The super-rich will soon be able to “live forever” thanks to sophisticated scientific breakthroughs effectively bringing about the end of death, experts believe.
Speaking to Daily Star Online, futurologist and former Labour MP Dr Ian Pearson said that the next few decades will see the blurring of lines between humans and machines.
He argued that such technology is already here to some degree, with retina implants and microchips, but the coming years will see that technology take a massive leap forwards.
“Think of it as like adding an extension to the brain, similar to adding a conservatory to a house,” he said.
Dr Pearson believes that by the 2050s, we will have achieved what he calls “electronic immortality”.
This will enable those with the means to afford it the ability to extend their minds into something resembling The Cloud.
Describing what this could look like, he explained: “Microscopic implants measuring just millimetres across could be inserted, linking up to our brains.”
This would also see humans able to communicate across the world, by transmitting our brains via something like The Cloud to another vessel, such as a cloned human body, on the other side of the world.
Although this incredibly sophisticated technology is likely to be restricted to the super-rich for the foreseeable future, Dr Pearson believes that “by 2060, this could become more mainstream”.
He added that it is most likely our brains would be transferred into Westworld-like robots.
“There would be no need for human cloning, we can create Westworld-style androids with rigid skeletons,” he said.
“These would have muscle-like fibres grown to human flesh, and they would be 10-15 times stronger than human muscle.”
This may sound straight out of science fiction, but Dr Pearson believes that such a human android could be produced as soon as 2050.
“You would need to create high-resolution silicon masks — and this technology will be here in the next 30 years,” he added.
In fact, he is so confident in the development of androids, he believes that we could even hire them out if we wanted to experience life in another body for a week or so.
“You could even get to live as a pet cat if the android was created,” he said.