[extropy-chat] Let's try this again.

[A B]

Hi John,
   
  Your criticisms are useful. Thank you for them. I suspect that Heartland and/or I (or others) will try to address some or all of them in the near future. However, it's important to keep in mind, that this conclusion/idea is still *very* young. It's only a few weeks old, at most. Heartland reluctantly accepted the conclusion only a matter of days ago. I think that some of the criticisms below only apply to an earlier stage of development, while the final conclusion was still unclear in everyone's mind. I don't deny that huge holes are missing from the argument; I think it will take a long time to resolve this issue. The more participants, the better. I am not an expert in any field relevant to this discussion, but I realize that many people on this list are experts, and can provide helpful nudges if they are inclined. I propose something of a clean slate for this idea. Let's take the conclusion and work backwards to put together a convincing argument, further supported by
 evidence if possible. I still believe, in some ways that I can't yet articulate, that the conclusion is true. That's the only reason I've remained in this debate.
   
  Best Wishes,
   
  Jeffrey Herrlich
   
  P.S. Does anyone have an idea for a new name for the thread? (Oh dear, this may be a dangerous question  :-)    ) 

John K Clark <jonkc at att.net> wrote:
  "Heartland" 

> is it that you, like others, still have no idea what I'm talking about?
> And if so, then could you tell me at what point I lost you? The more
> specific you get, the better. What concepts or definitions that I
> introduced were not clear? Which steps did not seem to follow from others?

Mr. Heartland asked for specifics and I have done so, I do not claim this
is a comprehensive list of the difficulties with his ideas but it's a
start:

1) Mr. Heartland says having someone tomorrow who remembers being you today
is not sufficient to conclude you have survived into tomorrow, he says more
is required but he never explains what or why. This leads to rather odd
conclusions, like anesthesia is equivalent to death and like you may have
died yesterday and not even know it. Mr. Hartland thinks your subjectivity
is an "illusion" created by a copy of you, Mr. Hartland says he hates this
and thinks it is a great tragedy, but even if true he never explains why
this is supposed to be upsetting.

2) Mr. Heartland says atoms are what makes us unique, but he ignores the
fact that our atoms get recycled every few weeks.

3) Mr. Heartland says atoms are what makes us unique, but science can find
no difference between one atom and another. Mr. Heartland points out, quite
correctly, that subjectivity and consciousness are what we should be
concerned about, but then he says particular atoms are what makes our
consciousness unique. It's true that the scientific method can not
investigate consciousness directly so nobody will ever be able to prove the
idea is wrong, nobody will ever prove that there isn't a difference between
atoms that the scientific method can't detect, but theologians since the
middle ages have been making the exact same argument about the existence of
the human soul. It seems a little too pat that the only difference between
atoms is something the scientific method can not see but nevertheless is of
profound astronomical importance, it's just like saying atoms have souls.

4) Mr. Heartland says the history (or if you want to sound scientific brainy
and cool "the space time trajectory") of atoms are what makes atoms unique;
but many atoms have no history and even for those that do it is not
permanent, the entire record of an atom's past exploits can be erased from
the universe and it's not difficult to do. This is not theory, this has been
proven in the lab and any theory that just ignores that fact can not be
called scientific.

5) Mr. Heartland insists his theory is consistent and logically rigorous but
he is unwilling or unable to answer the simplest questions about it, like is
A the original or B. Instead Mr. Heartland thinks informing us that A=A and
B=B is sufficient.

6) Several times Mr. Heartland informed us that location is vital in
determining which mind is which, but he never explained why because mind by
itself can never determine it's location. Also Mr. Heartland never explains
the position relative to what as we've known for over a century that
absolute position is meaningless.

7) Mr. Heartland, wrote "This "self" concept is too overrated in a sense
that it has no influence over whether my subjective experience exists or
not" and then he wrote "My copy" is not me". This would seem to belie Mr.
Heartland's claim of rigorous logical consistency.

8) Mr. Heartland wrote "Mind is not a brain" and he was absolutely correct
about that, but then he said mind "is definitely more like a brick, a 4-D
object". This would seem to belie Mr. Heartland's claim of rigorous logical
consistency.

9) As noted above Mr. Heartland thinks mind is a "4-D mind object", but he
is unable on unwilling to give the 4-D coordinates of the vital things the
constitute mind, like fun or red or fast or logic or love or fear
or the number eleven or my memory of yesterday.

10) Mr. Heartland wrote "creation of two identical brains, like writing
identical number types "1" twice, would produce two separate instances of
the same brain type" but if so he never explained why two calculators the
add 2 +2 would not produce answers that were profoundly different; and if
they are profoundly different he never explained how it is possible to do
science.

11) Mr. Heartland insists that if two CD's are synchronized and playing the
same symphony then two symphonies are playing, but a CD is just a number
thus there are always profound differences even between the same number, and
9 is not equal to 9. If true Mr. Heartland is unable to explain how it is
nevertheless possible to do science.

Finally I believe another reason many find it difficult to take Mr.
Heartland seriously is his treatment of criticism, whenever somebody point
out a flaw in his ideas he either ignores it, pleads persecution, or makes
assurances without giving one bit of evidence. For example, the existence of
Bose Einstein Condensations, the fact that Mr. Heartland's trajectories
through space time are temporary things that are easy to erase would seem to
blow a very large hole in his theory, but Mr. Heartland says it does not, in
fact he says his theory "has nothing to do with Bose Einstein
Condensations". Mr. Heartland does not explain how he reached this
astonishing conclusion, we must just take it on faith.

John K Clark




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