[OscarCunningham]

Lightning strikes don't wipe people's personalities. Also during epileptic seizures people's neurons fire in abnormal ways, but then return to normal afterwards. So I'd say that the RAM isn't critical; humans can boot from disk.

[workthrowaway]

> humans can boot from disk

wow, this is so intriguing. i like this analogy even if i don't know how accurate it is.

we indeed have things that we forget (running out of space?) and things that take time to remember (disk latency).

[jobigoud]

We also probably have things that we forget/block/deny but are still there somewhere underneath, reachable only if we are put in the correct psychological conditions.

Like how deleting files doesn't properly wipe out the bits and with the right tools you can still recover deleted info.

[jagger27]

Forgetting things is more like a lost pointer.

[navaati]

> humans can boot from disk

Now I want to read a sci-fi book with this sentence in it.

[TheSpiceIsLife]

Alter Carbon:

A key concept in Netflix's cyberpunk series Altered Carbon is the 'stack', an advanced hard drive installed on the brainstem on which a person can save a copy of their consciousness. The main effect of stack technology is a form of immortality, because a stack can be installed into another body if the original body dies. But there’s another a major implication only hinted at during the first season of Altered Carbon: If you could choose your own body, would you go with the one you were born with? That's an especially important question for gender fluid or transgender people. The topic was only hinted at in the first season, but Altered Carbon creator Laeta Kalogridis told The Wrap it's something she would like to explore in greater detail.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altered_Carbon_(TV_series)#The...

[tehlike]

I would also be curious about the impact of the divergence of branches. Like in git forks or branches diverging

This would be the perfect research testbed for human psychology and intelligence. Do something, compare with exact but unmodified state.

[heavyset_go]

ECT is notorious for "wiping" the last ~6 months of memories from patients that undergo that type of treatment.

[dmos62]

There are some documentations of incarnation and related phenomenon, ranging from anecdotal to quite convincing. So I'd say that the disk might not be critical; humans maybe can boot from network.