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Reposted by Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston

Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · 1d

Sydney people:

I'm giving a talk at #SXSWSydney on Mon afternoon hosted by Tom Nash focusing on survey results of hundreds of neuroscientists on their thoughts about the feasibility of brain preservation for eventual uploading.

Come check it out!

www.sxswsydney.com/lineup?date=...

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · 1d

Sydney people:

I'm giving a talk at #SXSWSydney on Mon afternoon hosted by Tom Nash focusing on survey results of hundreds of neuroscientists on their thoughts about the feasibility of brain preservation for eventual uploading.

Come check it out!

www.sxswsydney.com/lineup?date=...

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · 25d

When writing a chapter on how optogenetics enables memory manipulation (forced recall, erasure, etc), I was shocked that there were no popular science books that already covered the topic.

I'm glad to see that's finally been remedied! Very much excited to read this.

Steve Ramirez @okaysteve.bsky.social · Sep 8

Good morning everyone!
So, I wrote a book (!!) and it’s coming out November 4th in physical and audiobook form. It’s called *How to Change a Memory*

www.amazon.com/How-Change-M...

How to Change a Memory: One Neuroscientist’s Quest to Alter the Past

Buy How to Change a Memory: One Neuroscientist’s Quest to Alter the Past on Amazon.com ✓ FREE SHIPPING on qualified orders

www.amazon.com

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Reposted by Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston

Francesco Ellia @ellia.bsky.social · 27d

New #preprint out! In this paper @naotsuchiya.bsky.social and I take a look at the current debate on theories of #consciousness from a #meta-theoretical standpoint, and we argue that there is an ongoing process of #schismogenesis in consciousness science. [1/n]

www.researchgate.net/publication/...

(PDF) Intrinsic Universal Structures and Extrinsic Local Functions

PDF | Contemporary consciousness science faces an impasse: competing theoretical frameworks, structuralist vs. functionalist, universal vs. local,... | Find, read and cite all the research you need on...

www.researchgate.net

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Sep 3

"I'd accepted losing my husband, until others started getting theirs back"

open.substack.com/pub/preservi...

"I'd accepted losing my husband, until others started getting theirs back"

"We're not just grieving the dead. We're grieving our own failure of imagination. And that's a grief our psychological frameworks aren't equipped to handle."

open.substack.com

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Aug 26

I think basically all philosophers concerned with (potential) AI welfare also care about factory farming, let alone also human suffering in Sudan, Myanmar and other places in addition to Gaza? Surely being concerned about one issue doesn't preclude others?

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Aug 26

Melbourne people, I'll be giving a talk at the @wheelercentre.bsky.social tomorrow.

It's part of the Now or Never festival's theme this year: "I HAVE SEEN THE FUTURE" - very on topic for my book!

nowornever.melbourne.vic.gov.au/event/twc-ta...

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Aug 25

However much you appreciate sewers, it's not enough. Great piece on how our lives have gotten less shitty throughout history.

www.asimov.press/p/sewers?r=4...

What We Find in the Sewers

Our ancestors once spread their excess effluent on their fields; now we mine it for vital molecules.

www.asimov.press

Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Aug 22

@spencrgreenberg.bsky.social grilled me on:
1. Why do humans live 80 years, instead of 20 or 300?
2. How has the understanding of death changed over time?
3. If someone walks into a teleporter, who comes out the other end?

Was a great discussion!

podcast.clearerthinking.org/episode/276/...

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Aug 19

Eating a delicious lunch is definitely the right place to make the case for an unlimited lifespan.

Great piece by Cass Knowlton in @theageaustralia.bsky.social on my work and how it might help people enjoy great food indefinitely

www.theage.com.au/national/vic...

Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jul 19

"The treatment works like this: doctors use a modified teleporter that targets just one cubic centimeter of brain tissue at a time. That tiny chunk gets scanned, disintegrated, and instantly rebuilt in the exact same spot - minus any disease proteins."

open.substack.com/pub/preservi...

