Hi Kim,
You have accepted the artificial digital brain. This means that you
say "yes" to the doctor who proposes to you an artificial digital
brain. You are thus obviously open to the idea that the MEC hypothesis
in the cognitive science could be correct. Indeed, perhaps you believe
it *has* to be correct, but I will have opportunity to raise doubt
about that certainty.
From now on, we will always suppose MEC is correct. We will work in
that theory. We are just searching the consequences. In case we arrive
to a frank contradiction, we can say that we have refuted the MEC
theory. If we arrive to weird conclusions only, we have to accept that
MEC entails those weird conclusions (and we can begin to doubt MEC, or
to look in Nature if that weirdness is confirmed or falsified, etc.).
"KIM 2" is really the "2)" of the plan. See below(*)
I propose to proceed by little steps, under the form of questions.
MEC is correct (by assumption). This makes the following thought
experiment possible. You get a new job, but the job is located on the
planet Mars, and for personal reasons you want to continue your night
life on Earth (say).
No problem, MEC makes possible to scan you, at the right level of
description (or below), to annihilate you (let us say this is a legal
obligation), to send the scanned information (containing the plan of
your body, including the plan of your brain in its instantaneous
state) to the planet mars (using some laser, radio waves) where there
is a receptor and a reconstitution machine, which using the atoms in
the martian neighborhood (re)build yourself in the relevant state,
which, by construction, is really the state of your body 4m before on
earth. (4m, because light takes four minutes to travel from Earth to
Mars, as you surely know).
I assume very short scanning-annihilation times and short receipting-
reconstitution times. Hypotheses like that, or like the fact that your
"generalized" brain is in your skull, will be eliminated explicitly
later. The role of those hypotheses consists only in making the
reasoning more easy.
I assume all the usual default hypotheses: everything works fine. No
bugs in the scanning and reconstitution processes, no asteroid hurting
mars. The substitution level has been correctly bet, and it exists, by
the MEC assumption. All right?
The first question is: do you accept the job on mars, knowing that you
will be obliged to use this teleportation machinery every morning and
evening. I assume of course that you are interested in that job, ...
Yes or no? (or comments, questions, precisions, etc.)
Put in another way, do you agree that if we assume MEC and the default
hypotheses, teleportation like this is a safe mean for transporting
oneself.
Here are slight variants of the same question which will be useful
later. I suppose you, Kim, are doing the teleportation, and that I,
Bruno, remains on Earth during that time.
Both Kim and Bruno assumes MEC and the default assumptions. On Sunday,
you are on Earth, Monday your job on Mars begins.
Is is true that:
-On Sunday, Kim believes he will find himself tomorrow on Mars. i.e.
On Sunday, Kim believes "Tomorrow, I will find myself on Mars"
-On Sunday, Kim believes he will be, tomorrow, on Mars. i.e. On
Sunday, Kim believes "Tomorrow, I will be on Mars"
-On Sunday , Bruno believes that tomorrow Kim will be on Mars.
-On Sunday, Bruno believes that tomorrow Kim will find himself on Mars.
-On Monday, Bruno and Kim believes that now Kim is on the planet Mars.
-On Monday, Kim feels himself to be now on planet Mars.
What do you say?
Bruno
(*) the plan was:
A) UDA (Universal Dovetailer Argument)
1) I explain that if you are a machine, you are already immaterial.
2) Mechanism entails the existence of a subjective or first person
indeterminacy or uncertainty.
3) The Universal Machine, the Universal Dovetailer and the reversal
physics/bio-psycho-theo-whatever-logy.
B) AUDA (Arithmetical or Abstract Universal Dovetailer Argument).
1) Ontology: Robinson Arithmetic
2) Epistemology: Peano Arithmetic
3) Arithmetical Interpretation of Plotinus (including Plotinus theory
of Matter).
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http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
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Received on Mon Dec 15 2008 - 13:11:33 PST