[extropy-chat] What should survive and why?

[Lee Corbin]

Heartland writes

> Lee:
> 
>> Well, not John Clark, IIRC, would go to the extreme that
>> I, Robin Hanson, and many others would, namely, an
>> instance of us would choose vaporization so that a recent
>> duplicate frozen in the next room would get $10M, and
>> we would be making that choice for *entirely* selfish
>> reasons.
> 
> Frankly, that scares me, Lee. Please do not get offended by the analogy I'm about 
> to make but I can't help but think that if we replace "$10M" with "opportunity to 
> board alien spaceship hiding behind Hale-Bopp comet" the choice you would make, it 
> seems to me, would be equally unwise as the choice made by 39 members of Heaven's 
> Gate a decade ago.

A major difference is that there *was* no such alien spaceship :-)
whereas there really are negotiable $10M checks! 

> Lee:
>> We should focus on what it is about us that we treasure.  None of us
>> is really interested in how my bit string varies from moment to moment,
>> or from year to year. We are interested in survival.
> 
> This *is* about survival. Why would I care at all about any of this if it wasn't 
> about survival?

I agree.  You shouldn't.  Evidently you wouldn't.  I stated it in a way that
could be misunderstood.  Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

> If you believe that preservation of memories = survival, and memories are nothing
> but strings, why shouldn't you be interested in how a string varies from moment to
> moment? How can you expect to know how to survive if you're not interested in 
> conditions necessary for survival? I don't get it, and I don't need to.

I *am* interested in how "my string" varies, even varies from moment to moment.
Assuming that "my string" is just a digital readout of my state, that is.  So long as
it remains 99.99999999999% the same from moment to moment, that's okay.
And even if it's only 99.99999% the same---in case I am disintegrated and a
copy you made of me yesterday is teleported to my present location---that's
still fine (provided that there is something in it for us Lee Corbins, e.g. a nice fat
check---because I will not lose memories for nothing).
> 
> What I would like to learn from you, above all else, is why you think memories
> should matter so much? There are so many other things you could be focused on
> preserving into the future. Why memories, let alone your memories?

Some simple thought experiments may suffice for an answer.  Let's suppose that
tomorrow morning you woke up with *my* memories and I woke up with *yours*.
(An alien trickster who knows an incredible amount about how brains work has
been very busy with his nanotechnological devices.)  What would happen?

Well, first, that inital statement is not very precise;  because I used the word "you"
and "I" rather sloppily.  But hopefully it painted the right picture:  my memories
are placed into your body displacing yours, and your memories are placed in
my body displacing mine.  Here is what would happen.  A being (whose identity
I am not going to beg yet) awakes in Santa Clara California and says to himself
"What the hell am I doing here?  I remember going to bed last night.  I am
Slawomir, because I remember being him yesterday, but now it seems I have
a new body".  This is *exactly* what he would say when questioned by the
authorities.  In an exactly similar way, the story would be repeated where you
live:  I would wake up in your body and be wont to say things like "what the
hell happened?  Where am I?  Whose body and whose house is this??".

When we talked on the phone, we would agree that we had exchanged *bodies*
not memories. The creature in Santa Clara California would want the old Slawomir
body back (I assure you), and rightfully consider it *his* body!

Clear enough?  Don't you agree that it is our memories that determine who
we think we are (and, I go on to claim, who we in fact are).

Lee