[extropy-chat] Personal Identity Bis

[Lee Corbin]

Eugen writes

> Slawomir thinks that a few seconds of flat EEG will kill the
> original person.

Right, that is his claim.

> This means there are lots of zombies walking
> around (or at least brand new people,

There is a *big* difference between zombies and brand new
people!  I can hardly believe that you are (deliberately) confusing
the terms.  Even if (unlike me, alas) you think the concept of 
"zombie" to be utterly without referent, surely what Slawomir
is talking about is not that at all.

> Why just a few seconds of flat EEG? Why not anesthesia?
> Why not a boink on the head? Why not a really strong cup of coffee?
> 
> Calling this "death" does sound a bit ridiculous, doesn't it?

Of course, I agree with you about the essential questions here.
I'm just amazed you use the term zombie the way you do.  It's
amazing enough that I'm writing to inquire as to the possibility
that there is something going on here that I do not understand.

>> This is similar to the refusal of several people on this list---who otherwise
>> would not agree with Heartland in the least---to teleport. They are
>> materialists in every other respect: cryonics is fine, for example. But
>> the destructive property of teleportation, to them, kills someone and
>> replaces him with an entity who only *believes* that he was the 
>> original. (Of course I heartily dispute this myself.)
> 
> I don't. Location doesn't matter.

Er?  You mean that you *do* dispute this---along with me.  And, for
the record, I totally agree that location does not matter. (And I commend
you on the nice argument that you just put out about all the information
about an object (that's of any importance) resides *in* the object.

Lee