[ExI] mind body dualism

[Damien Broderick]

On 7/5/2010 12:56 PM, Stefano Vaj wrote:
> Functional equivalence at the sociological level is what (will)
> define(s) human upload on different platforms - as well as continuing
> identity on the same biological substratum in spite of its material
> alterations for that matter - the rest being mere matters of faith
> which will end up being little more than a historical curiosity.

Extrope posters have been going back and forth of this topic for 
something like 20 years without anyone being converted to a different 
position, as far as I know.

Just (again) for the record: I think the subject header is missing the 
point. What's in question is more like mind-body duality, or mind/body 
duality.

There is no mind without a brained body to instantiate mental processes, 
but that doesn't mean the body has to be identical to the current 
organic design derived from evolution. However it does not for a moment 
follow that if a machine makes a perfect copy of me (the duality part of 
the phrase) I will happily give up my life, knowing that my identical 
twin lives on. Hell, no.

"Functional equivalence at the sociological level"--a teleporter "clone" 
identifical to the original--might very well become accepted once such 
an innovation arrives, but the doctrine of functional equivalence at the 
sociological level is what fascist and communist and corporate 
consumerist ideologies use to make individual persons fungible and 
disposable. Hell, no.

Damien Broderick