Re: Altered states of consciousness

From: Brent Meeker <meekerdb.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Thu, 02 Apr 2009 11:03:18 -0700

Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
> 2009/4/2 Bruno Marchal <marchal.domain.name.hidden>:
>
>
>>> I would say that if you are at a fork where one version of you loses
>>> all memories and another does not, then you will find yourself going
>>> down the no memory loss path.
>>>
>> At which point? Also, why is it that we din't survive them to the
>> continuation where we don't ever mage very weird (amnesic) dreams.
>> We would not survive salvia at all.
>>
>
> This sounds a bit like the argument which says that if QI is true, we
> could never fall asleep, since we don't experience unconsciousness and
> therefore we would only experience the worlds where we stay awake
> indefinitely. That argument is invalid, unless we are falling asleep
> permanently, i.e. dying. If we fall asleep and wake up again, or
> experience amnesia and recover, then the worlds where that happens are
> *not* excluded by QI. They are simply worlds where you have a gap in
> consciousness, as valid when you are calculating subjective
> probabilities as the (in general far less common) worlds where there
> is no such gap.
>
>
>
But if you're going to derive physics from consciousness you need to
explain what connects across the gap - why is it still "you". I
appreciate that part of the answer is memories, although Bruno seems to
think they are inessential. But even if they are part of the answer
there still seems to me to be a problem in that almost all memories are
*not* in consciousness at any one time. So must we invoke "unconscious
memories" (which are where?) or some other factor that provides the
continuity of self or do we simply assert that you are no one in
particular when you are not remembering anything. My speculation is
that there there is subconscious "memory" on the very short term,
~second, which provides continuity . This operates even when you are
asleep so that there is continuity of events in you dreams. If you
suffer a concussion the continuity is broken and you have gap in memory
and in consciousness. This immediate memory provides continuity between
times when you recall long-term memories, which are the ones Quentin is
concerned with.

Brent

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Received on Thu Apr 02 2009 - 11:03:18 PDT

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