Life Unlimited Spring 2nd post Immortality

After watching the movie in class about Ray Kurzweil it got me thinking about a show on the Discovery channel which Adam Savage hosted called Curiosity with the episode titled "Can you Live Forever?". It talked about the theory of being able to live forever through the means of various different technologies and theories both fictional and non-fictional. The show and Kurzweil's moves had many of the same ideas about ways in which we could live forever. The Curiosity show first went over 3-D printing organs after and unfortunate accident involving Savage and a truck. This relates to Kurzweil's ideas on technology advancing enough to be able to keep his body able to go on until he can move his mind into a computer or some kind of cyborg robot. The show then moves forward in time to when the world is plunged into some kind of world war and Savage is forced underground during such a time he shows off the technology using stem cells to create new limbs from scratch and the ability to add technology to our brains to upgrade our memory storage so that we don't suffer from information overload. This is due to the rapid growth of technology due to the singularity which has given him the ability to do all of these things like how Kurzweil predicts it will. The computer brain hard drive upgrade reminds me of how Kurzweil wants to bring back his father by using computers to replicate an A.I. to be exactly like his father. This could be possible if the shows theory and Kurzweil's predictions are correct. The show ends with the possibility of humanity being able to transcend their bodies by giving them the power to be able switch between a selection of robots or clones to be able to switch between one for every occasion. The episode closes on him at his like thousandth birthday with his grand kids about 5 generations later supposedly. Kurzweil like the show have there own ideas on living forever, but I think the difference between the two is that Curiosity talks about it like a theory while the other is blinded by the idea of bringing his father back and not dieing. The show makes it a point when talking about certain tech I believe, it has been about 5 years since I have seen the episode, that some of the tech will take years to develop while others such as the 3-D organ printer are in development. I find that the show managed to perfectly talk about how the singularity would help us live forever unlike Kurzweil's documentary which was clearly biased due to most of the content trying to support his claim with the small bits of people disagreeing with him only to make him seem more human. Not to say that he has been wrong in the past about any of his other claims its just that his bid on immortality is a bit skewed because of his obsession with not dieing. Both forms of media are great at showing the ideas of living forever overall and are great to watch.

Spring Term 1st Post Peter Els and Ray Kurzweil Comparison

For my first post I just wanted to compare some of what I have read in Orfeo to the movie The Transcendent Man as these are the two things we have seen and read first this term. This blog post is just to make a comparison between Peter Els and Ray Kurtzweil which I think I may do a few of because they are both interesting people with one being fictional and the other real. Both share a connection with music which was introduced to them from a parental figure with Els from his mother, a pianist, and Kurzweil from his father who was a composer. Both characters are musically talented, but have had different goals in life like how Kurzweil wants to live forever and bring his father back from the dead through the use of technology/ Artificial Intelligence whereas Els as far as I have read has been in love with music and wants to make his magnum opus piece. These men also both lose there fathers while they are young from heart problems which in turn affected their opinions about life. A difference as far as I can tell is that Kurzweil is obsessed with living forever and is unwavering in his attepts which is good and scary. Els on the other hand as far as I have gotten through the book was not overly affected, but does mention that through his 7 decades before his dog had died he had only felt a certain level of grief about 6 times that had helped him have a certain appreciation for things. As I continue throughout the book I would like to go back and compare the two or compare Els to another person. His life is really interesting as his dad dies and how he views music through his own eyes and how he describes his dog Fideleo's attraction for music like how Kurzweil has his own views on the singularity and human transcendence.

Religious Faith and the Lack's Family

The Lack's family's beliefs helped them get through the legal issues and the media because they believed that god was watching over them along with Henrietta. Knowing that they felt safer when it came to all of these problems. In, "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks", Gary Deborah's Cousin reads a passage to the author "Those who believes in me will live, even though they die: and those who live and believe in me will never die."(Skloot 295). With quotes from the bible such as these and the lack of education that the Lack's family was able to receive due to american culture at the time it is understandable why they would compare the idea of Henrietta's immortal cancer cells to a god keeping her alive. This idea that god kept her alive to help our world up until now may have helped given the family some closure like when we hold funerals as apart of the grieving process.

Rebecca Skloot. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Broadway Books, 2010. Print.

Catholic Catechism Question

The idea that, "the end does not justify the means", is a very true statement to me. A person should not be able to do wrong and say because it did one good thing that it was the right thing to do. Going to an extreme for this hypothetical if a Nazi scientist killed and experimented on Jewish prisoners and then cured polio would it still be ethically correct? Which most people would say no while others may say yes because it cured their polio. It depends on what your own personal beliefs. The loving your neighbor as yourself fits in with this because we all have rights and dignity we should not try to use each other as a means to an end. I would say that, "the end does not justify the means", is an ethical problem in the sense that not everyone follows it. An example of this would be the scientists in the Henrietta Lacks books which would be their making millions by using her cells to cure disease by stealing them and not giving back to her family or telling Henrietta her cells had been taken. I'm not sure if there is a solution to making sure that people follow this rule/statement other than making some law that prohibits certain actions so that the end isn't found through unjustifiable means.

Should scientists and major companies be able to patent cells?

I don't think that companies should have the right to patent cells. In the afterword section of the book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot there is a section about this, "This means pharmaceutical companies, scientists, and universities control what research can be done on those genes, and how much resulting therapies and diagnostic tests will cost" (323). This means that these groups can charge very unreasonable amounts of cash so that no one can create a cure for certain disease and monopolize the industry.


 Rebecca Skloot. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Broadway Books, 2010. Print.

Inequality discussion

For the part of inequality disscussion I was a part of before I moved to listen to the assisted suicide group to hear their discussion was about income in equality. In the book Henrietta and her family are bellow the poverty line which is shown through the use of the free clinic and later on the fact that they could not afford health insurance. This could also be due to the fact that because of segregation they could not afford a quality education which could have lead into a better job to get them above the poverty line.

Why is chapter 23 called "It's Alive"?

The chapter is called "It's Alive" because this is when Henrietta's family finally finds out about her cells still being alive, but still don't know much about them. I feel like the title is a homage to the 1931 film Frankenstein. The title alludes to in my opinion the fact that the cells are still alive all this time and like in the 1931 film the Lack's family will get a surprise like Dr. Frankenstein.