[ExI] The Many Dimensional Sculpture, or dont' bother about runtime

[Rafal Smigrodzki]

I have been thinking about the implications of modal realism for my notion
of personal identity, and arrived at the conclusion that absolutely
identical copies and their "runtime" do not matter to me.

Let's start with some background assumptions: There is an ensemble of
structures/properties. Let's not discuss the meaning of "is". The ensemble
contains all. Let's leave aside the meaning of "all". Some of the elements
exhibit similarities, or correlations, such that it is possible to arrange
the structures in orderly chains of elements. An element in a chain is
apposed to similar elements that are either simpler or more complex. Since
the number of more complex similar elements is always larger than the number
of simpler similar elements, there is a certain direction along the chain,
as well as branching from simpler to more complex elements. Each element is
a state of our universe. Every event belongs to a tree of events that
branches along an axis, which we call time.

Whatever it means to "be", every event exhibits that property to the same
degree. Past, present and future exist equally. Time is real, yet the
ensemble of all events is timeless. This is the core of modal realism.

Some small structures within events reflect, or correlate with, their
surroundings.This special form of reflection or map of surroundings, is
probably a necessary feature of awareness. In addition to correlations with
surroundings, aware structures exhibit also the branching, time-axis type of
correlation typical of all physical objects. Furthermore, there are
higher-order correlations, or mappings present in some structures - a map of
the structure itself, reflecting itself in a recursive way. This form of
self-correlation may be the necessary (although perhaps not sufficient)
condition for  conscious experience. So you could say that consciousness is
a property of self-correlated structures, existing timelessly as parts of
the larger branching chains of world-states. It is possible to delineate
highly complex, many-dimensional, treelike shapes, exhibiting these
correlations and self-correlations, and being separate from other such
timeless shapes. Each one of us is a shape like this, a miniature tree, or
maybe I should say, a seedling of conscious life.

So what is to be done about it? After all, if the shape is timeless, its
extent in time cannot be changed. Its shape is immutable. You can't change
anything!

Well, a subjective experience of desire, and the experience of acting, do
correlate with the shape of your past and future. If an omniscient observer
were to investigate the brain structure at the base of the "tree", in a
child, and find a desire for chocolate, the desire would certainly correlate
with the parts of the tree corresponding to eating chocolate at later ages,
going down the myriad branchings of the tree. Given time-like correlations
between parts of the shape, similar inference could be performed from the
future into the past, and laterally, among parts of the tree separated by
space-like branching.

Do I make myself clear? Can you imagine a tree-like, branching, mathematical
shape, a monumentally huge graph, with every single thought and feeling you
had, have, and will have in all possible worlds, represented simultaneously
in its nodes? Like a GLUT (Giant Look-Up Table) of you? And this is the only
you, the one and unique representation and the time/place of your
consciousness?

Since every thought and desire correlates with the shape of the tree
throughout its extent, I see my thoughts, desires and actions as a form of
sculpture. It is as if time existed, and my decision to write this post
changed the shape of some branches of my tree of life. Every thought, every
action chisel out the shape of myself. The shape itself is timeless, yet
what I do correlates with the past, and the future. As I wrote in the
paragraph about time - time is nothing but the existence of correlations
between world-states. Causation is nothing but correlation...if you know
what I mean. In case some readers might see this as just my private ravings,
this notion of causality is actually accepted by some notable philosophers,
e.g. it is expounded upon by Daniel Dennett in "Freedom Evolves". So my
thoughts *cause* the ylem to flow into the shape of my heart's desire!

Thus I am the many-dimensional sculptor of my past, present and future. I do
care about the size of my tree of life, which translated into time-speak
means, I want to live longer. If some of my versions in at least some
possible universes escape aging and live for thousands of years, it is like
saying that my tree of life is tall. And those who would resolutely refuse
life extension? Their trees are stunted, mere bushes, since in every
possible universe they choose death.

But what about all those copies and "runtime"?

As I wrote above, each one of us corresponds to only one shape. Individual
shapes my partially overlap, sharing some parts, and there are gazillions of
physically distinguishable states in each "I", like very close relatives
populating the googolplexes of universe-states, but there are no "copies".
Just like there is only one square, there is only one of me-trees. You can't
faithfully copy the mathematical being, a square. A square that is located
in the same place, of the same size, with same relation to other
mathematical shapes is still the same square. To make a copy you need to
change its relationship to other structures - but maths is unchangeable.
Math, the Platonic realm, can be only discovered, not changed. So if you try
to make an identical copy of me, you can't do it. You can produce new nodes
on my tree of life by exposing me to new stimuli - to say it timelessly,
there may be correlations between your actions and the shape of my future
but you can't copy the whole thing. A million brains running exactly the
same thought, down to the quantum level or below, is only one brain. A
million brains that are similar enough to produce the same macroscopic-level
thoughts, words and actions but differing at the quantum scale may represent
true copies but personally I don't care about them - they do not differ in
the higher-order correlations I mentioned above as necessary for
consciousness. Why bother running them if they don't materially change the
shape of all my thoughts? I might object to such copies being tortured,
since they would increase the measure of pain in the me-tree. Timelessly
said, the preference inherent in my structure (hopefully) correlates with a
small measure of quantum-level painful states and with a large number of
interesting, or pleasant macrostates (i.e. groups of microstates
corresponding to a single thought).

Sorry for inundating you-all with these half-formed and wordy musings. I
feel that I still have not wrapped my mind around the notions exposed above.
Perhaps other parts of my tree of life, the ones located down the
time-dimension, have a clearer understanding. Maybe this post does correlate
with the existence of such mind-states.

Only time will tell :)

Rafal
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