New Rule, No Dying

Neural Scanning

Scan Complete!

In a future where human technology has improved, overcoming the classical challenges faced by mankind, such as limited resources, food, shelter, and land. One challenge, probably the most traumatic and philosophical human challenge, death, has also been technologically overcome. As the reader may know, this is not as straightforward as bringing people back to life, and therefore offers many more challenges, especially of the moral nature, to be addressed.

As the technology for consciousness reanimation came into play the majority of the secularists have taken adoption of this technology. Now most people using the re instantiation, use it in the way it was designed to be implemented, but there are a few pushing the limits and overusing the technology to push physical limits, or perform reckless tasks.

And on with our story about how once consciousness is capable of being backed up, people start taking greater risks, and the side effects associated with these activities.

---- In a future, yet to be determined ----

“Hey Fred!”, asked a voice from down the corridor several paces behind.

Fred spun around to see who it was. As if seeing a ghost Fred replies, “oh, hey Johnny. Didn’t know that was you…. Haven’t seen you in a bit... How have you been?”.

“Good. Just finished up my last final, and more importantly I was cleared a few days ago for another re instantiation!”, said Johnny.

“Huh, what do you mean cleared? Didn’t your last death traumatize a young group of children on a playground?”, Fred asks in disbelief.

“Well, that is what I am told.. But I talked with my father, and he got it all straightened out for me”, said Johnny as his face lights up in a smile that is definitely Johnny. A face that was most likely reconstructed weeks ago using his latest scan. The ability to 3D print flesh is not a new one, but as it is being used to construct more and more of the body in sometimes deadly accidents it has become a creepy use of the technology. Where it used to be used mainly for reconstructing critical organs, it is now being used to reconstruct entire bodies.

Fred is still in a haze after seeing his friend. He hasn’t seen his friend since Johnny died. Weird to even think that someone you know, who was dead could weeks later be standing in front of you and have the audacity to say,“So what do you think, skydiving?”. Johnny’s grin lit up a bit more upon asking this.

“Huh”, Fred says coming out of his daze.

“Want to go sky diving tomorrow?”, asked Johnny again with a huge smile on his face. This had the effect needed to bring Fred to his senses. He thought out a somewhat appropriate response to his friends query.

“Well, last time, when your chute didn’t open… it not only scared those kids who were playing on the ground.. but I was pretty shaken up about it as well. And I know you insist on no redundancy and packing your own parachute because of the ability to re instantiate...”, Fred looks away from Johnny. This is the first time he has seen Johnny since that horrible incident. Truthfully he has been avoiding Johnny, because this is not the first reckless death Johnny has suffered. In the past there were adrenaline junkies, and now it seems that those types of people have become death junkies.

Johnny looks at Fred and realizing that Fred is right. “Yeah, sorry man. I just thought it would be a good way to celebrate the end of finals and all.”

“Johnny, I just can’t handle that situation again. I have been with you three out of the last five times that you… well, that you DIED man! That is getting hard to explain to your parents, and my parents, along with the authorities.”

“Fred, I tell the authorities and everyone else that you are not complicate in those situations”, says Johnny, who is visually more at ease, sensing that Fred is ready to give in.

Johnny has been taking more risks over the last 8 years, but overall he was always pretty careless and reckless as a kid growing up. “And, yes, I have taken more risks since when we were kids growing up together, but maybe the first time it happened… maybe they shouldn’t have brought me back.”

Johnny is referring to a jump he had taken off of an old highway bridge. They had jumped off this bridge several times before, and the water was just deep enough. As a precaution the boys would always check to make sure no snags or logs were below the spot where they landed. This particular time though, Johnny had just gotten his first neural backup and was anxious to jump in the water.

Johnny came from a more progressive family where new technologies were more readily put to use. His parents knew that he was in a higher risk category than most children his age, so they enrolled him in a program for neural backup.

