Using the latest brain preservation techniques, could we ever abolish death? And if so, should we?

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This lecture was recorded at the Ri on 2 December 2024.

Just as surgeons once believed pain was good for their patients, some argue today that death brings meaning to life. But given humans rarely live beyond a century – even while certain whales can thrive for over two hundred years – it’s hard not to see our biological limits as profoundly unfair.

Yet, with ever-advancing science, will the ends of our lives always loom so close? For from ventilators to brain implants, modern medicine has been blurring what it means to die. In a lucid synthesis of current neuroscientific thinking, Ariel Zeleznikow-Johnston explains that death is no longer the loss of heartbeat or breath, but of personal identity – that the core of our identities is our minds, and that our minds are encoded in the structure of our brains. On this basis, he explores how recently invented brain preservation techniques may offer us all the chance of preserving our minds to enable our future revival, alongside the ethical implications this technology could create.

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