The Year is Almost Over

An Unwise Experiment

"What question would you ask me, so that you would know it was me?"

Late one evening as I returned to my hotel, the concierge gave me the letter that I had been expecting. It was a typically verbose reply from my school friend Lambert Woff, the professor of neuroscience. After I read it, I began to wonder if I may have changed the course of scientific history.

Dear Blutter,

Yes, of course I would be delighted to have you stay with me when you come to Stuttgart! In fact I have some news that should interest you. I don't know if you'll remember, but some years ago when I visited you, we had a long conversation about brain cell replacement, specifically the progressive replacement of neurons with artificial cells, capable of acting in precisely the same way as the originals. Do you remember? We imagined cells constructed of radio valves or something similar, replaced slowly one by one, and talked about what effect this might have on the consciousness and identity of the subject. It is actually a popular thought experiment amongst scientists that has come to be known as the 'philosophical zombie debate'. One view is that the substituted neurons could process the perception of the environment and subsequently act in every way the same as the original organism, yet there may no longer be any self awareness or sense of identity that lives there. I frequently pose this question to undergraduates, and always receive a fascinating variety of responses. Well, most of them are stupid, but some are interesting. Now I hope you don't mind me saying, but you are often of value to me when we have our discussions, because you are a sensible fellow, yet you have no scientific training. This occasionally makes you able to give quite insightful input into our discussions without your thoughts being polluted by the biases of common opinions among researchers and undergraduates today.

I believe your guess at the time was that for a zombie to control itself it must be aware of itself, and that no loss of any type of self awareness would be possible in order to perform an exact simulation of the original person, so once the substitution process was complete, there would be no obvious reason why the subject couldn't continue living in the normal way with an artificial brain, although I seem to remember you guessing that the practicalities of the idea would come with huge potential for unpredictable complications.

In some way I suppose I must have seen this as a challenge, or perhaps a desire to celebrate our long friendship, or possibly a trust in your judgement that wasn't very wise. About the time we had this discussion, the technology in the field of serotonin offset and antibody containment electrolysis was beginning to progress rapidly. To cut a long story short, within a few years it became possible using the process to perform exactly the experiment we talked about. Unfortunately the technology became available, but, strange to say, no sane participants were prepared to be the first subject.

But the more I thought about it, the more benefits to mankind that this technology could provide occurred to me. Transfer of consciousness, replication of life experience, accelerated learning... the possibilities were endless. A subject had to be found. At last, after much deliberation, I decided it had to be me.

The process is only similar in overall concept to the idea. Of course there are no technicians replacing the tiny bits of brain with radio valves, one by one. There are a number of operations that take about three days each, and they involve extremely slow injections of artificial plasma carrying genetically programmed cells into the brain, then a monitoring process which often takes some weeks before the next injection can begin. At this stage I have had nine operations, and it is predicted that I will have twelve to fourteen more.

As you predicted, there have been strange complications. Do you remember Mister Wilson at school? He told us he was taking colloidal silver as a health remedy for something, I can't remember what. Then he turned a sort of mauve colour. Remember? How it never went away? How much we laughed? Well, unfortunately that's me now. Also, my head is a noticeably different shape. But it's a bit like Macbeth - I'm too far gone now, and I have to keep wading to the other side. We believe the neuronal replacement will only be temporary, as normal tissue regeneration will replace the artificial network within a few years. Let's hope I don't look like that Nosferatu chap by then.