This isn’t the first time that Johnny has taken a fatalist view on his first death. Fred has heard this story to many times, and starts, “No Johnny, thats not it. You were in such as hurry to jump that day, and you wouldn’t let us check it out first. The worst is that you cited the neural backup you just had, and said, ‘hey, whats the worst that can happen!’”. Now Johnny looked away. He does not remember these details. Over the years the story was relayed to him enough times where he can fill in the memory gaps as though there, but his memories all have gaps from one neural backup to whenever he needs to be re instantiated. This leaves Johnny with 5 gaps in his personal time line where his memories are permanently lost.

Fred continues looking at his friend, and starts to think if the technology is really capable of flawless consciousness restoration, or if the Johnny he is seeing is but a dimmer glimpse every time he undergoes the procedure.

The first time Johnny died was the most traumatic event for Fred and the other boys out swimming that day. It was traumatic for Johnny too, although he does not remember the experience. When Johnny hit the water nothing seemed out of the ordinary. It was only moments later when the water calmed and Johnny did not resurface that the boys began to panic. The murky water proved hard enough to find him in, and the snag was so thick that the boys had to wait for adults to come to recover what remained of Johnny.

Seeing Johnny several weeks later in school was a hard shock to Fred and the other boys. Just because death had been overcome did not mean that the significance was dulled into obsolescence. Johnny did not seem to be himself at this juncture, but after a few more weeks the gang was back together.

Fred came back to life after remembering that tragic incident. “Johnny, do you mind if we walk an talk? I have one more exam across campus to get to.”

“You still have exams? I am just here turning in some assignments I had a delay due to medical leave.” Fred looked displeased at this statement. Johnny had always managed to get medical extensions on his school work even though his incidents were ultimately deemed self inflicted.

“Yes, well, only one more to go”, said Fred as he guided Johnny in the direction of his exam. The two boys began to walk, and Fred took note on what a beautiful day it happened to be. He was looking forward to being done with school and starting his summer job in a few weeks. Fred began speaking again once they were on course to his next exam. “So about the skydiving. I think I am going to pass this time. I just made some other plans between now and starting my job for the summer. We are getting the family together up at the old lake house for a week. What do you have planned for this summer anyway?”

“Just getting caught up on things really. I am going to take a few classes here in order to get caught up on my studies, but other than that, no real plans”, said Johnny, who is momentarily distracted by a group of cute girls walking by. Johnny turns his head to watch them walk by, and more quietly says to Fred,”life sure is pretty!”.

Fred smiles, giving a glance back and approving nod, but does not slacken his pace. Johnny is the type of guy who can draw this conversation well into the start of his exam if he doesn’t keep him moving.

“Fred, I was thinking. I know you probably don’t want to go skydiving after what happened, but I will let you pack my chute this time”, he says this glancing sideways to look at Fred's reaction.

Fred more or less rolls his eyes and looks perturbed at this statement. “you know johnny”, he starts,”You let me pack the first 3 flights we took, then on the 4^th and 5^th you insisted on doing it yourself… and we both know what happened on the 5^th drop..”

“Yeah, I know, but this time I won’t be like that”, Johnny said in a sincere tone. Fred just walked on without changing pace. He had heard this arguments before, and from the same ghost. Not only did Fred wonder if the iterations of Johnny were the same, but also if there was something he craved from the instantiation process. Irritation with Johnny was also hard to repress, but he managed to continue their dialogue.

“Well, if you want to come up to the lake house in two weeks, we would love to have you”, said Fred.

By now the boys had traversed half the university, and were well on their way to the philosophical computational science building where Fred had his last exam. This subject of Johnny always dying was probably a major reason for young Fred’s interest in such a subject. Fred felt that this moment would offer a good segue into the conversation of Johnny’s philosophy toward death.

“You know Johnny, I have often wondered what it must feel like to overcome death as you have done a few times now.” Fred glances at Johnny to gauge his reaction, and sees the tell tale signs of thoughts starting to take shape on Johnny’s face. “You know about my Uncle Jack, right?”

A pained expression crossed both boys faces. Uncle Jack had taken the boys on many adventures growing up, and was fondly remembered by both of them. Both boys were young when he passed, but the memories of the uncle were strong.