In-Place Teleportation And More: New Thought Experiments For Probing Personal Identity & Survival

In an era of shrinking science budgets, thought experiments remain affordable

open.substack.com

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Reposted by Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston

PLOS Biology @plosbiology.org · Jul 14

Awake, asleep or drugged? This #PreRegistered study in flies by @naotsuchiya.bsky.social &co uses a data-driven approach to search for markers that can determine the individual performance of time-series features in distinguishing levels of #consciousness @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/44xzIeE

Top left: Flies were dorsally fixed to a rod and placed on an air-supported ball. Isoflurane was administered through a rubber hose. Top right: Local field potentials (LFPs) are obtained during wakefulness and anesthesia using linear multi-electrode arrays inserted laterally into the fly brain. Bottom left: At a given channel and time-series feature, they compute feature values for every epoch from each fly (each entry in the image plot corresponds to a scaled feature value from one epoch). Bottom right: As a weaker form of generalization, the authors also assess within-fly effect direction consistency by finding, for each wake epoch, the proportion of anesthesia epochs which have greater or lesser feature values.

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jul 15

Do synapses come in analog or binary strengths? Come discuss tomorrow!

Aspirational Neuroscience @aspirationalneuro.bsky.social · Jul 13

Join our Memory Decoding journal club on TUESDAY: carboncopies.org/Events/Journ... #neuroscience #memory #decoding #aspirational #prize

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jul 3

Read the full outline of the Brain Preservation Foundation's plans for Standards and Accreditation here:

preservinghope.substack.com/p/setting-st...

Setting standards for brain preservation quality

Monitoring preservation’s transition from the laboratory into clinical practice

preservinghope.substack.com

Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jul 3

To address this, the Brain Preservation Foundation intends to establish quality standards and an accreditation program to fill this gap, to help transition high-quality brain preservation from laboratory research into credible clinical practice.

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jul 3

Historically, there have been no standardized quality metrics or independent third-party evaluation of preservation providers, making it difficult for patients to assess different procedures or for the field to demonstrate scientific legitimacy.

2/n

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jul 3

If proponents of brain preservation/biostasis/cryonics want the field to become mainstream science, we need standards for what counts as a well-preserved brain. To become mainstream medicine, we need 3rd-party reviews and accreditation.
The Brain Preservation Foundation wants to make this happen
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Reposted by Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston

Aspirational Neuroscience @aspirationalneuro.bsky.social · Jun 30

Join tomorrow 3 pm PDT! Systems consolidation reorganizes hippocampal engram circuitry - carboncopies.org/Events/Journ... #neuroscience #memory #decoding #hippocampus #consolidation

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 27

New paper showing cryopreservation & subsequent functional/electrophysiological recovery in both

1. hippocampal slices
2. partially in whole mouse brains (!)

Great discussion of how to deal with osmotic shrinkage too

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 25

Much more in the actual paper, including:
-general neuroscientists vs engram expert response breakdown
-timeline estimates for when whole-brain emulation might be possible
-discussion of caveats

6/6

dx.plos.org/10.1371/jour...

What are memories made of? A survey of neuroscientists on the structural basis of long-term memory

Despite the last decade’s development of optogenetic methods for artificially manipulating engrams, and subsequent claims that there is a consensus that memories are stored in ensembles of synaptic co...

dx.plos.org

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 25

Despite disagreement, the community assigns substantial probability to long-term memories only depending on static brain structure preservable by modern brain preservation techniques.

Good news for those interested in brain preservation for life extension!

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 25

To take this further, we asked what probability neuroscientists thought
1) at least one memory could theoretically be decoded from static brain structure (i.e. a preserved brain)
2) all memories could theoretically be decoded, e.g. by making a whole-brain emulation

4/n

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 25

If long-term memories are stored in synaptic ensembles, rather than dynamic processes like electrophysiological activity, then maybe they could theoretically be read out from a static snapshot of the brain's ultrastructure?

Here neuroscientists are less certain

3/n

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 25

In a review from 2015, Mu-Ming Poo stated “There is a clear consensus on where the memory engram is stored—specific assemblies of synapses activated or formed during memory acquisition”

Most, but not all, neuroscientists agree

2/n

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Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston @arielzj.bsky.social · Jun 25

What do neuroscientists think is the physical basis of long-term memory?

Could memory theoretically be read out from a static snapshot of brain structure?

Our survey of hundreds of participants has just been published!

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