Wouldn’t it be great to know that there is life after death and heaven exists? Believe it or not, scientists are actually working on technology that may someday function as a kind of heaven. Now, all we that is left for us is just to stay alive until it’s ready, and maybe start asking: Do we really want to live forever?
The history of heaven
If there is one thing that hasn’t changed throughout the history of humanity it’s death. While life expectancy may have increased dramatically and many plagues and diseases have been completely eliminated, we all still have to face the fact that one day we will die.
Because facing death is such a challenge, men came up with the ultimate solution: the afterlife. According to this concept, each individual has a unique invisible part like a soul or spirit containing our stream of consciousness, and while our physical body may someday die, this part will continue to exist.
The afterlife played an important role in an ancient Egyptian religion, and its belief system is one of the earliest known in recorded history. Many religions that came later like Christianity and Islam, have used the fear of death as a mean of control. According to them, if you won’t do what you are been told, you will be punished when you die and sent to hell and vice versa - if you do what you are been told, you will be rewarded and get to heaven.
The death goes only one way. Therefore, nobody really knows if heaven exists, but with its many references on pop-culture we all have a pretty good idea about it: a place with no time or space limits, where you can do anything you want. So, if we all know what’s heaven all about, why not to build it?
The Connectome
The Human Connectome Project (HCP) is one of the most ambitious projects in the history of mankind. The goal of this project is to build a "network map" (connectome) by using a combination of non-invasive imaging technologies, including fMRI, functional MRI, MEG and EEG, in order to shed light on the anatomical and functional connectivity within the healthy human brain. Eventually, the goal of the project is to create a comprehensive data base of all the neurons of the brain and their synaptic connections.
The idea for this mapping was directly inspired by the success of the Human Genome Project, which was declared complete in April 2003, and so the HCP was launched in July 2009. The HCP will probably take a few more years if not decades to be complete, as there is a challenge in handling the large numbers: while the number of base-pairs in the human genome is 109, the human cerebral cortex alone contains on the order of 1010, neurons linked by 1014 synaptic connections. Nevertheless, the potential of this project is so great that many people are already starting to fantasize about its implementations.
The main purpose of the HCP is to find cure for all sorts of brain disorders like dyslexia, autism, Alzheimer's disease, and schizophrenia. This explains why it is funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). But this project can open the door for even greater revolution: mapping the saturation of our brains could be the first step toward the possibility that one day we could transplant our consciousness.
Mind transplantation
Mind transplantation (AKA “mind uploading”, “brain emulation”, or “mind transfer”) it a theoretical process in which a particular brain is scanned and all of its data, including long-term memory and "self", is copied to a computer. The computer can then run a simulation model of the brain's information processing in such a way that it would respond in the same way as the original brain, and experience that it has a conscious mind.
The idea that mind transplantation can be achieved is based on philosophical thesis of physicalism which assumes that that "everything is physical", and that there is "nothing beyond" physical. From the physicalist point of view, our psychic experiences do not stem from our soul or spirit but are simply a product of the activity of neurons and synapses in the brain. And so, according to this theory, all we need is exactly what the Connectome provides.
Elon Musk is probably the most famous entrepreneur of this new emerging field. His startup Neuralink is developing technology that will enable the integrating of the human brain with artificial intelligence. While the company has never officially stated that one of its goals is to develop a mind transplantation, it is very likely that one day it will consider this possibility.
Another lesser known billionaire who likes to invest in crazy new technologies is the Russian entrepreneur, Dmitry Itskov. In 2011, Itskov founded the 2045 Initiative – a non-profit organization that aims to “create technologies that enable the transfer of an individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality.”
Who wants to live forever?
The target date for the 2045 initiative is, well, the year 2045… This is the year that Ray Kurzweil, the most famous futurist, predicts the singularity – the moment when, according to Kurzweil, man will integrate with machines. Kurzweil believes that whoever live up to that moment will reach eternal life, for with we can live forever. Kurzweil, now over 70, is very eager to get to this point which is why he takes 100 nutritional pills a day and spend more than a million dollars a year on it.
But what about people who dream of eternal life but don’t believe they can survive another 25 years, either because they are very old or because they suffer from a deadly disease that has no cure now? Moreover – what if mind uploading technology is not ready by 2045, but only years later?
A startup called Nectome offers a solution: they’ve developed a special technique, known as aldehyde-stabilized cryopreservation, that uses special chemical cocktail that can preserve the brain and all the neural connections within it. So theoretically, your brain and your consciousness can preserve for hundreds or even thousands of years. The only catch is that you will have to technically die during the reservation process. This fact didn’t stop dozens of people, including the entrepreneur and investor Sam Altman, from paying a $10,000 deposit to join its waiting list.
Heaven’s door
If the day comes and we can transplant our consciousness into the computer, there is a good chance that the experience will be very similar to what we call heaven. Time and space won’t play any major factor as we won’t have any physical restraints, we can do anything we want, there won’t be any pain or illness, and most importantly – we can live there forever.
But this this artificial heaven will have one major advantage over the “ordinary heaven”: people can communicate from it. While many people nay believe that there is heaven, no documented message has yet been received from it. In contrast, the futuristic artificial heaven will allow several means of communications between the people of this world and the people of heaven: from a simple chat, to a complex synthesize voice call. Virtual reality can even allow people from both worlds to meet, almost face to face. The potential of this is incredible – even death won’t separate people a part.
As for the decision to end life and enter heaven – well, there’s a good chance that we won’t have to make this kind of choice. In the future we can just save our brain data every day when we go to sleep, so if God forbid something happens to us and we will die, we will still save.
The thin line between heaven and hell
It is important to remember that the concept of mind transplantation is still in its very early stages and there is much that we really don’t know: Can people live without a body? Can our consciousness exist on a computer? What is consciousness?
While in many areas of life men are starting to play the role of God, perhaps when it comes to dealing with the mind and consciousness, we need to draw the line. After all, even if our intentions are good, there is a still a chance that the heaven that we build will turn out to be hell.
Conclusion
In his 1986 song, Freddie Mercury asked “Who Wants to Live Forever?". At that time, this question was purely theoretical. 4 years after his death, Queen’s latest album, Made in Heaven”, was released. Given the rapid pace of technological development, perhaps the first person that will live forever and will be able to make things from heaven has already been born.
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