About

Supported by the Royal Institute of Philosophy.

Speaker    Eric Olson

Some people believe that future technology will enable us to upload ourselves into a computer and live in electronic form. Wewon'tneed food or housing or furniture, and we will be immune to ageing and the usual causes of death. But is this really a coherent scenario? No one would suppose that future technology will enable us to convert bricks or trees into electroniccodeby uploading them. Is it any more possible to upload a human being?

Eric T. Olson grew up in eastern Washington state, USA, amid tumbleweed, coyotes, and rattlesnakes. He studied at Reed College and later at Syracuse University, where his PhD thesis was supervised by Peter van Inwagen. A period of unemployment followed. Eventually he obtained a lectureship at the University of Cambridge. He is currently Professor of Philosophy at Sheffield University. He has a special interest in the metaphysical nature of human beings. He is the author of several books: Do We Have a Soul? (2023) with Aaron Segal: The Human Animal: Personal Identity Without Psychology (1997) and What Are We? A Study in Personal Ontology (2007).