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Source: http://rt.com/news/prime-time/avatar-russian-scientists-brain-983/
Immortal Avatar: Russian project seeks to create robot with human brain
Published: 30 April, 2012, 14:15
Edited: 30 April, 2012, 21:18
Edited: 30 April, 2012, 21:18
Inspired by director James Cameron’s idea, a Russian businessman has launched his own Avatar project. Hundreds of researchers are involved in creating a prototype of a human-like robot which would be able to contain the human consciousness.
In creating the Russia 2045 movement, Dmitry Itskov did not mean to use Avatars to explore new planets. His ultimate goal is to make immortality possible by transplanting the brain and its personality into a robotic body.
The immortality project consists of four stages, and a team of researchers in the Moscow suburb of Zelenograd is currently working on the first one. About 100 scientists are already involved in the initiative, striving to bring the concept together, and Itskov is planning to hire even more during the upcoming stages.
So far, scientists are struggling to complete the Avatar-A, a human-like robot controlled through a brain-computer interface. Itskov served as a prototype for the machine, thus the robot was nicknamed Dima.
“It should fully resemble a real man,” explains chief designer Vladimir Konyshev. “It would be hard to tell him from a man both close up and from afar.”
According to the company’s website, the project consists of four stages.
Stage 1 – called Avatar – is aimed at creating a robotic copy of the human body, controlled though a brain-computer interface. This stage is to be completed by 2020.
Stage 2 – Body B – to create an Avatar in which a human brain is transplanted at the end of one’s life. This stage is to be completed by 2025.
Stage 3 – Re-brain – to create an Avatar with an artificial brain, in which a human personality or consciousness is transferred at the end of one’s life. This stage is to start in 2030 and to be completed by 2035.
Stage 4 – Hologram-like body – A hologram-like avatar. To be started in 2040, and completed by 2045.
Stage 1 – called Avatar – is aimed at creating a robotic copy of the human body, controlled though a brain-computer interface. This stage is to be completed by 2020.
Stage 2 – Body B – to create an Avatar in which a human brain is transplanted at the end of one’s life. This stage is to be completed by 2025.
Stage 3 – Re-brain – to create an Avatar with an artificial brain, in which a human personality or consciousness is transferred at the end of one’s life. This stage is to start in 2030 and to be completed by 2035.
Stage 4 – Hologram-like body – A hologram-like avatar. To be started in 2040, and completed by 2045.
Currently there are tests to fix the robot’s eyesight. Each eye is an individual camera that observes and remembers surroundings, obstacles and faces. Underneath the latex skin lies a complex system of motors and electronics.
In the next few months the group will demonstrate a robot that will be able to move around on wheels.
“The next step is to make a robot that can walk, controlled by the movements of a human operator, which we hope to do by next year,” Konyshev told RT. “If you want to see what our ultimate goal is you can watch movies like Avatar or Surrogates, robots controlled by human thought.”
The designers hope this robotic skeleton could also be the first step towards creating the next generation of artificial intelligence, perhaps even robots that think for themselves.
The ultimate goal: Immortality
The Avatar-A project’s aim, Itskov says, is to create an autonomous system of human brain nutrition, preserving nerve connections so that the brain does not degrade or die.
“Unlike in the film, we want to create an android, and not a biological body,” Itskov told RT. “I think it will become available to people in just ten years in the exactly same form.”
The Russia 2045 strategic social initiative is regarded as a means of promoting the idea of humanity attaining cybernetic immortality. The movement is based on dozens of projects in different stages of development and hundreds of proposals from scientists, philosophers, public figures, and visionaries. The founders of the movement, Dmitry Itskov in particular, believe the initiative will provide the impulse to accelerate technological progress. Itskov is aggressively promoting the project to make it international. The team is now in the process of creating a fund in the US, which will look for and develop the technology necessary for the project.
The idea is based on work by US scientist Robert White. In experiments with chimps, White showed that a monkey’s brain can be taken out of the skull and plugged into a system that will keep it alive.
“Our main goal is to preserve personality and prolong life,” Itskov told RT. “Scientists say that if it weren’t for certain diseases and degradations of the cardiovascular system, our brains could live for two or maybe even three hundred years.”
Itskov says that this “avatar” will live according to completely different principles – it will not need food or probably even a home. The activist sees it as a way to combat nature.
“Our civilization is experiencing growing pressure in the form of natural and technological disasters – we’re becoming hostages of the technologies we’ve created,” Itskov says.“In the future, society will change radically, mostly because humans will move on to the next step of evolution.”
Lending a helping hand
Not all of the projects being developed in Zelenograd sound like they've come straight out of a sci-fi movie. Some, like the robotic hand of the prototype, are actually being used to help people who have lost limbs.
So far, the hands operate separately from the head and the body, though the work on them is still in progress. Pneumatic muscles clench the fingers into a fist; compressed air forces them to contract.
“This definitely can be used to help disabled people. We already ran some experiments – a subject without a hand tried this technology. He said the hand worked for him. All it takes is to attach electrodes to the undamaged part of the arm so they can read the muscle activity,” software engineer Andrey Telezhinsky explained to RT.
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WARNING FROM RAEL: For those who don't use their intelligence at its full capacity, the label "selected by RAEL" on some articles does not mean that I agree with their content or support it. "Selected by RAEL" means that I believe it is important for the people of this planet to know about what people think or do, even when what they think or do is completely stupid and against our philosophy. When I selected articles in the past about stupid Christian fundamentalists in America praying for rain, I am sure no Rael-Science reader was stupid enough to believe that I was supporting praying to change the weather. So, when I select articles which are in favor of drugs, anti-semitic, anti-Jewish, racist, revisionist, or inciting hatred against any group or religion, or any other stupid article, it does not mean that I support them. It just means that it is important for all human beings to know about them. Common sense, which is usually very good among our readers, is good enough to understand that. When, like in the recent articles on drug decriminalization, it is necessary to make it clearer, I add a comment, which in this case was very clear: I support decriminalizing all drugs, as it is stupid to throw depressed and sad people (as only depressed and sad people use drugs) in prison and ruin their life with a criminal record. That does not mean that there is any change to the Message which says clearly that we must not use any drug except for medical purposes. The same applies to the freedom of expression which must be absolute. That does not mean again of course that I agree with anti-Jews, antisemites, racists of any kind or anti-Raelians. But by knowing your enemies or the enemies of your values, you are better equipped to fight them. With love and respect of course, and with the wonderful sentence of the French philosopher Voltaire in mind: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
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"Ethics" is simply a last-gasp attempt by deist conservatives and
orthodox dogmatics to keep humanity in ignorance and obscurantism,
through the well tried fermentation of fear, the fear of science and
new technologies.
There is nothing glorious about what our ancestors call history,
it is simply a succession of mistakes, intolerances and violations.
On the contrary, let us embrace Science and the new technologies
unfettered, for it is these which will liberate mankind from the
myth of god, and free us from our age old fears, from disease,
death and the sweat of labour.
Rael
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