[extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading

[Bret Kulakovich]

On Jan 31, 2006, at 6:16 PM, ben wrote:

> I can tell you exactly what's going on. Crypto-Dualism.

Which is fine, unless you are a Neutral Monist. (Hey I didn't use the  
D-word first.)

Let me just say that I do understand what you are saying. Though I am  
not sure if the question and answer going on here are specific  
enough. How about this:

> Case 1:
> Copy is created, original still exist. Copy status is...
> YOU

And that's great. Two of me would get a hell of a lot more done. But  
are there two of me? Or is my subjective experience now through 4  
eyes and two bodies worth of sense-data? There is a difference  
between you saying YOU and me saying Me in this regard, and I think  
it is what is hanging up the whole conversation.

> Any one is completely
> interchangeable with any other, in every respect.

Yes. But as soon as there are more than one, what happens to  
subjective-me? I would think there were then two of me, and each  
would do its own thing.

Is that what you are saying? I am not quite sure how this is dualism  
unless you are starting to talk copying into machines, since in each  
case the entire mind/body unit (separate or not) has been duplicated.


?

Bret K.



>
> "I can't believe intelligent people still don't get this" is  
> exactly my
> reaction. I can't quite believe that intelligent people are  
> clinging to
> this dualist view. All this talk of 'you' and 'your own life' is a  
> form
> of mysticism. It ignores the fact that 101001101 is IDENTICAL to
> 101001101. If a mind and everything in it, including all it's  
> subjective
> opinions and feelings etc., is indeed information (and we know that
> information can be completely represented in a digital form), then  
> thats
> it. That's everything. There is no room left for anything else. At  
> all.
> Hence, the 'you', the 'life', the 'thread' is all in there, all
> information. It's absolutely no good saying "yes, but there's still  
> the
> FLOW of that information, the link to the next brain state, etc.",
> because all that still boils down to information that can be read,
> recorded, and reproduced. The fact that it's rather weird to think of
> there being two of you is irrelevant. It's also weird to think of a
> photon being both a wave and a particle. So what.
>
> Answers to those questions:
>
> (Please fill the copy status for each case with either "is you" or  
> "isn't
> you".)
>
> Case 1:
> Copy is created, original still exist. Copy status is...
> YOU
>
> Case 2:
> Copy is created, original brain was destroyed during scanning. Copy  
> status
> is...
> YOU
>
> Case 3:
> Copy is created, original stays around for a while and is then  
> killed. Copy
> status is...
> YOU!
>
> All You! You=You. Copy You (perfect copy, includes all information
> relevant to a mind) = You. Exactly as a digital copy of "All of  
> You" IS
> "All of You", no matter how many other copies exist. Saying that it's
> just one "All of You" is both true and irrelevant. Any one is  
> completely
> interchangeable with any other, in every respect.
>
> Oh, i give up.
>
> It seems clear that the animists and the patternists here aren't going
> to convince one another of their respective viewpoints. Perhaps we
> should just concentrate on other things, like how an uploading  
> procedure
> could satisfy both. F'rinstance, i suspect that we may crack the issue
> of neural interfacing, enabling more and more comprehensive and  
> powerful
> links between neurons and electronics, and leading to something like
> Moravec's Transmigration, before we solve how to scan,  
> destructively or
> not, an entire brain, then figure out what to do with the resulting
> information.
>
> Any opinions on that?
>
> ben
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