“I don’t remember him being a risk taker, but he always enjoyed what were considered to be adrenalin sports. His accident has nothing to do with how you choose to live, but he is the last person I was close to who I remember dying..”, says Fred with the start of a glimmer in his eyes.

Fred continues the story, “He died in a freak accident at the border of space. They were doing some routine work with some small space cables and the space solar array when his vacuum balloon failed.”

For the readers who are not familiar; a vacuum balloon is like a blimp only instead of hydrogen or helium it had nothing in it, creating an object much lighter than air. These were manufactured in the vacuum of space, and then pulled down to earth to create a means of crane system without any expensive crane operations, rigging, or sky hooks.

On with Fred’s story, “The secondary containment it turned out was already compromised, so when the primary containment ruptured it was a disaster. Imagine all of that air rushing into the balloon all at once. Now back then they didn’t realize how much energy could be released in such a rapid implosion, so they thought the tether system would hold, but the implosive force caused all of the safety tethers to fail simultaneously as well. In a perfect storm where he was knocked unconscious, he started plummeting to earth, his suit didn’t respond to thrust him back to safety either. That was his and the people he was working with faults because they had to disable the thrust systems for the task being performed.” Fred pauses to let his friend absorb this grave story.

“I don’t think I ever heard that story before”, said Johnny who looked sad and dismayed.

“That is the problem Johnny”, replied Fred. “You have heard it before. Well…. Not this instantiation of you, but a version of you. Unfortunately that version died in your skydiving accident...”. Fred waved his hands in a manner indicating his irritation and sadness with his friend.

Johnny looked very upset at this news. He knew how much it took for Fred to open up like this, and was saddened that his friend was forced to do it for a second time. He wondered what his reaction was at the first telling of this story.

Johnny did remember when Uncle Jack’s death took place. It was a few months before the ability to create neural backups was released into the market. It was as if Uncle Jack was the last man shot in a war, with peace being announced soon after. This only made his fatality all the more painful, as fatalities in general were greatly reduced even before the ability to perform neural back up or re instantiation had been put in place.

After a momentary pause, Fred begins explaining why he is so frustrated with his friend.

“We had just done the first 3 jumps, and heading up the elevator to do the 4^th. You started pulling out your backup chute, and then repacking your main chute… when I asked you what you were doing you smiled up at me, and said, ‘well, you only live once, they used to say! I got them beat four fold!’. So I told you the story about Uncle Jack, but that time your reaction was one of stubbornness. Your mind was already made up and you had already decided you were going to take the risk. You insisted that you would be fine, but just needed to unburden yourself for the descent. As I know, and I am sure you have been recounted of the story, the 5^th descent did not go so great...”

Johnny sincerely apologizes for his past transgressions toward their relationship. Fred has always been his best friend, and he knew before his last death that their relationship was being strained by his reckless behavior. After the apology, the two boys are now in a somewhat lighter mood then when they first met today.

As they near Fred's class their pace begins to slacken. Johnny makes a quick comment speculating whether the weather was artificially nice today, or naturally so. Since the ability to regulate the climate was well managed by humanity, one could never truly tell anymore, and these boys had never known a world of random weather events. Sure, occasionally there might have been a bolt of lightening where electrical pressures were out of parametric bounds, but this was even becoming a rarity since this energy was generally captured for good use before it could be discharged randomly. This thought about the weather was not entirely random, since the installation of quarantine and control cables is what Fred’s Uncle had been working on when he died.

“Johnny, I have a few moments before I need to head in for the exam, but what would you say to getting together this summer?”, Johnny’s face perked up even more after hearing this, and Fred continued, “Johnny, I don’t want to jump off of space elevators, sky hooks, or even bridges either. I just want to do safe things when I am with you anymore”. Fred grins as he says this, because the relief was hard to hold back. Johnny’s deaths had put a major strain on their relationship at times, and Fred finally felt the relief of telling his friend how he truly feels.

