I found this article interesting, not so much for what it is, but what I think it will eventually lead to. Without having to lose your eye. I think in the not so distant future, you will have the ability, with the help of technology, to record your entire life. Downloadable to your personal library available for review and study at your convenience. This technology will be completely un-obtrusive and will be standard operating equipment on any human. If I had unlimited capital, I'd invent it myself. Here's the article and link: http://tech.yahoo.com/news/nm/20090305/tc_nm/us_eyeborg Filmmaker plans "Eyeborg" eye-socket camera (Reuters) * Posted on Thu Mar 5, 2009 12:38PM EST "BRUSSELS (Reuters) - A Canadian filmmaker plans to have a mini camera installed in his prosthetic eye to make documentaries and raise awareness about surveillance in society. Rob Spence, 36, who lost an eye in an accident as a teen-ager, said his so-called Project Eyeborg is to have the camera, a battery and a wireless transmitter mounted on a tiny circuit board. http://www.eyeborgblog.com/ "Originally the whole idea was to do a documentary about surveillance. I thought I would become a sort of super hero ... fighting for justice against surveillance," Spence said. "In Toronto there are 12,000 cameras. But the strange thing I discovered was that people don't care about the surveillance cameras, they were more concerned about me and my secret camera eye because they feel that is a worse invasion of their privacy." Spence, in Brussels to appear at a media conference, said no part of the camera would be connected to his nerves or brain. He does not intend to create a reality TV show and the camera will be switched off when not needed, he said. "I don't want to go into a locker room. I don't want to show the world me going to the bathroom either ... I'm not a life-caster and I don't plan to be one," he said." (Reporting by Bate Felix; Editing by Louise Ireland)
http://www.ctraces.com/Circuit_Traces/CT1_4/physics.html Interesting stuff. This book explores the possibilities proposed by your first paragraph re: downloading personalities. The numbers it uses for support of its theme are really far flung, but if you like that sort of thing this is the ultimate ...to the point where it enables us, in the end, to meet God.
Interesting stuff Omega. In theory the construct would make sense simply because of Moore's law and the passage of time, looking at it from a completely common sense point of view. If a movie like "The Matrix" can blur the mind for a minute, imagine just a million years of exponential computational power. Did you read the book? Sounds quite technical. Care to expound on the subject as it seems to be of high interest to you? Funny, all this time I equated your name with Charleton Heston, only to Wiki it and find out how close to God and it's subject matter within this book, it really is. Then it goes full circle back to Charleton Heston and his portrayal of spiritual or Godlike beings. Hmmm...
Perhaps, as technologies catch up, possibly packaging and selling those life "events"? Provided they are interesting of course. Man, I have a livid experience of a pineapple chunk and a certain female anatomical par... Nevermind. Total Recall (which I happened to think was ahead of it's time) anyone?
I admit I plagierized the name from the book. Not important though. The guy with the camera for an eye is something thats always been fun to elaborate on, when you consider all the electronics that could be interfaced with carbon based life. Like becoming a cell phone, stereo, telescope, microscope etc etc etc. ...and its going to happen. Just fished the book out, haven't touched it for 5-10 years. Its way over my head with equations I don't have a clue about. Like the link said theres an appendix for scientists in the back with things like chaos in quantum mechanics explained ...yea right. Tipler is authoritative, he has to be. How easy would it be ridicule what he proposes if he couldn't out account for his theory with anyone who tried. Some confident journalist might try to have fun at his expense but with his command of science he could just explain to him what he isn't educated enough to understand about the theory. Its so far flung, he accounts for every atom in the universe, every possible personality will be emulated just from accounting for all the possible combinations of neuronal patterns in a brain -that is what he says will be you or me or us. And that is what will populate the entire universe ...eventually. I admit I didn't get thru the whole book because it just sent my relatively illiterate head spinning after I got half way. You rekindled my interest in it though ...thanks.
Well, after falling in the rabbit hole which is the proposition of "Simulated Reality" and many of it's sub-sets, my brain just puked out of my head and onto my desk... what a mind fuck. Thanks Omega, thanks a lot... One point. It was theorized that a planet-sized computer of the future would have the computational ability to fully simulate "reality". Fine and dandy but our brains as of this moment already can do this (dreams), albeit with degrees of believability, in a much smaller package. I'm sure all of us have had dreams where we were aware (used) of all 5 senses. Nor here nor there.
Theres a theory that reality IS a giant computer the component parts of which are all the atoms in the universe ...who am I to say. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism Heres a link to compliment the reality sim speculations. Ever hear of 'Lucid Dreaming' where, with practise, you can control where your dreams go?
Looks like I'm gonna be up for while. Lucid Dreams... checking into it. "... and the green grass grew all around and the green grass grew all around..."