Stathis asks
> Yet another thought experiment for your consideration. You are
> offered the option of 10 years of normal life, or being cloned
> 20 times with each clone living one year. I would choose the
> 10 years; if I chose the 20 clones, each one of those clones
> would be kicking themselves for their stupidity. I take it you
> would choose the 20 clones, and each of your clones would be
> smug in the knowledge that they have doubled their effective
> runtime?
That's right. Math grabs me by the throat and says "the bridge
will hold" oops, that's another time you have to believe the
math, sorry, it says "you will live twice as long and derive
twice the benefit in 20 copies as 10, just as if a single one
were to live 20 years instead of 10, he would acquire twice the
benefit."
(For other readers, Stathis and I of course are controlling for
irrelevant aspects of this, such as nonlinearities that might follow,
for example, from considering that twenty successive years may be
a lot more meaningful, or something, than just ten years.)
Yes, as each clone was about to die, they'd feel bad of course,
since the death of any human being is a sort of lie, an unfulfilled
promise. But they'd feel better than the 10 year version when his
time is nearly up. He'd say "I should have gone with the 20 duplicates
and had a fuller, richer life."
Lee
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Received on Tue Jul 04 2006 - 17:38:51 PDT