[extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent)

[John K Clark]

"Lee Corbin" <lcorbin at rawbw.com>

> So if it's true that there is an extremely similar (only a trillion or so
> atoms  different with slightly different pattern) copy of you running on a 
> planet
> of Alpha Centauri, it's okay if it or you die?

Yea yea Alpha Centauri, I've been hearing this argument for years. I'll just
repeat a post I sent to the list way back in 1999:

An exact duplicate of the earth, and it's entire ecosystem, is created a
billion light years away. The duplicate world would need some sort of
feedback mechanism to keep the worlds in synchronization, non linear effects
would amplify tiny variations, even quantum fluctuations, into big
differences, but this is a thought experiment so who cares. In the first two
cases below the results would vary according to personalities, remember
there's a lot of illogic even in the best of us.

1) I know all about the duplicate world and you put a 44 magnum to my head
and tell me in ten seconds you will blow my brains out. Am I concerned? You
bet I am because I know that your double is holding an identical gun to the
head of my double and making an identical threat.

2) I find out that for the first time since the Big Bang the worlds will
diverge, in 10 seconds you will put a bullet in my head but my double will
be spared. Am I concerned? Yes, and angry as well, in times of intense
stress nobody is very logical. My double is no longer exact because I am
going through a traumatic experience and my double is not. I'd be looking at
that huge gun and wondering what it will be like when it goes off and if
death will really be instantaneous. I'd be wondering if my philosophy was
really as sound as I thought it was and I'd also be wondering why I get the
bullet and not my double and cursing the unfairness of it all.


My (semi) double would be thinking "it's a shame about that other fellow but
I'm glad it's not me".

3) I know nothing about the duplicate world, a gun is at both our heads and
we both are convinced we're going to die. One gun goes off, making a hell of
a mess, but the other gun, for inexplicable reasons misfires. In this case
NOBODY died and except for undergoing a terrifying experience I am
completely unharmed. The real beauty part is that I don't even have to clean
up the mess.

The bottom line is we don't have thoughts and emotions, we are thoughts and
emotions, and the idea that the particular hardware that is rendering them
changes their meaning is as crazy as my computer making the meaning of your
post different from what it was on yours.

   John K Clark