Some Questions About Our Body-Free Future

I’ve been an indoors person almost my whole life and so the idea of tech surpassing our biology has always appealed to me, but what many see at the end of this road – the mind upload – just leaves me with questions.

So, I wanted to take this opportunity to explore some of those questions about the mind upload – maybe you’ve had the same questions, maybe you’ve got answers!

For those who are unfamiliar, the concept is pretty aptly named – uploading your mind to some storage device that can allow your consciousness to continue in a new form. 

Ideally, this has been described by smarter people as being able to periodically have your mind backed-up digitally (maybe while you sleep) so that if, god forbid, you don’t make it home one day – your consciousness could be booted up and loaded into whatever you want (perhaps a smart home?).

And while your family may never notice the difference, this is where my first, most obvious question comes up:

That’s not “me”, is it? 

This one is the real deal-breaker for me, so I’m just going to get it out of the way now – that’s just some copy of me.exe, right? Like, if I copy a file from one drive to another and delete the original, it’s still been deleted. 

If we’re talking about abandoning our bodies, I think we need to be clear on if your personal conscious experience and your physical body are a package deal. Remember, this isn’t a brain-in-a-jar situation. We’re talking about a sophisticated copy/paste job here.

All this is to say I find it hard enough to be responsible for the me I can control – I’d hate to be responsible for a “me” that I wouldn’t “be”. Especially a “me” running on some low-tier hardware, which brings me to my next question.

What do the mundanities of the body-free future even look like?

As for many, tech has always been a fascination of mine. I like the fast graphics and the big numbers.

I try and keep up with this stuff, so it sucks that when I think about replacing body parts with tech parts or finding the right quantum-drive for my mind-upload, I have to also consider the current tech landscape and that’s when I start getting real worried.

Healthcare is something a lot of people struggle with as is. I don’t think I’d like to add the current tech culture of scalpers, rushed products and anti-consumer practices to the process.

When my robot-replica gets hit on the head and a stick of brain-ram goes loose, will my great grandkids have to pay for a whole new brain-board because “the cost of repair is nearly as much as a new one”?

And what’re my great grandkids doing with a copy of me inside a robot dog or a Roomba anyhow?

Maybe they’ve just put the copy of me on a server in their “spare room” or on some monthly subscription model like in that TV show, or will I just spend eternity in that great big Fortnite match in the sky?

The bigger questions of longevity in such a scenario boggle the mind, but it also brings into focus perhaps the most important question for those still hankerin’ for a mind upload.

Who do you trust building your mind machine?

Our relationship with tech companies and their products as a species is one of the most powerful cultural shapers of the past few decades. Through their services and products, we’ve been enabled and emboldened to express ourselves and connect, for better and for worse, yada yada yada.

What’s odd about this relationship though, is that despite how much we all use this tech, we lie to each other about it – like we’re embarrassed.

Many use platforms specifically to denounce the use of said platform – and here’s the thing – this stuff is happening anyhow, we’re doing it.

That last clip is from Neuralink, Elon Musk’s company dedicated to creating neural implants (presumably in the shape of an X) to better map, improve and possibly copy the brain – do you see a day where you’ll be ready to put one of Elon’s products in your skull?

While convenience has earned tech a seemingly irreplaceable role in our lives, I think that for us to safely continue down this road to a body-free future, more than convenience will need to be on offer.

Or at least that’s what I’d like to think. There’s this dull voice in my head though – reminding me that, in reality, people like toys, don’t like missing out and are famously bad at thinking past their soon-to-be-robotic noses.

Let’s both hope I’m wrong.

-Branden Mayer