[ExI] Mind Uploading: is it still me?

[John Clark]

On Wed, Dec 24, 2025 at 6:18 PM Brent Allsop via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:


> *> All this will be a mute point when we have neural ponytails and merged
> minds.Any particular body will simply be an appendage of the whole.*
>

*What if I want to remain independent and don't want to be a "simple
appendage to the whole"?*

*John K Clark  *








>
>
>
> On Wed, Dec 24, 2025 at 2:59 PM John Clark via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Dec 24, 2025 at 3:47 PM Keith Henson <hkeithhenson at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>
>>> *> I have considered this.  I think there should be a restriction or
>>> custom of one at a time.  You can either be an active meat body or an
>>> upload, but not both at the same time.  And copies are not permitted.*
>>
>> * Otherwise, the population gets entirely out of hand. *
>>
>>
>> *I don't think that will be a major problem because it's very unclear to
>> me why, even under ideal conditions, an upload would want a meat body, and
>> the more overpopulated the physical environment becomes the more unpleasant
>> it would be and so there would be even less reason to want to download.  *
>>
>>
>>>
>>> * > Robin Hanson and I differ on this point.  He thinks uploaded copies
>>> will be made in large numbers, driving the value of each one to near zero.
>>> Lots of scope for dystopian SF.*
>>>
>>
>> *I agree with you on that. Back in 2016 when it was still unclear if AI
>> or uploading would come first Robin Hanson gave me the first draft of the
>> book he was working on called "The Age of Em" and asked me for comments. He
>> thought (incorrectly as it turned out) that uploading would come first. He
>> figured if there was a task you needed to do that would take about two
>> weeks you would make a temporary upload of yourself that he called an "Em"
>> that would accomplish the task and when it was finished the copy was
>> supposed to just kill himself and let the original carry on with his life.
>> I thought that was unrealistic and blatantly unfair because the copy never
>> asked to be made, the original is the one who decided to cause it to come
>> into existence and so should be responsible for it. I suggested a slight
>> modification in the plan, the original would accomplish the little two week
>> task and then the original would terminate himself and the copy would carry
>> on. But I don't think Robin liked my suggestion very much. *
>>
>> *John K Clark *
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> Keith
>>>
>>> On Wed, Dec 24, 2025 at 4:06 AM John Clark via extropy-chat
>>> <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Tue, Dec 23, 2025 at 9:41 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <
>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>> >
>>> >> > You are all your copies.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > All my copies have an equal right to call themselves John K Clark, but
>>> all of them would insist that only one of them is "me" because all the
>>> copies would start to diverge at the instant they were made, assuming they
>>> were exposed to different environmental conditions, because then they would
>>> all start having different memories.
>>> >
>>> > John K Clark
>>> >
>>
>>
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