[ExI] This Fly is LIVING in the Matrix

[Ben Zaiboc]

On 11/03/2026 13:24, John K Clark wrote:
> This Fly is LIVING in the Matrix


"... and the company behind it says humans are next"

Not quite. Eon say that Mice are next, and then hopefully humans.

Here are some estimated numbers of neurons in various brains:

Nematode worm 302 (mapped and simulated about a year ago)

Adult fruit fly 125k (about 400x more than nematode)

Mouse 70 million (about 260x more than fruit fly) In six months? (minimum, more likely about two years, but who knows?)

Human 86 billion (about 1200x more than mouse) Three years after mouse? (I'd guess >3, <10 years, barring some unforeseen stumbling block)

Any of you still planning to be here in 10 - 20 years? ��


'the weights as determined by the number of synapses connecting the neurons'

If this translates to human brains, it's a huge deal. It means that the kind of detailed molecular information that many people assume will be needed for full uploading, is not actually necessary. Just the physical shapes of brain structures will be enough. Synapses are the smallest things that will need to be scanned. That sets limits on the scanning resolution needed (and so the time needed for a scan) and the storage requirements.

It also possibly solves the question of what kinds of cells need to be scanned: Do we need glial cells, etc.? The answer looks like being No.

Doing this with a mouse brain will be the real clincher (we are much much closer to mice than to fruit flies), then it should be just a matter of scaling the technology up to deal with a human brain. Hopefully.

Probably the most encouraging thing here is the explicit mention of uploading as a goal. No pussyfooting around avoiding the issue. That alone feels like a huge step forward to me (next we'll hear about medical researchers talking about extending human lifespans as an explicit goal! Yeah, right).

Oh, yes, and the mention of embodiment being the big difference between this and previous efforts. That's a big thing to make sure people understand, because it will help to dispel perceptions that uploading would be a terrible experience, with 'no sense of smell', "I'd never do it if I couldn't play golf!" and similar nonsense. It could even get many people imagining what an uploaded life might be like, the almost-unlimited possibilities.

This is all great, much better than I would have expected at this point.

My guess at when we will actually be in the singularity just got a bit earlier.

-- 
Ben