Altered Carbon: Body And Mind Alteration
Imagine you are in the 25th century: in Altered Carbon , humanity has populated the entire galaxy under the supervision of the UN. The divisions of class, race and religion still exist, but technological progress has given a new definition of life. Consciousness is now stored in digital discs implanted at the base of the brain, easily transferable to a new body, as if it were a case.
This definition belongs to the world created by Richard K. Morgan in the science fiction novel Altered Carbon , which became a series for the Netflix platform. In this imaginary world there are many dilemmas about the future of humanity.
Among these, for example, the relationship between the mind or soul and the body. In a society where the mind can be “downloaded” to a digital disc, what would death be like? Does the same inhabit one body rather than another? What consequences would immortality have? These are just some of the questions that may arise while enjoying the book or the Altered carbon series .
The cortical stacks of Altered carbon
In this dystopia, human identity (or consciousness) can be transferred into a cortical pile. This stack (or digital medium) is inserted into the spine, between the cervical vertebrae. It stores people’s memory and identity, which are automatically updated in the brain.
On the other hand, there are the enclosures, or bodies. They can be natural or synthetic, therefore artificially created. When the body dies, the cortical pile can be stored for an unlimited time or placed in another case. When stored, the identities are loaded into a virtual context.
In this scenario, death is not perceived as we perceive it: the fact that the body dies does not mean that identity does, so killing a body would not be the same as dying, since life can be restored to the deceased in another case. The “real death” occurs only following the destruction of the cortical pile. Can you imagine what implications this would have for those who believe that the soul goes to Heaven? And for those who believe in soul migration?
The relationship between the mind and the body
The philosopher Renato Descartes hypothesized a dualism between the soul (la res cogitans ) and the body (la res extensa ). His hypothesis is strongly present in Altered carbon . Yet this distinction does not exist in reality.
Neurologist Antonio Damasio explains in his book Descartes’ Error that mind and body are one. We cannot learn without a body, nor would we be able to isolate a mind: this, in fact, cannot learn anything by itself, because it needs the body. As Damasio says “the body offers a content that is part of and is the envelope of normal mental activities”.
Anyone living in this fictional world would therefore need a body to be conscious. Yet being in one body rather than another is not the same thing. Changing your body would lead to very strange sensations.
In addition to this, if the custodians differed greatly from each other, the self-concept and personal identity would change dramatically . Even learning would undergo changes: the sensations perceivable through the senses would no longer be the same and, therefore, neither would our interpretations of these signals. Finally, changing custody would mean putting yourself at a greater risk of trauma.
What immortality entails
In the series, those who have lived for a very long time – hundreds of years – are called the Mat. It is an abbreviation of Methuselah, a biblical character who is said to have lived no less than 969 years. But fascinating as living that long may seem, a Mat from the book tells us that “there was a need for a certain type of people to carry on, to want to carry on, life after life, case after case. They must have been different from the beginning; it didn’t matter what you would transform into over the centuries ”.
As the character tells us, therefore, being Mat is not for everyone. Living for a long time involves seeing many things, good and bad. Seeing many of your loved ones die, even children and grandchildren or even great-grandchildren. Could you handle it? Furthermore, relationships with those who have lived less long will not be the same. “If you live long, you will begin to pass things on to others.
You will feel too immersed in yourself. And eventually a person begins to feel like God. Suddenly younger people, thirty or forty, are no longer worth anything. You have seen many civilizations arise and die, and you begin to feel that these have nothing to do with you, and that nothing really matters to you. And maybe you will start trampling those younger people, as if they were flowers under your feet ”.
