On 14 xxx -1, Marchal wrote:
> OK, so you agree that a computationalist could, in case it is
> technologically feasible, use teletransport to "move" herself.
> Remember that the "original" is destroyed, and "reconstituted" elsewhere.
>
> I guess you agree that if someone survives teletransport, she will still
> survives teletransport in case of multiple and independent
> reconstitutions.
>
> Now, you were saying that the "entrenched trivial" errors concerns the
> measure issue.
>
> Could you tell me if there is already an "entrenched trivial error" for
> those who believes, like myself, that if people tell us in advance that
> there will be multiple reconstitutions, then, before teletransportation,
> their "immediate" futur is undetermined ?
>
> This is what I like to call Mechanist or Computationnalist Indeterminism.
> So my question is "do you believe in Mechanist Indeterminism ?".
The situation you described is completely deterministic, much like
the MWI of QM.
For all practical purposes, a person who is copied should expect
their future selves to be effectively randomly chosen.
If you want to talk about what is actually going on though, I
don't even accept that 'individual identity' carries over from one time
step of a computation to the next. It's just that the future self or
selves are sufficiently similar to the current self to motivate an
interest in his (or their) well being.
- - - - - - -
Jacques Mallah (jqm1584.domain.name.hidden)
Graduate Student / Many Worlder / Devil's Advocate
"I know what no one else knows" - 'Runaway Train', Soul Asylum
My URL:
http://pages.nyu.edu/~jqm1584/
Received on Wed Apr 14 1999 - 13:49:41 PDT