Nice try, Danny, but as usual what I thought was a simple and direct concept was completely missed, qat least in the beginning (see what I mean Lee?).
The key issue was the comment that despite the fact that the people in his brain weren't real, that they could still be considered real in our universe. Your response deals with "those people are real in the sense that his brain is devoting processing power to creating the mental image of the individual, and everything related to this individual's personality", which supports an hypothesis that I shared with Lee privately - that people who are completely immersed in one particular communication style and iconography will default to that style when addressed with a different one, despite its complete inability to accurately express what needs to be communicated.
As usual on this list, that communication style is biased heavily toward computer technology. So instead of a subjective vs objective argument, which is where Saibal's idea really falls (along with the one that Stathis dodged), the first concept out of the box from you is a qualitative defense of how real Nash's friends were because of the "processing power" his brain was devoting to creating them. Sounds like you're talking about a Pentium chip or something, never mind that the amount of power that his brain is using is irrelevent. If he hallucinated that he saw one obscure figure for a split second and never saw it again, that obscure figure would be no more real in "our universe" than his hallucinated friends were.
However, you do finally get around to "Therefore the person is real to at least one first person perspective, but is not currently real to any third person perspective." which takes us right back to my original question to Saibal, which was how come he said that they *were* real in "our universe"? The key phrase being "our universe" which means the objective reality that we can all agree upon typically because of shared and agreed upon observations which would exclude subjective hallucinations.
As usual, the basic, straight forward questions go unaddressed in favor of the usual banter, but that's par for the course here. I'm just playing through.
"It is not impossible to conceive of future devices that could display thoughts on a screen, or even materialize the thought (for you Trekkies), making the person real even to the third person perspective."
Funny you should mention that - that's part of what I'm working on, 1930s style, of course.
----- Original Message -----
From: "danny mayes"
To: "aet.radal ssg"
Subject: Re: Many worlds theory of immortality
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 19:43:52 -0400
I'll answer your question (at the risk of incurring your wrath): those people are real in the sense that his brain is devoting processing power to creating the mental image of the individual, and everything related to this individual's personality. So even though the person in his head isn't nearly as substantive or complex as a person in the "real" world, information processing has been devoted to creating this "person", who has a real appearance and personality and behavior to at least one observer. Therefore the person is real to at least one first person perspective, but is not currently real to any third person perspective. It is not impossible to conceive of future devices that could display thoughts on a screen, or even materialize the thought (for you Trekkies), making the person real even to the third person perspective.
Danny
aet.radal ssg wrote:
You're assuming that Einstein came up with those ideas through brainstorming. You're the one that called the ideas discussed here often as "half-formed". The problem I used to have (I'm too busy to even give darn anymore) is when ideas are put out that don't seem to any thought behind them, prior to being offered. Like my still unanswered question to Saibal about how people who aren't "really" there but exist in Nash's head can still be considered real in "our universe". That's what I'm talking about. That's a fully formed idea with absolutely no basis in the objective world that was just put out there like it meant something, when in fact it's ridiculous. I asked simply what he meant by it, to see how possibly he could defend such a statement, and got nothing. Par for the course, I'm sure.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jesse Mazer"
To: aet.radal.ssg@post.com, everything-list@eskimo.com
Subject: Re: Many worlds theory of immortality
Date: Thu, 26 May 2005 12:29:13 -0400
>
> aet.radal ssg wrote:
>
> > Clearly, the method and definition of brainstorming that you're
> > accustomed to is different than mine. >The "half-formed idea" is
> > what initiates the brainstorm for me, which is fully formed when
> > the storm is >over, ie. the ground is parched and in need of
> > rain, the storm comes and when it's over, the ground is >wet and
> > crops can grow. Sorry, I just couldn't think of a snappy computer
> > metaphor, being as I'm from >the 1930's, as I have been told
>
> But does this mean you think no one should discuss ideas that are
> not fully developed? To use my earlier example, do you think
> Einstein should have kept his mouth shut about ideas like the
> equivalence principle and curved space until he had the full
> equations of general relativity worked out, and that if he did try
> to discuss such half-finished ideas with anyone it would be because
> he just liked to hear himself talk?
>
> Jesse
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