Johnny’s face showed even greater relief. He could never remember having a conversation quite this profound with his friend, but after all, it sounded as though they had a conversation of this nature that was later erased by his reckless behavior. He was now starting to realize how his actions were affecting those who are closest to him.

The bustle around them began to pick up as people began moving into the building. A smile came across Johnny’s face as he looked at Fred. “You know”, Said Johnny, “from now on I think things will be better. I think I finally get it. Maybe we can create a new rule”, Johnny paused to glance at another group of girls passing by. He continued after both boys nodded an approval, “New rule, no more dying”.

Fred liked this and reiterated it, “Yeah Johnny, I like that rule. No more dying”, he said smiling back at his friend. They grasped hands, and then hugged. “Well Johnny, I better get to this exam, but definitely come up to the lake with us”.

“Will do, see you soon, and sorry for all of the distress over the years my friend”.

---- The End ----

The boys parted, ending our story of them and leaving many other stories about how this technology has been affecting people throughout the world still untold. As mentioned in the story of the boys, this technology is creating small issues, and lapses in time for people who have undergone re instantiation. This causes a gap between when the neural scan was completed, and the death of the individual. When re instantiated the point where the memories leave off is right when they were captured by the neural scan. The companies make this seamless by placing the re instantiated person back in the same environment. This makes the coping or coming back to life easier to cope with, but also creates the need for an intervention to explain what happened and that the person has lost a small part of their life.

In the future the companies who do neural scanning are looking to create a sleeper unit, that allows for the neural scan to be completed while the person goes through their normal sleep routine, but the details and quality control are still being worked out before this is to be released.

People at higher risk of death usually get neural scans more frequently so that they lose less of the recently acquired memories. This is akin to the most optimistic form of capture, which would happen on the fly and keep the persons consciousness updated at all times as new memories and experiences are created neurally.

One other thought along the Evolving Ourselves notion would be that this technology enables unnatural selection to escalate at an even more profound pace. Due to the fact that people can be brought back to life, in a body very similar or even improved on from the body that they died in. As the book argues, we have been performing unnatural selection and other unnatural activities since humankind has harnessed any technologies, no matter how primitive. So to be detracted by this argument probably does not occur to most people, but it presents another situation where humanity has taken control of our evolution.

We didn’t talk about murder with these two boys, but it is a concern for the administrators of the re-instantiation. Re instantiation is very resource intensive, and takes a great deal of computational power to ensure the quality of the copy being produced. Ethical issues also come into play as not everyone is neurally backed up, and murder is still deemed an inhumane act.

Overall people have become more peaceful as general knowledge and well being have been increased for all of humanity, but it does still take place from time to time. Responses to murder do vary now depending on if the person murdered can be re instantiated and their last backup point was. The intentions of the murderer are also heavily indicative of the punishment that is dealt. Punishments for murderers vary depending on the jurisdiction.

Had the incidents of death from the story above been of a more questionable nature toward Johnny, Fred may be suspected in a case of murder. Cases of murder are tough to prosecute because of the nature of the memory upon re instantiation. Because the victim does not remember the alleged crime, they cannot give an accurate account as to how their death actually took place. This leaves the defendant and the investigator to hash out the details.

The latest technology might actually eliminate the need for investigation if the murdered victim has the latest neural recording technology. Although still in testing researchers are looking at ways to back up memories on the fly and even more interesting is the ability to re construct the brain of the cadaver when the death was not traumatic to the head region of the body. This second method would not have been applicable in Johnny’s last death, however for the vast majority it would. This is not without its limits since there is a time line when recovery of a brain scan can be used, and when the data is useless. This also assumes that the brain is intact, which sadly encourages murders to use means that ensure this evidence is eliminated as well.

Another sticky point with this technology is the integrity of the instantiations. There have been several reported instances where the need to go back a neural scan was necessary in order to avoid even worse consequences of an obfuscated consciousness. Depending on the frequency of the neural scans, this can eliminate months of the persons memory. Of course this issue is being resolved with the scan on the fly technique, and the scan while you sleep devices that are being tested now.