[ExI] Cryonics is getting more respect from the courts

[Damien Broderick]

On 5/20/2010 11:50 AM, Stefano Vaj wrote:

> doubts exist amongst those who have an "essentialist", as
> opposed to as "functionalist", view of identity even in the event of a
> biological reanimation.
>
> After all, aren't zombies, philosophical or other, the archetypical
> reanimated corpses?

I'd have thought that in Western Civ, the archetypal reanimated corpses 
are Lazarus and Jesus. Given that they were Jews, and I gather Jews 
mostly don't believe in a pop-in "soul" ontologically distinct from the 
body, this could raise some interesting questions as well.

Not at all sure that "essentialist" is the right word to describe 
someone like me. "Continuist" or something, maybe, if there is such a 
philosophical category. No absolute discontinuities in process allowed. 
After all, many essentialists might be quite happy to say that a perfect 
copy is by definition essentially the same (is of the same essence) as 
the original--two circles, say.

Damien Broderick