Re: "Last-minute" vs. "anticipatory" quantum immortality

From: Wei Dai <weidai.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2003 22:27:30 -0500

On Wed, Nov 12, 2003 at 10:11:04PM -0500, Jesse Mazer wrote:
> Of course not, no more than I would treat the copy who materialized in a
> room with the portrait of the candidate who went on to lose the election as
> a zombie. From the point of view of myself about to be duplicated, it was
> certainly be much more probable that my next experience would be of finding
> myself in the room with the portrait of the candidate who would go on to win
> (since after the election that copy would be duplicated 999 times while the
> other would not), but the probability of ending up in the room with the
> losing candidate was not zero, and after the split it is certainly true that
> both copies are equally conscious.

Suppose you get into an experiment where you're copied, then the original
is certain to be killed. According to "anticipatory" quantum immortality,
your probability of experiencing being the original after copying is
complete is 0.

Therefore you should have no objection to the original being tortured in
exchange for a payment to the surviving clone, right? (Ignore for a moment
your natural aversion against torturing anyone. Suppose that if you
objected to being tortured, a random someone else will be tortured
anyway.)
Received on Wed Nov 12 2003 - 22:28:36 PST