"...man does not live by reason alone, and the times to come would try men's souls." (62, p. 524)
Thus, Poul Anderson misquotes a Biblical passage, deliberately, then quotes Tom Paine accurately.
(Van Rijn referred to times that fry men's souls.)
Demeter Mother uses the map of Anson Guthrie's genome to grow a new young adult male body and downloads into its brain enough of download Guthrie's memories to reproduce Guthrie's identity. Then, since Demeter Mother incorporates downloads of Kyra and Eiko, she combines their DNAs to produce a female body into which she downloads her memories. This new being is Demeter Daughter.
In Chapter 63, Anson and Demeter Daughter have a six-year old son, Noburu. Demetrians will be moved to Isis at 82 Eridani and to Amaterasu at Beta Hydri, some as suspends but many as downloads that will later be transferred into new living bodies. Each colonized planet will have a new Life Mother and even planets of bare rock will be terraformed: a future full of life.
11 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Ha! I thought of that too, Old Nick talking somewhere of times that would FRY men's souls!
Fascinating as the HARVEST OF STARS books are, I really can't buy things like the downloading of human personalities into either artificial neural nets or new organic bodies. I am slightly less sure of the implausibility of AIs not being possible. And I find the idea of cloning least implausible of all, because that has been proven!
I simply wish the cloning of new limbs or organs for humans who need them was further along.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
What is certain is that any artifact that duplicates the functions of the brain will be conscious. What is not yet certain is whether such an artifact can be made.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Here, I agree, with me stressing somewhat more skepticism on whether AIs are possible.
Ad astra! Sean
If one material object can do X, it's highly probable that another can do it.
But it is the organism as a whole that is conscious so I think that an artificial neural network will have to function as the brain of an artificial body.
Kaor, Paul!
But many humans survived without loss of consciousness despite losing amazingly large parts of their bodies. Or think of fictional, nonhuman examples like the Merseian cyborg spy Dwyr the Hook in ENSIGN FLANDRY.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
But maybe to become conscious a brain has to interact with an environment as part of a central nervous system.
Paul.
People who suffer complete paralysis - with no sensory input from their bodies - don’t lose the capacity for consciousness, nor do those who lose as much body tissue as you can without dying.
Conversely, brain damage -does- impact consciousness.
Occam’s Razor suggests therefore that the brain is the seat of consciousness.
Consciousness is centered/located/generated in the brain but is also a subject-object relationship so I think that the brain becomes conscious by functioning as part of an organism interacting with an environment. An artificially maintained but isolated brain would have nothing to be conscious of.
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: But that still does not change the fact of unfortunates living without loss of consciousness despite losing disturbingly large portions of their bodies. So I agree with Stirling that the brain is the seat of the mind/consciousness/personality/soul of a human being.
And I am not so sure a human brain, removed from its body artificially maintained by life support systems, will lose consciousness. Not if that brain was aware of its surroundings and somehow able to process data and interact with them. A grotesque and appalling existence, but still EXISTING.
Mr. Stirling: I forget the technical term, but there a few rare infants tragically born without brains. If I'm recalling correctly, they die within one or two days of birth. And that supports your argument: loss of or severe damage to the brain does affect consciousness.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
A brain removed from a body would have no sense-organs to give it awareness of its surroundings but, if it remained active, it would retain memories of previous experiences.
Try to imagine an artificial neural network or brain that had never had any sensory input. It would have nothing to perceive, remember or be conscious of. But that consciousness when it does get started is centered in the brain is not in dispute.
Paul.
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