Could Ötzi the Ice Man ever be revived?

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BRuss
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Joined: Sun Feb 13, 2022 6:11 am

Could Ötzi the Ice Man ever be revived?

Post by BRuss »

For those of you who don't know, Ötzi was a Bronze Age traveler whose mostly intact body was discovered frozen in the Alps bordering Austria and Italy in 1991. His brain was reasonably well preserved , enough to be scannable - obviously damaged (and there is some suspicion that he may have been bludgeoned before his death, accounting for some damage), but recognizably a brain. He is currently in cold storage in Austria.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96tzi

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Imi-p5T2PWk

Do even the most speculative immortalists ever perceive a day in which Ötzi might be restored to life? Obviously he wasn't the beneficiary of anything remotely like cryonics, but he was more or less straight frozen, albeit at far higher temperatures.
jordansparks
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Re: Could Ötzi the Ice Man ever be revived?

Post by jordansparks »

Damage occurs first at the very smallest scales. Molecules break, membranes tear, proteins denature, etc. At this point, the tissue still looks great under light microscopy. Then, some cells start to completely fragment, with the little fragments getting stirred. I really don't see how you could ever infer original structure from stirred fragments. At first, this would be noticeable under light microscopy, but the brain would still look fine to the naked eye or to a CT scan. It's not until this damage is widespread that the brain begins to look damaged. So if the brain looks damaged, then it's probably hopeless because the ultrastructure and histology are both already lost.
Starman Jones
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Joined: Fri Oct 13, 2023 5:46 am

Re: Could Ötzi the Ice Man ever be revived?

Post by Starman Jones »

But the Original position of such stirred fragments could possibly be inferred through some super powerful computing devices in the distant future
jordansparks
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Re: Could Ötzi the Ice Man ever be revived?

Post by jordansparks »

It's impossible to do the computations to unstir a solution if it's been stirred for more than a few seconds. It doesn't matter how much math you throw at it. It's absolutely impossible because the number of unknown variables exponentially explodes. It won't even be possible if you can calculate the trajectory of every single molecule. Brownian motion will affect each change in trajectory, and it's random. You can't add huge amounts of noise at each step and then repeat a trillion times and expect to have any signal left from the original. I can't believe I'm even trying to explain this.
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