Download a human

People who are close to me know I am a Star Trek fan. I also have a long time wish to go to space — maybe someday. In my home, I have an iPad dedicated to the HD Earth Viewing Experiment on UStream which sends out a constant video feed of three cameras attached to the international space station ISS.

But secretly I do not believe in a Star Trekian future. Seriously I do not think it is a plausible future that we space travel as humans beyond our solar system. I think even Mars is quite a stretch.

Instead, I think it makes much more sense to download our human brain into a computer and send that computer instead. Just imagine there is no need for food, water or other supplies + equipment necessary to make those journeys. It even does not matter so much how long the journey will take.

Computing power is progressing nicely and IBM already designed a computer to simulate a mouse brain. In another decade or so and we will see computers who are capable of emulating a human brain. Now at that point, we can program an artificial intelligence which is indistinguishable for a human. We can program the computer anyway we like, but why not model it by copying actual humans? You might think I am insane, but it would make so much more sense to me.