will no longer be "me".

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 11:24 AM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	if you replace my organs and body parts with other systems that work very differently than my original body, then you will alter that self. "I" will no longer be "I". That new being will not have the same patterns of emotional response that I have, therefore it will no longer be "me". The self is more aptly visualized as a pattern trajectory through space and time. It is always evolving. If you choose to alter that trajectory through the new technologies available, that is the choice self that your 'self' has made. There is no real line to be drawn at any point of your self evolution. The upgrade will be gradual enough that at every point it will be reversable. However, once you taste the upgrade, I doubt that you would ever want to go back. The whole point is really to evolve the self. Whether you call it 'me' or 'altered-me' or whatever, is an arbitrary distinction because the self is ALWAYS changing. We are always an 'altered me'. subtillioN

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 1:33 PM by /:setAI	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	you must understand that human consciousness is a temporary measure- it will end- you will end- do not try to hold on to "yourself"- ther are new "hardware" subtrates as well as new "software"- Minds will change- the Nture of mind will change- you will change- Change is- you cannot reamain You- nor should you wish too- Human Mind is a means to an end- in and of itself human consciousness is a suffering abomination- our selfish individuality is a cancer- we must be eaten- to say "I" is a the greatest of all Lies- "to get Everything you have to give everything up" Lao Tzu

		individuality is a natural right posted on 02/18/2003 5:42 PM by hippocampus	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	I agree with the first part of your post. we should learn and improve and grow everyday, so that we will be a new person tomorrow. our selfish individuality is a cancer- we must be eaten- to say "I" is a the greatest of all Lies- but I don't agree with that. our individuality and our sense of self is our natural right. denying people their individuality leads to dictatorship. dictators usually try to make people give up their individuality for the sake of king, nation, or religion.

		Re: individuality is a natural right posted on 02/18/2003 6:40 PM by /:setAI	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	denying people their individuality leads to dictatorship I wasn't refering to "denying" individuality- you cannot deny something that doesn't really exist except as kludge of survival schemes- the structure of human "self" cannot/will not/ should not endure in a system where memes can be shared/processed/woven within All consciousness completely and instantly and "bodies" can be of any material/or lack-thereof/ in this paradigm a "dictatorship" would likely not exist- and if it did the "dictator" would be an omnipotent/omniscient/omnipresent hierarchical swarm-consciousness- so really a "true theocracy" those "individual" hungry-ghosts who try to hang on to their old primate egos will quiclky become disconnected/disharmonius/disentangled from the "Akashic" human network - without opening your structure to be adapted/processed/amplified you would quickly become isolated and useless- then non-existant- an enfoldment into such a God-nexus would not be surrendering your "self" but actualizing your true Will-

		Re: individuality is a natural right posted on 02/18/2003 6:50 PM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	you should start a religion! 8)

		Re: individuality is a natural right posted on 03/29/2003 11:39 PM by Shrike	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Um, this is just wrong on so many levels, I feel I must respond...but where to start? Okay, first let me say that there are a whole lot of folks that I just would not care to "swarm" with. Just because they are all homogonized into one great "god-nexus" consciousness does not at all indicate to me that such an existance would be harmonious. I don't buy into the underlying assumption. Then there is the idea that such a swarm consciousness could possibly be "hierarchical". This would indicate that some of the swarm must be different or separate from the rest and also that this "other" part has some greater significance than the rest. Well, I can't speak for the rest, but that would certainly dis-harmonize me. Oh wait, there is no "me"...me is us. Or we are me. Whatever, it'd still piss me off. And finally, and perhaps most insulting is the bullshit elitist assumption that if one were to choose to retain individuality, that one must then "become isolated and useless". Oops, you failed to recognize something important here; Gods are useless. To have the ultimate power to do anything, essentially removes any value from that which you have done. If one can create or destroy universes on a whim, is doing so "useful"? Not at all. This god-nexus swarm homogeny which you describe would, in fact, be useless. If there were such an orgy of mind-melding, choosing to not share, or choosing to share on some limited level would be equally as valid as choosing to "lose onself in the greater nexus". However, orgies are interesting...would you mind if I just watch?

