[ExI] Essential Upload Data

[Re Rose]

Really good question, Ben, thanks!! I think the whole of the information
that defines "you" exists throughout your body -- and that technology such
as we know it is not capable of copying it, and may never be. The
connectome alone would not be enough information, your gut biome would not
be enough information, all your dendritic spines in a 3D map would not be
enough information. However, the whole  of the interactions between all the
relevant systems, plus their dynamics, most likely is enough information.
That's what I believe you minimally need. Thus - I believe the
information that makes up "you" quantifiably exists, and is installed and
running on a biological agent, and that aggregate is you.

I do not mean to imply that there is any non-quantifiable ethereal aspect
of you which may be thought of as a soul. I think everything we're
discussing here is basically quantifiable and mechanical, and that the
information is there. I'm saying we don't yet have even the cluiest clue as
to how to retrieve it.

My biggest concern is that we might discover a technology that is "good
enough" to fool people. It seems plausible that a copy, or a really good
ASC preserved brain, should hold the data we need. That, IMHO, is a
dangerous idea, because people will convince themselves that's all you need
to preserve yourself. So the goal - to reanimate and continue to live your
life - will not be met but YOU are not around to advocate for yourself!
Your copy will be very happy to be reanimated, though, just as a stranger
or a sibling might be. You are not your sibling, or a stranger, though, and
you will not be there.

This new uploaded agent may even believe it is "you". In fact I expect s/he
would. They will avver that they are "you" because they will in fact be
alive, and with your memories. How would a copy of you know it's not you?
Hm. After all, it would be a being with your memories and experiences and
and I believe it will believe it is you.

But the real concern here is YOU being YOU! Just consider that you violate
no physical law of anything by existing contemporaneously with this new
being with your uploaded copy of your brain. So, la la la, you are hanging
out with your copy one day. Having coffee, maybe. And a scone. It's
pleasant and the coffee is good. You want to die now? Do you think you will
magically inhabit this nice new being made from your upload, seeing from
its eyes and gathering information from its sensors, because you now die?
Nope. That won't happen, sadly. All that will happen is that you will die.

And we don't want that!

-Regina



-----------------------------

Message: 7
Date: Fri, 15 May 2020 08:08:48 +0100
From: Ben Zaiboc <ben at zaiboc.net>
To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
Subject: Re: [ExI] Essential Upload Data
Message-ID: <627fe901-abc8-6603-3a05-1c6f65648ce7 at zaiboc.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="windows-1252"; Format="flowed"

On 14/05/2020 23:00, Re Rose wrote:
> A copy is not and can never be you because "you" are a whole being, an
> agent - not fully described by information?in your brain alone

I'd be interested to know, then, what information /does/ fully describe
'you'.

Unless you are claiming that 'you' is more than information? (and if so,
then what else?).

--
Ben Zaiboc
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20200515/b07041c2/attachment.htm>