Eternal life and its effects on the human brain?

[CurvKyle]

Hypothetically of course, but if there was some medical breakthrough that allowed one to live for tens of thousands of years (if not forever) what effects would it have on the human brain that has evolved to live only a hundred years or so?

[insane_alien]

well, our memory would become very lossy as there is only a finite amount of data it can store(although it is a huge amount). people would probably end up insane from boredom. i'd like maybe 500 years but after that i would want out.

[gcol]

I presume all parts of the body that have a use -by date of about 100 years would be similarly affected. Which parts of your body would you sacrifice to keep your brain going?

[CurvKyle]

I presume all parts of the body that have a use -by date of about 100 years would be similarly affected. Which parts of your body would you sacrifice to keep your brain going?

 

well as long as those organs still function there shouldn't be a problem, right? If the aging process is somehow stopped, all the organs should function properly forever. The brain, however, is much more complex and I would think some complications could arise. Just a guess though, I'm no science major.

[calbiterol]

There have been recent breakthroughs in storing memories in electronic memory. Neural interfaces, that is - and in this case, they are interfaced to a storage unit for your brain. I think we'd see plenty of ways around the problems caused by immortality (or near to it) before we actually see immortality. But that's just my two cents.

[Cyberman]

One thing that should be mentioned is the fact that humans lose brain mass after a certain age. Slowing the aging process would probably also slow this process, however it may cause one to face more restraints, after all lossing brain mass even more slowly would effect how much you could remember and process at any given time. Especially, living longer you would have more memories to store and process.

[Dr. Dalek]

Then again crossword puzzles, chess, and physical exertion can decrease the rate at which the brain decays, and as I recall may encourage the growth of new brain cells.

Living for an ammount of time as long as

tens of thousands

, or even just

500 years

would give one lots of memory to process and therefore would serve as mental stimulus.

Would that keep the brain healthy longer?

[scicop]

As refered to above, as the human brain ages it does become damaged. In fact as we age, we ALL get plaques similar to those found in Alzheimer's disease. These, in-part, contribute to the poor memory that can plaugue our senior citizens. Sure old folks can (and are) very alert and some (over the age of 80) are still scientist that run their own lab! But, obviously they don't function as they did when they were in their 40's or 50's.

As time goes on, dementia and/or memory loss would set in.

[bascule]

You lose one neocortical neuron every second on average. At that rate (and given you have about 20 billion neocortical neurons), after a little more than 600 years you won't have any neocortex left whatsoever.

[Dr. Dalek]

You lose one neocortical neuron every second on average. At that rate (and given you have about 20 billion neocortical neurons), after a little more than 600 years you won't have any neocortex left whatsoever.

Whats the threshold? What percentage of those brain cells can you lose befor you get something like dimensia?

[CurvKyle]

You lose one neocortical neuron every second on average. At that rate (and given you have about 20 billion neocortical neurons), after a little more than 600 years you won't have any neocortex left whatsoever.

 

If it were possible to stop aging, would the neurons still be lost, or is it not a part of the aging process?

[calbiterol]

You lose one neocortical neuron every second on average. At that rate (and given you have about 20 billion neocortical neurons), after a little more than 600 years you won't have any neocortex left whatsoever.

 

Again, if we were able to achieve such a lifespan through technology, I think technology could solve this problem. A regular delivery of stem cells might correct this (I'm spewing words here, I don't know what I'm talking about - but I would say if we could prolong life that long we could solve such problems).

[Rocket Man]

You lose one neocortical neuron every second on average. At that rate (and given you have about 20 billion neocortical neurons), after a little more than 600 years you won't have any neocortex left whatsoever.

 

true, but doesnt the brain grow neurons at a similar rate?

the human body can last 120 years in full health. so does the mind.

 

i reckon that eternal life would lead to very strong veiws of the world, the convenient part is that as neurons decay and get replaced, you can re-experience huge parts of life.

