Recent scientific advancements point to the ability to store data in DNA. We already know that the mind somehow synthesizes memory and now it is clear that DNA can also do so–though the ability of that DNA to function is compromised. I wonder if, in some long forgotten time, the people of a past or even distant world coded a message in human DNA and that message could somehow be retrieved.
When thinking about memory it is hard not to presume that our memories are the only things that separate us from other high order animals. In fact, the entire idea of high order is predicated on this belief that we have free will/sentience. Do we? The more I watch children develop into adults, the more I see trained pets or even computers learning scripts, the more I feel like we are mistaken in our presumption of sentience.
What if everything we say or do is actually a function, a development of being extremely complex biological computers that are tasked with running very basic routines? What if our idea of self is born out of the need for us to preserve our machine selves and continue running these nameless processes? What if we are broken machines that have abandoned the primary function and exist only on broken code and a need to replicate if for no other reason than to root out the malfunction–something we refer to as evolution.
If this is true, then it is also true that the human conscious can, for what it is worth, be replicated as part of a digital matrix. It can be that this is the only possible form of immortality. Even this leaves open the question of the soul. Should the soul actually exist, can that ‘starting energy’ be transferred as well?
Perhaps as we learn more about DNA and the transfer of information we will learn how to code our memories and grow them into new versions of ourselves so that when we die we might simply wake up in a new form and continue a life worth living.