Upload My Mind for Another Lifetime

One of the things I’ve lately lamented is that all my memories and experiences will simply be lost and vanish when I die.

I am trying for some immortality with my books, blog, and podcasts. Also, I’ve said in the past that my students are my legacy, though that technically expires in one generation. What good is my Wikipedia entry if no one ever accesses it? We’re back to my life being erased.

I understand science is holding out hope for this. The idea that we could upload our consciousness to a computer has been explored both in science fiction films and in scientific literature. Ray Kurzweil has suggested it might be possible by 2045, although I believe I recently saw a headline that suggested 2030. Sooner would be nice; my mind will be 73 or 88, depending on those two dates, and who knows what of my mind I might lose by then.

Thinking about this for a moment, I also wonder: What would it be like to have one’s consciousness as a Ghost in a Machine? Would thought processes continue in the same way? Could I continue to learn, reading texts, listening to audio, and watching videos that are stored digitally on the internet? Would it take time, or would that be an instantaneous process—in which case I would devour all human knowledge available on the internet, and then be bored for eternity, or at least until the electricity runs out. And then what? Is my consciousness released into the cosmos?

My personal belief system suggests that my consciousness lives on after death, and I also hold that reincarnation makes the best sense for an afterlife. Would locking one’s consciousness in a computer prevent reincarnation? Maybe that’s a good idea, seeing where the world is going? Or could I, as an AI, help shape the future to better mankind? That might be a better alternative than being born again in a possibly bad situation.

Food for thought. Or fodder for a science fiction story. Feel free to contact me for the rights!