Could scientists upload an animal brain to a computer? The answer to this depends on what you mean by 'upload' and 'brain'. If you're a little free and easy on both, then it's been done already.
Caenorhabditis elegans is a tiny little worm that lives in soil and rotting vegetation. It’s a multicellular eukaryotic organism, so it technically counts as an animal.
This little worm never grows to more than 1mm (0.03in) long and is one of the best-known creatures on the planet.
We have sequenced its genome and mapped the development of every one of its 2,000 or so cells – including its 300 neurons. There’s little variation in the worm, and what variation there is has been mapped as well.
So, scientists have been able to model the entirety of its brain in a computer – which not only shows the same reflexive behaviours as the real thing, it can even be trained to do a couple of new tricks too, such as balancing a virtual pole (yes, really).
But if we become a little pickier about our definitions, then this doesn’t quite cut it.
The simulated C. elegans brain was not uploaded from a real one – it was copied from data gathered from years of experiments on thousands of worms. There wasn’t a way to record the thoughts or memories of one individual creature and upload them correctly into a computer.
There are a lot of people who believe brain uploading is the future of the human race: an ‘inevitable consequence’ of our current research in neuroscience and artificial intelligence (AI), the ultimate way to cheat death.
But there are some serious difficulties to overcome before that happens.
If our minds are entirely composed of and constructed by the physical cells and chemicals in our skulls and nervous system, we’ll somehow have to read the state of the brain in perfect detail.
Then we’ll have to create a software model that reproduces the behaviour of the brain down to molecular, or probably atomic, accuracy.
More than a decade ago, scientists showed that it was possible to identify neurons and their connectivity in a carefully prepared piece of mouse brain. After careful staining, it was sliced into layers 70 nanometres thick, and a computer reconstructed the 3D form. Needless to say, the mouse didn’t survive.
This is an example of destructive scanning – the method that many suggest will be necessary to record the brain in sufficient detail. A brain can’t survive the scan.
Some argue that as medical scanners achieve higher and higher resolution, one day we may be able to scan the state of every cell without destroying them. But such a scan would have to be instantaneous, otherwise one part of the brain could already be thinking something new before the scan was fully complete.
Could it be performed on a recently deceased brain? Scientists have suggested that we may need to scan the brain while it’s actively working in order to ensure the modelled behaviours of every cell are correct.
Today’s computers are amazing, but even the most optimistic futurists still predict a wait of a hundred years or so before we could simulate the required atomic levels.
And then there’s a final difficult question. If in 500 years it becomes possible to upload your brain non-destructively… in the instant after it happens, two yous would exist.
A you existing in the virtual world of computer software. And the original you, still thinking with your wetware, perhaps with a slight headache after the scans.
But if you’re still alive, did you really cheat death? Clearly not. Instead, you’ve made it possible for anyone to take virtual-you, make copies and use you for anything they want. Sounds terrifying.
This article is an answer to the question (asked by Darcie Walsh, Preston) 'Could scientists upload an animal brain to a computer?'
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