[extropy-chat] Survival tangent

[Jef Allbright]

Damien -

I understand your point, but I think what you're getting is out of
context. You'll probably need to go back one earlier in the thread to
see this.

Slawomir was saying that if someone asserts (1) that persons are defined
by their VBM, then *they* must see that this implies (2) that their BVM
could be distributed piecemeal among a large set of persons.  He then
points to the absurdity of (2) in an attempt to show that (1) must be
false.

If (2) did in fact follow from (1), and (2) were found to be absurd,
then (1) would have to be false.  However, I have been trying to show
Slawomir that his argument doesn't hold because (2) doesn't follow from
(1), and furthermore no one (other than he) suggested that it did follow
from (1).

In other words,

I'm not saying that he believes (2) but I did make two attempts at
getting him to clearly specify it.  On the contrary, it is understood
that he thinks it is an absurd consequent, to be used to prove the
falsity of (1).

Incidentally, I'm also not saying that I believe (1), because I think
it's only a part of what defines a person, but again that is not the
point.

Does this make sense to you?

- Jef
 

-----Original Message-----
From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org
[mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Damien
Broderick
Sent: Tuesday, October 31, 2006 7:56 PM
To: ExI chat list
Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent

At 05:32 PM 10/31/2006 -0800, Jef wrote:

> > (2)  Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their VBM is 
> > tantamount to saying that each person is all persons.
>...
>
>(2) should be, "Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their 
>VBMs implies that a person can survive as long as these same VBMs 
>distributed among other people's heads survive."
>
>So you appear to be saying that it follows from (1) that a set of 
>values, beliefs and memories distributed throughout a set of persons is

>equivalent to a set of values, beliefs, and memories associated with a 
>single person.  Again this would be the fallacy of the undistributed 
>middle.
>
>While I know of many who have asserted that one is effectively defined 
>or distinguished by ones values, beliefs and memories, I know of no one

>(other than you) who has said that this implies values, beliefs and 
>memories could be independently distributed as you say. So what are you

>arguing against here?

My understanding is that Slawomir 's saying *exactly the contrary*, and
that this is what vexes him about your reading.

Damien Broderick


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