		Re: individuality is a natural right posted on 05/27/2005 11:40 PM by Spinning Cloud	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Sorry, but I'm with Shrike on this one. I find it absolutely horrid to even think that I would have no private, independent thoughts and actions. Losing all sense of individuality is NOT what want to endure. I don't find any part of that scenario in the least interesting. I'd be as interested in that as I would leaving my door wide open 24/7 for any stranger to walk through and make themselves at home. 'Hive' conciousness is an abomination and I don't see it as a beneficial evolutionary step. I don't understand why you view individuality and privacy the way you obviously do. I find them highly prized aspects of humanity.

		absolute individuality is a lonely death posted on 01/25/2006 10:16 AM by Dan+Demi	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Then there is the idea that such a swarm consciousness could possibly be "hierarchical". The body system has central motivators and desires. It is "the will to power". Shrike, your arguments against this "god-nexus" 'swarm' show that you wish to avoid being dominated or iritated. You live in a town or city, and are surrounded by people. You have a job, you specialize and form a unit in society. We are already a national swarm. Unity would be easier if ignorance was gone. Inhancing the mind and body would naturally reduce ignorance. 'Anger/hate' can be reduced or reprogrammed and they were originally meant for the human to defend his food/teritory. Evolution is oxymoronic, and it took billions of years to ever get anywere, and now technology can start a new form of evolution that is more sociable and friendly.

		Re: absolute individuality is a lonely death posted on 01/27/2006 5:52 PM by Shrike	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	The body system has central motivators and desires. It is "the will to power". Shrike, your arguments against this "god-nexus" 'swarm' show that you wish to avoid being dominated or iritated. You live in a town or city, and are surrounded by people. You have a job, you specialize and form a unit in society. We are already a national swarm. Hrmm - old thread. Anyway, your "analysis" of me is pretty far off-base - which is understandable seeing as how your underlying assumptions are so far off-base. I have lived in towns and cities, but I don't do so as often as I live out of them. I do specialize in some areas, but I also generalize in many many others. I sometimes form a unit in society, but only occasionally. I prefer to solo. As for my arguments "showing" what you claim, you are wrong. I was illustrating the absurdity of the idea that a homogenous swarm would be hierarchical. My personally wishing to avoid being dominated or irritated - even if it were true, which it may or may not be depending on the moment - is irrelevant. What is relevant is that "someone" definately would be dominated or irritated if taking part of that situation which was described in the post to which I replied. Allow me to put it in other terms: Are some parts of a god more godly than others? My position in the post you quoted, was that the concept of some parts of the god, being higher, better, superior (pick one) - is ridiculous. Unity would be easier if ignorance was gone. Inhancing the mind and body would naturally reduce ignorance. 'Anger/hate' can be reduced or reprogrammed and they were originally meant for the human to defend his food/teritory. Evolution is oxymoronic, and it took billions of years to ever get anywere, and now technology can start a new form of evolution that is more sociable and friendly. Unity -might- be easier if ignorance was gone. It's a pretty assumption, but I see no basis of fact from which to draw that conclusion. In fact, I think that the opposite can easily be argued - and backed up by fact. It seems to me that historically, people are far easier to unite - and control - when they are kept ignorant. Religeon is one obvious example of this phenomena. As for technology starting a new form of evolution, I think that's wrong. Evolution is a process of keeping what works and discarding what doesn't. This is a fundamentally different process than man using technology to re-invent himself. Evolution is not based upon planning, engineering is. If man uses technology to achieve homo superior, then that is -not- evolution, that is engineering. One reason why I don't frequent Kurzweil's forums, is that they have such a very high noise to signal ratio. For every well thought out post and defensible opinion, there are dozens, if not hundreds, of posts full of wild flights of fancy and arguments which have no basis. In the future, if replying to a post of mine, please spare me any psycho-babble and try to focus on the actual text of my statements. I do make a serious effort to think through what I say before I type it -at least show me the courtesy of actually thinking about what I've said - a courtesy which I have obviously extended to you.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 11:16 AM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	I detect an either/or assumption here. Currently we are isolated within a single, fragile meat body. The future envisioned by Ray, Natasha, myself, and others along these lines involves an EXPANSION of choices for incarnation. Yes, but the word 'incarnation' says it right there. There is no mind/body split so there is no non-physical mind to escape the physicality of the 'body'. When your are dealing with virtual worlds, or consciousness for that matter, we are dealing with the realm of representation. Representation ALWAYS requires a physical/causal substrate from which to be an emergent property. In the realm of representation it makes no difference whether you are traveling through the simulated 'space' or whether the 'space' is 'traveling' through you. The 'space' of representation is an abstract one. It is not limited by the causality of the real world. Therein lies its representational power and its allure. Why would it be necessary in most cases for the detailed pattern of the mind to physically travel around the world when the experience itself (being a much simpler data-set)is much more easily transfered? Experience is what links us to the 'external' world. It is also the common bond that unites us. Of course we will initially start this process (we have already) by extending our senses and by adopting virtual personas. If we can escape the confines of our brains, we can "roam around" in any number of physical bodies of any kind by downloading or linking, or in any number of virtual bodies. Though I completely agree with you, there is a critical distinction to be made. There is a mind/body dualism inherent in your language (I suspect that is why you used quotes around "roam around"). The mind cannot 'escape the confines of the brain'. There is no deus ex machina. No meat/mind split. No ghost trapped in the machine. The mind is an emergent phenomenon, entirely causally dependent on the physical substrate from which it emerges. The brain/body may be HIGHLY upgraded (this is the 'escape' that you were probably talking about) to the point that the network pattern (wireless or wired) is highly manipulable, evolvable and transferable, but I suspect that when the pattern is copied to the computer for whatever purpose (backup, mind-upgrade simulation, etc.), there will be no need to ever destroy the original evolving physically instantiated data-set. If we have a constant connection to the global matrix then we already would be part of the global computer and yet we would still retain our individuality and mobility. We wouldn't be physically stuck in some imobile data-storage facility somewhere. This individual freedom gives us the ability to be our own local-system administrators, a freedom I would never relinquish. To attain the freedoms that you speak of, the MASSIVE upgrade of the physical substrate itself (brain/body/environment) will be enough to create the direct neural connection to the global/local networks. This direct connection is all that we really need to attain those freedoms through the ubiquitous giga-computers of tomorrow. Far from forsaking a freely roaming body, we would escape the highly confined condition that we have today. I put down some thoughts on this for a conference in Germany in 1997: Thank you for the info Max! Regards, subtillioN

