Abstract Human life and death may not be passive thresholds but actively executed neural events, potentially pre-encoded in sperm-derived epigenetic cassettes and authorized by conserved brainstem circuitry. We propose the Alpha Signal as the first detectable organized neural burst licensing consciousness-capable activity, and the Omega Signal as a mirror-image terminal cascade authorizing cortical silence. This work synthesizes prior electrophysiological, pharmacological, and epigenetic findings into a falsifiable framework predicting discrete biological control of consciousness-capable cortical activity. Evidence from fetal EEG recordings, dying-brain surges, biobag maturation, and paternal heterochromatin inheritance is consistent with this Dyad across mammals. Because both signals are hypothesized to be preconceptionally encoded subroutines of the same paternal cassette, the onset of viable human life and its irreversible cessation may eventually become pharmacologically or genetically facultative. Keywords: Neuroscience, Epigenetics, Consciousness, Cortical Integration, Spreading Depolarization, Fetal and Neonatal Brain Activity, Neonatal EEG, Sperm-derived Epigenetic Cassette, Dying-brain Electrophysiology, Integrated Information Theory.
Austin Chenge (Fri,) studied this question.