| > That also means the the brain could be copied Unfortunately, no, it doesn't, because there is no way we can "read" a brain. "Reading" tiny parts of a brain is possible, but requires destruction of a lot of other parts. We have billions of neurons, and each neuron has connections to thousands of other neurons, and all of that is mashed together in a lump of gray mass. Scientists today can map the structure of a handful of neurons in a single brain. A typical procedure might involve perfusing the organism with a chemical that plastifies the brain, and then cutting slices out of the brain. Besides the fact that these mappings are just tiny 2D recordings of a tiny sliver of the full 3D brain, they are not precise enough to actually simulate the neurons. The connections between Neurons, the synapses, are so tiny that you need extremely complicated microscopes to see them, and you have to be fast because the light from the microscope actually destroys what you are looking at... And, of course, the mice these brains come from will have some genetic modification that makes their cells phosporescent so you can see parts of them better. |