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 11:50 AM by hippocampus	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Dear Max You addressed my point in your article: Too big an alteration in our personality at a time by the machine will break the chain of psychological connectedness and continuity that makes us the same individual over time. (See my The Diachronic Self: Identity, Continuity, Transformation for an extended discussion of this idea.) If we went through the equivalent of a decade of change during our dream experience, then the machine altered us all at once, the discontinuity between the new and the old personalities may be very large. The discontinuity may be large enough that we should say that the original person has ceased to exist, having been replaced by another individual. Perhaps we would not be concerned about this if the machine altered us every few seconds to make our brain structure and body match our experiences. Deciding this issue would require more detailed specification of how the advanced experience machine operates. So long as experiences are being done to us rather than participated in by us, it is hard to make sense of the idea of a continuous personality that integrates changes in personality to form a coherent individual across time. I guess the question then is how extended that transformation time should be, in order to preserve the sense of self. Thanks.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 1:33 PM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	The hormones are simply a slow and imprecise chemical diffusive mechanism of information transfer to produce a global homeostatic effect within the organism. This process could be substituted with a much more precise communication via radio transmissions between stationary or mobile nanobots which would effect the desired 'global' response within the organism.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 7:01 PM by claireatcthisspace	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	You say functions of the brain, I say (have said many years) functions of cognition in relationnto emotion and feelings are paralell to the internal organs (hormones) that are inexplicably related to the brain again. I said (many years ago) How Much Does The Brain Need The Body? I am still saying it. The brain needs to body because it needs habituation procesess, lymbic procesess and many others, but this does not answer my question. My question is/was, how much does the brain need the body in terms of, can an AI robot have any perticular passion for learning like ahuman and can it "want" to learn and does this re awaken our understanding towrds waht it means to be "Intelligent" and "Creative" considering we often do things because we "like" to do so, not because we are programmed to do so. There is a difference in motive. The implicatons are enourmous and it needs "cross fertilisation" of concepts to sort this one. Neuroscience and cognitive science and the boundries that ties up how these relate from the descriptive means to the physical means. Thatt's the hard part. Claire

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/17/2003 7:25 PM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	we often do things because we "like" to do so, not because we are programmed to do so. correct, in a sense, but really we are programmed to like to do certain things.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 12:15 AM by Dimitry V	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Yeah, it's a distinction without a difference.

