[extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity.

[Heartland]

On 1/28/06, Heartland <velvethum at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 1/27/06, Heartland <velvethum at hotmail.com> wrote:
> Unfortunately, the side effect of this is that the original life ends
> forever.


That is  what the individuals I am thinking of actually seem (seemed) to
want.  The termination of that specific thread.  What I am dealing with is
reasons to support cryonics that would not involve thread continuation.  It
is kind of like having access someone's letters, writings, etc. but in a
more robust form (e.g. for writing an in depth biography) without actually
being able to ask the individual questions about what they were thinking at
the time the writing took place.
>

That's an interesting reason for signing up for suspension. I was under 
impression that cryonics was about saving actual lives but if someone really 
wants to preserve just memories/experiences for posterity, instead of an 
actual life, I see no problem with it, as long as he is aware of what he 
pays for.

I would like my original brain to be fully restored and operational. This
> would restore both life and the identity of the original. Subsequent mind
> substrate changes would have to be performed by Moravec transfer.


So  either of (a) an identical atom by atom brain disassembly followed by
identical reassembly (with isotopic identity preserved if you so choose)
[leaving aside the difficulties of actually doing so]; or (b) a reactivation
of the thread present at your time of "death" running on a non-biological (
e.g. uploaded) substrate would not be acceptable?

If the answers are yes to either of these questions can you provide a
rational explanation other than something along the lines of "this is what I
feel most comfortable with"?

Thanks,
Robert

Ultimately, I would like to preserve the original subjective experience 
which, objectively, is nothing more than a mind-producing activity of matter 
in space and time. That matter and its activity carves out a necessarily 
unique trajectory in space-time. To preserve subjective experience, then, 
means to not destroy the original space-time trajectory of mind-producing 
activity of matter while keepling it "mind-producing".

I assume that scenario b) involved destructive uploading so it's definitely 
unacceptable since it clearly destroys the original trajectory while 
creating a duplicate thread/process along separate trajectory.

Scenario a) is much more interesting but also more complicated. The 
explanation of why the scenario should be acceptable probably involves 
examining the actual function that space-time trajectory serves. I have a 
pretty good idea how to explain this but I would have to think about it some 
more. If you want, I could try to explain later.

Slawomir