[ExI] Who is the 'real' you? [WAS Re: Let's play What If.]

Stathis Papaioannou stathisp at gmail.com
Thu Oct 28 00:15:05 UTC 2010


On Thu, Oct 28, 2010 at 3:44 AM, Richard Loosemore <rpwl at lightlink.com> wrote:

> If we start thinking that all one million duplicates are independent
> entities, then this has a blowback effect on the original, simple case where
> one person is completely duplicated AND the 'original' is destroyed at the
> same instant that the new one is created.
>
> The blowback is this:  some of us want to say that this is equivalent to
> going to sleep and then waking up in a new body.  But if the same situation
> is looked at from the point of view of the million duplicates (all of which
> are new creatures, so NONE of them are a continuation of the 'real you'),
> then the implication is that this is like death plus the creation of a new
> individual with the same memories.
>
> So that gives two contradictory interpretations.
>
> I believe the solution is relatively simple, though strange.  The concept of
> a "you" is just not coherent in these circumstances, and in fact the problem
> actually comes down to an IRRESOLVABLE duality between the two concepts of
> "death plus replication" versus "going to sleep and waking up".  These two
> are the same concept.  There is no difference between the two of them, and
> no conceivably way to test for a difference between them.
>
> The problem has always been that we evolved the concept of a self in a world
> in which duplication does not happen.  The concept is not built to stand the
> strain of that extended usage.

We evolved in a world where duplication is going on continuously but
the original is destroyed. That is what happens as part of normal
metabolic processes. No-one gets stressed over the fact that next
year, all the atoms in their body will have dispersed throughout the
biosphere as thoroughly as if they had been cremated, and living in
their home will be a copy with their memories. People *do* get
stressed if that copy with their memories is not expected to be around
in a year, since that would mean they would be dead.


-- 
Stathis Papaioannou




More information about the extropy-chat mailing list