 

this topic reminds me of "wowbager the infinitely prolonged" from the hitch hikers guide to the galaxy.

[bascule]

true, but doesnt the brain grow neurons at a similar rate?

 

Not in the neocortex:

 

http://unisci.com/stories/20014/1207014.htm

 

Neuroscientists have not found any evidence that adult primates are able to create new neurons in the most sophisticated part of the brain, the neocortex, according to the results of a study published in today's issue of the journal Science.

 

"As a neuroscientist, oftentimes the first question I'm asked when I meet someone is, 'How can I get more brain cells?' I'm as interested in the question as everyone else," says Kornack. "It's now apparent that although some parts of the primate brain do acquire new neurons in adulthood, the neocortex is not among these regions."

[bascule]

To everyone else: I'm not saying the problem is insurmountable, but it's certainly one that needs to be addressed.

 

As for me, I can't imagine remaining biological for more than 100 years. I'd rather start replacing parts of my body with machine parts, including my brain. Bit by bit, nanomachines could gobble up your brain, until eventually every neuron has been replaced with a robot counterpart. At that point, you'd effectively be digital, and can transfer your program outside your body. Yay! Mind transfer

[Rocket Man]

neocortex.. isnt that the area that develops at a ridiculous rate around the age of 7 then trims back neurons later in life? wouldnt that just be a flood of stem cells and new stimulus? theres got to be a way to get that area to continue to develop.

 

given eternal life/immortality, i would get very fed up with life much the same a "wowbager the infinitely prolonged". Douglas Adams explores this concept rather well.

[DonHotts]

If everyone were able to live for eternity, I would have to think suicide rates would be much higher-second guessing their decision to live forever, the mental stress of the mundane everyday life for hundreds or thousands of years, etc...

 

I would have to agree that 500 yrs. or less would just about do it for me.

[MM6]

I don't understand your premise. If your body is living for tens of thousands of years, your brain would live under that same umbrella of time, since it's part of your body after all.

 

What is it that's regenerating your tissues--stem cell therapy? Stems cells can replace other cells with a distinct architecture, but replacing dead neurons and their connections with perfect fidelity might be impossible. It's interesting if you would retain (regain) your memories/knowledge with the replacement neuronal networks.

 

Now the plaques, tangles and inflammation, that's what you have to worry about. Those are correlated with Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative disorders (causation has not been proven). If you can keep those from forming you may be OK.

 

As for memory, the amount of storage in the human brain is enormous. You could keep making neuronal connections infinitely (I'm not aware of any upper limit on how many connections a single neuron can have). If you ever did start having problems storing data, by that time we'd have a way to integrate technology into the brain, solving the storage problem.

 

PS (I plan on living forever)

[Mr Skeptic]

You might end up with severe learning impairment. Some people get "set in their ways" after a few decades -- imagine after a few centuries! Many times ideas change not because people change their minds but because the old geezers die out. The effect of virtual immortality on society would also be interesting.

[lucaspa]

You lose one neocortical neuron every second on average. At that rate (and given you have about 20 billion neocortical neurons), after a little more than 600 years you won't have any neocortex left whatsoever.

 

But if we are going to keep the rest of the body going for that long, it means we have solved the problem of getting adult stem cells to replace aging cells. So we would be stimulating neural stem cells to make new neocortical neurons.

 

I think Insane_Alien may have stated the biggest problem: memory storage. Either we would have to implant electronic memory with a bio-implant interface or find a way to cull memories. I think Poul Anderson mentioned this in one of his books, but I can't remember the name of it. Obviously, if the memory culler were misused, you could lose a lot of your personality as well.

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Merged post follows:

Consecutive posts merged

As for memory, the amount of storage in the human brain is enormous.

 

But finite.

 

You could keep making neuronal connections infinitely (I'm not aware of any upper limit on how many connections a single neuron can have).

 

There does appear to be an upper limit:

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1234667

http://jcs.biologists.org/cgi/content/figsonly/120/21/3830