[extropy-chat] Memes and Identity (was Martine Rothblatt and "bemes")

[Lee Corbin]

Robert writes   [P.S. Robert, your text comes out HTML here, I've reformatted it]

> On 11/8/06, pjmanney <pj at pj-manney.com> wrote: 
> > Hey, was anyone going to answer my question about Martine Rothblatt's
> > concept of "bemes" as a valid concept of future identity? 

My apologies to PJ---I got the slides printed out, and looked them over,
but was not able to come to any concise conclusions. Hence I appreciate
Robert tackling the points.

Then, afterwards, Robert wrote

> The problem may involve the effort to distill things into labels we can talk
> about and communicate.  Lets consider one person is 80% long term
> memories (typically a Luddite) and 20% short term "beingness" (their jokes,
> their priorities, their stories).

I object, your honor!  If you took away my *entire* last year's 
memories, especially including my current thoughts, then I'd
be identical to what I was last year!  And by my measure, 
that's about 99% Lee Corbin.

> >> On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin < lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote: 
> >> 
> >> > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. 
> >> > Don't forget my memories.

> Your point is taken.  

> *But* what about of those neuroscience disease puzzles involve illnesses
> like when you can "be" (retain and manipulate) short term memories but
> not long term and vice versa (I don't know the technical terms, perhaps
> someone could go dig in Wikipedia).  Is a person who lacks one of those
> capabilities less "human" than Lee? 

Ask the people who know and love them, not me.

I *think* they'll say that they're still human, and even chatise you for
wondering. Moreover, I'll predict that they'll say that their loved ones
are still the same people, but something profoundly important is missing,
that's all.

> >> Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential 
> >> components of the survival and reproduction processes. 
> > 
> >Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far 
> >as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing, 
> >they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and 
> >are indeed memetic.

> Short term memories and conscious thoughts are IMO "memes", See
> William Calvin's explanation for this.

In which book?  Or where?   Calvin says that short term memories
and conscious thoughts are memes??  It's an unusual usage, I'm pretty
sure.

> That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end 
> product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it. 

Can you be without becoming?  Is everything not change? 

Yes, you can "be" without becoming.  It's a tradeoff, in my opinion.
I want to learn and so "become".  But I also want to remain basically
me.  And until the backup strategy I recommend ("always give previous
versions plenty of runtime") becomes an option, I slowly die a tiny bit
every day.  I wish that I were not slowly becoming someone else;
but it's (a) unavoidable, given the current technology, and (b) too
attractive, in the sense of wanting to know more and do more.

Mike Perry, in his book "Forever For All", gives the position that I
think mostly correct.  Consider that there is a "core" you, consisting
of your long term memories, beliefs, behavior dispositions, and values.
Then there is a more superficial-you, which gets layered onto the
core-you.  Mike claims that arbitrarily many layers can be added
without threat to one's core identity.  I, myself, am a little skeptical;
that's why I've gone for the "give backups runtime" solution.

Lee