Lee Corbin writes:
> > Actually, my personal view is that *none* of my copies > > are me, whether in the future, the past, in a parallel > > universe or coming out of a teleporter in this universe.> > Of course, you realize the cost to our communication the> taking of this stance entails. I do know what you mean;> in fact, 40 years ago exactly, when I first got obsessed> by all this and wondered which duplicate I would be, my> final answer (for a while) was "You will be both and neither."> By saying that I would be neither, in effect I was subscribing> to the view you espouse here.> > > I believe the first person singular pronoun can only be > > used consistently when referring to a single observer > > moment, and that it is misunderstanding this which leads > > to the so-called paradoxes of personal identity.> > Indeed---there is a problem with consistency. Yet what is> this Lee Corbin to take of your sentence right here? What> do you mean by "I"? Surely you mean the Stathis collection> over, say, a few weeks or a few months taken over the> multiverse, Tegmark universes, and a huge *set* of observer> moments. Does it really make sense to speak of an observer> moment believing anything?
Perhaps it would help if I spoke about my computer rather than myself. Clearly, its physical state changes from moment to moment: the phosphors on the screen, the position of the hard disk, the electrical activity in the CPU, even the oxidation state of the copper wires and the amount of dust on the keyboard. So I cannot say it is the same computer from moment to moment, if I am to be absolutely precise and unambiguous. (This is true despite the fact that functionally it is not much use to consider the computer's instantaneous state, since computation is a process: there is nothing wrong with saying that a computation must take a series of distinct computer cycles to occur, and indeed it doesn't matter if the individual cycles occur in completely separate computers). However, I *do* say that it is the same computer from moment to moment, because it is convenient for my purposes to do so. I have in mind a rather vague set of criteria for this: the dust on the keyboard and the oxidation state of the wiring don't matter, changing the CPU or the hard disk or the operating system may or may not matter, changing the CPU AND the hard disk AND the operating system probably does matter and I would then say I have a new computer, even if the monitor and some of my files are the same. The point is, these criteria are *necessarily* vague, and it is always possible to come up with examples that will defeat any attempt to pin down what is "my computer".
> > Without going into arguments about the merits of this view, > > given that I honestly believe it, how should I behave?> > Yes! The key point! After all the philosophic BS & endless> verbiage, THAT IS THE KEY POINT. What *actions* should we> take in various scenarios.
Yes, and that is why I need a working idea of "my computer", even if it is vague.
> > I can get into an aeroplane trusting that it will not > > plummet like a stone or fall off the edge of the world, > > but I can't accept at the visceral level, despite what > > I know intellectually, that the person waking up in my > > bed tomorrow won't be me.> > Is this a duplication scenario? Otherwise, I thought that> you were saying that the person waking up in your bed> tomorrow is definitely *not* you, given your above views.
By what I have said above, I know that the person waking up in my bed tomorrow is not me, but I behave as if it is me, because this convenient and sanctioned-by-evolution view is as deeply ingrained as is breathing. Moreover, although this working sense of continuity of identity is vague and arbitrary, I have never thus far been in a real world situation where there is ambiguity as to whether it is or isn't me. When I am copied with one duplicate missing a third of my memories while the other duplicate has all of my memories but in addition has acquired half of your memories and George Bush's sense of personal identity, then I will be confused.
> The key experiment is whether or not you would sacrifice> yourself for an exact duplicate. Say that it's totally> current with you, except for the last minute, and your> choice is to die, and the other choice is that he dies.> But if the instance of Stathis having the choice dies,> the other gets 10 million dollars in addition to getting> to live.> > You know my answer: it will be me waking up in my bed> tomorrow, even if this instance chooses to die. One> indication of the reason is that that instance is vastly> more similar to me than is an instance that brutally> kidnapped for many hours (as someone's "joke").
Yes, this is the losing a minute of memory to midazolam or drunkenness scenario. Originally, I think I said I wouldn't do it, then changed my mind. It is instructive that you made the point by analogy with memory loss, because that is what we automatically try to do when considering these duplication examples: relate them to a familiar single-timeline situation.
> > The conventional view on personal identity would seem> > to be wired into my brain at a much deeper level than> > the belief that the world > > is flat or that chunks of metal can't fly.> > Yes, but is it more deeply wired than your conviction > that you are only in the here and now in a single world,> and that the OMs over time and space and dovetailers is> a stretch?
My conviction that I am a series of transient beings is an intellectual conviction only. The illusion that I am not is not something I can overcome intellectually. Or, I can put it somewhat differently, amounting to the same thing: I know I exist only transiently, but I don't let this affect my behaviour, which is determined by the view that am a single entity persisting through time.
Stathis Papaioannou
_________________________________________________________________
Try Live.com: where your online world comes together - with news, sports, weather, and much more.
http://www.live.com/getstarted
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list.domain.name.hidden
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list-unsubscribe.domain.name.hidden
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
Received on Thu Jun 22 2006 - 00:06:44 PDT