<div dir="auto"><div><br><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 4:10 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><u></u>
<div>
Jason Resch wrote:<font size="4"><br>
<br>
Various things about uploading and duplication...<br>
</font><br>
It seems we agree on the various duplication scenarios, we just
prefer to use different terminology, but this started as a
discussion about 'Open Individualism', which I'm still no closer to
understanding.<br></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">If you agree that you become all your duplicates then you are just one step from accepting the premise of open individualism, which follows if you make the further assumption concerning your duplicates:</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">That they need not be exact copies for you to become them.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div>
<br>
>>> Boiled down to one sentence, it is the idea that:
"There is only one person." <br>
<br>
>> Ok, well that is demonstrably not true. There are at least
two people, you and me</div><div dir="auto"></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">There are two organisms, but how many unique "experiencers" are there?</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Is there a large number because over time each organism produces many unique experiences each of which is had by its own unique experiencer? (This is empty individualism), are there just two experiencers, because each experiencer is a continuation of the same material organization/body? (This is closed individualism), or is there only one experiencer, as the experiences are mere contingencies, like they are for the same organism in two different times. (This is open individualism).</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">The reason transporters, duplicates, amnesia, split brains, etc. are useful is because they highlight the flaws and assumptions in our (usually unquestioned) conventional view of personal identity where we equate each person with each particular organism.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">But consider how badly the conventional view (i.e. "one person to one organism") fails to address the situation where we anesthetize the corpus callosum and cause a temporary split brain which results in two independent consciousnesses in the same skull (this is a recognized real-world phenomenon that occurs after split brain surgeries, or in the related diagnostic Wada test).</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">When there are two independent consciousnesses do we say they are two different people? What happens to those persons when the anesthetic wears off and the consciousness fuses into one? What causes the two minds to split and fuse in the first place? Which hemisphere (one, both, neither) do you become when your consciousness splits during such a procedure?</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">We can non longer use the notion of a "biological organism" to handle the individuals that appear in this situation. Instead we see the division and fusion of consciousness is a matter of integration: when information is shared between them, they recognize they belong to one and the same mind, when this integration is lost they each feel as if they are their own separate individuals, unaware of what the other hemisphere knows or is thinking.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Open individualism suggests that you and I (and all others) as separate organisms, may be much like the split hemispheres of a split brain patient, each believing they are separate, but really only under a spell of non-integration.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><br>
<br>
> Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "now"
to refute eternalism?<br>
<br>
From what I can understand, eternalism is the view that the future,
as well as the past, is fixed. I don't think that's likely to be
true, but wouldn't know how to refute it through what I'm presently
aware of.<br></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">That's what I believe to be the correct answer. Some people believe that if those other times were real and existed, that they could feel it (even from the perspective of this time), and therefore declare it false because they only feel that they are in one moment of time.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto">
<br>
> Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "this
branch" to refute many-worlds?<br>
<br>
I don't have any interest in many-worlds, it may or may not be true,
but don't really see the point in agonising about it. It has the
same status, in my mind, as the simulation argument. Can't be proven
or disproven, so maybe it's true, maybe not, and either way, what
can we do about it? Nothing.<br></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">My point here was the same as above, related to eternalism. Some people think that if they were in other branches they would perceive that fact directly.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto">
<br>
> If not, then I would argue that neither can you use the fact
that you are only presently aware of "Ben Zaiboc's POV" to refute
open individualism.<br>
<br>
I don't see how that follows, </div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">All the many conscious perspectives that exist are already non-integrated. Therefore we should not expect any of them to be able to feel the other perspectives from the POV of one of them. So this lack of direct apprehension of the other views cannot serve as evidence against the hypothesis that a single experiencer possesses all these perspectives.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto">but anyway, I'm not trying to refute
it, I'm trying to understand what it means. "There is only one
person" can't mean what it seems to mean, as it's clearly not true.
There are lots of people. So what does it mean?<br></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Before I can answer that, we have to be very clear how we are defining person.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">If you define person by "biological organism," then I agree, there is clearly not one person. But if you define a person as "a particular consciousness", or as "one who experiences", then the answer to how many people there are is not so obvious. As the split brain scenario shows, there are flaws with defining persons as particular "biological organisms". It gets no easier when we consider transporters, cloning machines, mind uploading, etc.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto">
<br>
"There is only one person in this room at this moment" is true.
"There is only one person in this town" is not. Clearly 'one person'
in Open Individualism has some special meaning that people don't
ordinarily use, or are even aware of. Can you explain what this
special meaning is?<br></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">A more nuanced definition of person, one usually centered on consciousness. When I ask, for example, whether one survives a star trek style transporter, clearly they do not if we define the person by a particular body or collection of atoms, but clearly they do if we define the person by their mind/consciousness. So what is the better, more accurate way of defining a person, and to decide what ordeals a person can survive?</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto">
<br>
> You can experience great pain and you can experience great joy.
Those two experiences couldn't be more different from one another,
but they are both experiences you are capable of having. I would
argue then that your experience of eating an apple is not so
different from the experience of that New Zealander eating an apple
200 years ago, at least the two experiences are more similar than
the two extremes of consciousness experience you are capable of
having. All conscious experiences have in common, the feeling of
immediacy, and that is all that is required for it to feel like it
is your experience.<br>
<br>
I've no argument with the idea that two humans, no matter how
different, have lots in common. Just because two things have lots in
common, doesn't mean they are the same thing, though. Two grains of
sand have much more in common with each other than I do with some
New Zealander 200 years ago, but they still aren't the same grain of
sand. Nobody claims "there is only one grain of sand".<br>
<br>
I can't make any sense of this 'one person' thing at all.<br></div></blockquote></div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Perhaps this analogy can help: one ocean contains many drops of water.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Each drop of water, while unique, is nevertheless a part of a greater singular whole. Each conscious experience is like a drop of water. They are unique and different.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">The question of personal identity, is how do we group these drops into particular collections of drops which we call "persons".</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Empty individualism says each drop is its own person.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Closed individualism says some of these drops can be placed into certain buckets, and these buckets represent all the experiences a particular person has.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Open individualism says all the drops belong to one big bucket, the whole ocean.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">I'm not sure if this analogy helps or not, let me know and keep asking good questions. :-)</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Jason </div></div>