If you had the opportunity to live forever, would you take it? The obstacles to keeping your body alive indefinitely still seem insurmountable, but some scientists think there is another possibility opened up by digital technology: creating a digital copy of your "self" and keeping that "alive" online long after your physical body has ceased to function.
In effect, the proposal is to clone a person electronically. Unlike the familiar physical clones - offspring that have identical features as their parents, but that are completely separate organisms with a separate conscious life - your electronic clone would believe itself to be you. How might this be possible? The first step would be to map the brain.