[extropy-chat] "Dead Time" of the Brain.

[A B]

Hi Heartland,
   
  But as I said before, trajectory does not effect the functionality of any atom. Lets say I'm doing an open-skull surgery on a living, conscious human brain. I decide to remove a Carbon atom from a neuronal membrane. I can then insert *any* Carbon atom from my handy supply of Carbon atoms. It won't effect the functionality of that membrane in the slightest bit. The trajectory of an atom is a *byproduct* of the atoms existence and function; it doesn't give that atom any special properties, none. Trajectory from the past doesn't "run" a mind, real-time atoms do.
   
  Consider this, Heartland. During ~10^29 Planck Intervals when no neurons are discharging, the "mind-process" is absent. This can be verified by clinical observation: zero electrical activity as measured by an EEG equates to an absent mind. Now mentally extend the condition during ~10^29 Planck Intervals to 10 minutes of the same thing - an absent mind for 10 minutes - easily achievable with anesthesia. Now shrink it back down to ~10^29 Planck Intervals, the mind-process is still absent during this period; during this period it is what you would call a "brain object". And this is going on in *your* brain, right now, as you read this. So, your argument makes no sense, unless you agree that you are now a copy (as you have been all along), and the "old" version of you is deceased.
   
  During this ~10^29 Planck Intervals, a person's brain is very much in motion. As John said, we are each moving at an extremely high relative speed, we simply don't detect it. So buy the time the mind-process naturally starts up again (and the "brain object" becomes a *new* "instance" of "mind object"), our brains are quite shifted in their space/time position, and hence the new trajectory will be different.
   
  Imagine a very simplified "brain" that consists of a small, closed loop of neurons. Think of it as a single-neuron-thick necklace with a circumference of a penny. ~10^29 Planck Intervals will elapse between the firing of neuron A and its neighbor, neuron B. During this period, neuron B will undergo a huge number of internal physical changes, such that it is no longer neuron B. It is now a *copy* of neuron B (an imperfect one). Imagine how changed neuron Z is by the time the charge returns to it. No structure in the brain will ever stay unchanged. It is continually being imperfectly copied by physical processes, over time.
   
  Best Wishes,
   
  Jeffrey Herrlich
   
  P.S. Yes, I did receive your message. 

Heartland <velvet977 at hotmail.com> wrote:
  Hi Jeffrey,

Jeffrey:
> "So *how exactly* can a "copy" be distinguished from an (recently dead) 
> "original"?

By tracking trajectories of separate instances of mind object, of course.

Jeffrey:
> Subjectively there is no difference. Objectively there is no difference. The 
> copy detects no difference. The dead original detects no difference... obviously. 
> So, where can the difference possibly lie?

Wait. The whole purpose of trajectories is that they *do* give an objective 
observer reliable means of distinguishing copy from the original.

Let me give you a simple example which you could then extrapolate to a mind object. 
Assume arbitrary 4D point x=0, y=0, z=0, t=0. There is a helium atom at point 
x1,y1,z1,t1. There is also another helium atom at point x2,y2,z2,t2. Assuming these 
atoms are not next to each other and cooled down to 0K, all the x,y,z,t coordinates 
for both atoms can never be equal. And since they will never be equal then this is 
how an objective observer could theoretically distinguish one atom from the other, 
one instance of an object from the other.

S.

P.S. Did you get my last response to you where I explain what I mean by mind object 
and brain object? If not, it's probably in the archives. 
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