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 02/18/2003 12:29 AM by subtillioN	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	just different levels of explanation...

		Re: hormonal feedback to brain posted on 06/30/2003 1:18 AM by scubas	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Umm.. I don't I agree yet disagree with that one. Knowing the chemical compositions are sensitive to their function, insulin serves a purpose of it's own, so how we do know how these things work in the system as a whole? what effect does insulin have on the blood to the heart, pancreas, and so on? All in all, it does seem nessecary to build a humanoid robot, but when it comes down to... it sounds like he's on a path to creating a human!!! My god it would be alot simpler for Ray to just have sex to create one by golly.

		Re: Human Body Version 2.0 posted on 02/17/2003 12:07 PM by jasgoss	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	This sounds great but it leaves one question open. How do you adapt mankind to such striking renovations in technology. The FDA can't get anything done in under a decade so even if we have the technology we can't use it yet. I see the AI movement like an army striving towards a common goal. The technologists are making great strides in their area but what are the lawyers, politicians, philosophers, and psychologists doing to prepare humanity for these innovations? If these steps aren't set into motion early-on then how are we going to see the culmination of any of this technology in our lifetimes?

		Re: Human Body Version 2.0 posted on 03/25/2003 7:12 AM by JoeFrat	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	There is a simple sollution to this: Tell your friends.

		How about hair? posted on 02/17/2003 3:01 PM by Physically_Tormented	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Please tell me that, with all this awesome technology, we'll be able to wipe our scalps clean to get rid of unwanted hairfollicles (from oh, say, a botched hairtransplant), and that we will be able to initiate an entire set of new follicles that form as nature would form them in an unborn baby, with a natural direction, except this time with the genetics we want them to... All this talk is always about organs that we need to survive. But if Primo bodies are sex-changable, then surely you can get to delete and initiate whole new hairdo's, right? Maybe I should forward this idea to Natasha Vita-More... Why must life be so painful? Why can't I have been born in 2020? God I hate life at present time... *sigh*

		Re: How about hair? posted on 02/19/2003 3:18 PM by Physically_Tormented	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Somebody who has knowledge on tissue-engineering, etc... PLEASE tell me hair won't be an issue in the future. I'm dying with mental agony here. Every second of every day is a constant hell for me.

		Re: How about hair? posted on 03/25/2003 7:18 AM by JoeFrat	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	I don't think hair is an issue today. If i see a bald person i don't judge them any different from anyone else. As for the opposite sex, some women like men with bald heads some don't. But i am pretty sure that within 15 years they dermatologists will have the problem solved:-).

		Re: How about hair? posted on 03/25/2003 10:21 AM by grantcc	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	I'm dying with mental agony here. Every second of every day is a constant hell for me. Why are you doing that to yourself?

		Re: Human Body Version 2.0 posted on 02/17/2003 5:37 PM by Thomas Kristan	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	It is a possible and feasible - no doubt about. But a small device, already indicated as Metabrain on the primo body design, may change the whole story, shall overturn the outcome. Until you have a physical body, the paste of time is quite dictated by this body. Unless you don't want to boil the river you swim in, you must go quite slow. Maybe a million times slower, than the Metabrain permits you to. Therefore, between the two swimming moves, you may want to go on a vacations - mentally. To swim inside some virtual river, where the paste of time is much more suitable for your speedy Metabrain. The avatar body and the strong virtuality river are also - quite much better. So, the best idea is, to dock your primo body to some computornium. Be cause you don't want to go back - ever. From the most pleasant strong virtuality, back to the physical reality? I think not. The exchange rate for the time may also be drastic. A year in the SV - or a minute in a reality, as we know. Also, the energy you are spending for a minute of a "real swimming", may holds for billions of years, of swimming over there. Body design 2 - may not be more, than a very short passage. - Thomas

		Re: Human Body Version 2.0 posted on 05/28/2005 12:00 AM by Spinning Cloud	[Top] [Mind·X] [Reply to this post]
	Well I like to swim...no I love swimming. But I don't see how virtual swimming would be anything close to the real thing. I free dive and love the infinite variations of the swells through the California kelp beds, prying abalone f