|
On April 17 2012 05:28 Sbrubbles wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:05 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 04:14 Sbrubbles wrote:On April 17 2012 03:51 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 02:57 CptCutter wrote:
when you guys log into your starcraft 2 accounts, does it matter whether the account you logged into was your original or a copy? to me, it doesnt actually matter as nothing is affected by it being either. when you create your account for starcraft 2 and play games, only the information is transported and stored. your computer then reconstructs a new profile by getting your account information, so in a sense, i see this problem as exactly the same thing. If you are killed, moved and reconstructed, that is still you just different atoms would be used.
ill ask something, if you were to break down 2 peoples bodies into atoms and mixed them together, would you be able to tell which atoms belonged to which person? because what this question seems like to me is that you seem to believe that the atoms that make up your body belong to you and cannot be replaced, and that this assortment of atoms is what defines you. (which is completely wrong to begin with since most/if not all cells in your body break down and get replaced by new ones)
i would prefer to think of myself as similar to a computer program. it does not matter what machine the program runs on, it is the program and the way it runs that defines what it is.
The problem with people arguing as you do is that you see human bodies as something static. They are not they are biochemical processes. You cannot break down process and reconstruct it. You can create new process that is functionally identical. Problem is the original process is no longer. That is why any deconstruction whatsoever is irreversible, as at the point when the process stops, your existence ended for good. You are the process, you are not the static structure. Anyway, this is still a good discussion as it allowed me to understand the problem deeper, beyond the apparent nonsense of multiple people being one person. In the beginning that was the only apparent thing. But thinking about it I now also see the why behind the requirement for continuity. The continuity requirement follows from the fact that we are not in fact static structures. We are biochemical processes, and as such are intimately linked to the physical substrate in which those happen. Consciousness and all mental states are artifacts of those processes (or subprocesses themselves). Process cannot be deconstructed and reconstructed as it is defined by its continuous existence in time. By what metric are you saying the original process is no longer? As far as the OP states, the "copy" is identical to the "original", including the notion that it IS the original. So, why isn't it? Tell me how this teleportation is different from any other circumstance in which you lose conciousness (sleep being the most obvious one). Identical structure is not the same as "sameness". And the original process is no longer because it ceased to be completely for a time. Process is bound by existing continuously in time by its nature/definition. When I sleep my biochemical processes continue, I still function continuously. Consciousness does not need to be active at all times and I think it is not even needed for self-identity necessarily. You say you function continuously while you sleep, but how are you sure of that? You don't know anything except that which your senses tell you, and asleep you aren't being told anything. How can you be sure the world wasn't created this morning, right as you woke up? Here's a scenario for you. You're in deep sleep. Some scientists lift you up without waking you up, put you into the teleportation machine, which deconstructs you and reconstructs you 10 meters from your current position. The scientists take your "clone", still asleep, and put him into your bed. Your clone wakes up, without a clue as to what happened during the night. He thinks he's you. He is identical to you. He is you. How can you be sure this didn't happen last night?
I'm still aware when I'm asleep for the same reason I don't piss myself when I sleep, for the same reason that I can wake up at the times I need to wake at, for the same reason I will wake up if you cut off my arm, got set on fire, etc...
People really need to stop bringing up the whole sleep thing because it's really making this discussion sound unintelligent.
|
On April 17 2012 04:46 urashimakt wrote:How is being disassembled (and "killed") and put back together exactly the same somewhere else any different than experiencing a length of time without being disassembled? I'm me because of my memory of my experiences. As each indivisible unit of time passes, I "die" and a new me with the memory of the "dead" me goes on. What's important is that the integrity of my memory remains intact and that I continue to exist in the same form for everyone around me. Whether I live normally for a moment in one place or use this "killing and teleporting" machine, the me from a moment ago will be gone and the me of the next moment will have his moment. I'd use it. Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 04:46 Meatt wrote:
It's not, but the original is dead now. It's people's egos that just assume the universe is gonna grab their own specific first-person-view (or "soul" if that helps) and teleport it along with the deconstructed atoms. Negative. It's just going to start up a fresh new install of Windows, but also re-install all your programs and music again. But it's still technically different computer, even if it's identical. The idea that your perspective is anything more than a biological analog of a history of your chronologically ordered sensory inputs seems off. There isn't a "soul" to feel an intangible loss when our body stops functioning. The organism that's destroyed will simply cease to be and it'd have no qualms with that, because it doesn't exist anymore. The organism that is created would be you. It would have your memory and your form. It would carry on your existence as an entity to the rest of the universe. You would carry on living no differently than if you had stood still for a fraction of a second, since that version of you would just be you with your memory and form. When someone dies they don't weep. It's the people around them that experience loss.
And that is what you miss, you are not just your memories. You are your body, and actually people arguing that this teleport kills you are the materialistic ones. As they actually argue that the matter that you consists of and the specific process that runs on this substrate is you and that is it and there is nothing else. Whereas you posit that you are not your body but you are the information about your body. Which is completely at odds with standard meaning of the word self and is much more idealistic approach.
|
On April 17 2012 05:32 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 04:46 urashimakt wrote:How is being disassembled (and "killed") and put back together exactly the same somewhere else any different than experiencing a length of time without being disassembled? I'm me because of my memory of my experiences. As each indivisible unit of time passes, I "die" and a new me with the memory of the "dead" me goes on. What's important is that the integrity of my memory remains intact and that I continue to exist in the same form for everyone around me. Whether I live normally for a moment in one place or use this "killing and teleporting" machine, the me from a moment ago will be gone and the me of the next moment will have his moment. I'd use it. On April 17 2012 04:46 Meatt wrote:
It's not, but the original is dead now. It's people's egos that just assume the universe is gonna grab their own specific first-person-view (or "soul" if that helps) and teleport it along with the deconstructed atoms. Negative. It's just going to start up a fresh new install of Windows, but also re-install all your programs and music again. But it's still technically different computer, even if it's identical. The idea that your perspective is anything more than a biological analog of a history of your chronologically ordered sensory inputs seems off. There isn't a "soul" to feel an intangible loss when our body stops functioning. The organism that's destroyed will simply cease to be and it'd have no qualms with that, because it doesn't exist anymore. The organism that is created would be you. It would have your memory and your form. It would carry on your existence as an entity to the rest of the universe. You would carry on living no differently than if you had stood still for a fraction of a second, since that version of you would just be you with your memory and form. When someone dies they don't weep. It's the people around them that experience loss. And that is what you miss, you are not just your memories. You are your body, and actually people arguing that this teleport kills you are the materialistic ones. As they actually argue that the matter that you consists of and the specific process that runs on this substrate is you and that is it and there is nothing else. Whereas you posit that you are not your body but you are the information about your body. Which is completely at odds with standard meaning of the word self and is much more idealistic approach.
Isn't it given that our body is recreated exactly as it was? That's what I took from the OP. The body physically holds our memories, so since the body is granted I focused on the memory bit.
|
On April 17 2012 05:28 Sbrubbles wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:05 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 04:14 Sbrubbles wrote:On April 17 2012 03:51 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 02:57 CptCutter wrote:
when you guys log into your starcraft 2 accounts, does it matter whether the account you logged into was your original or a copy? to me, it doesnt actually matter as nothing is affected by it being either. when you create your account for starcraft 2 and play games, only the information is transported and stored. your computer then reconstructs a new profile by getting your account information, so in a sense, i see this problem as exactly the same thing. If you are killed, moved and reconstructed, that is still you just different atoms would be used.
ill ask something, if you were to break down 2 peoples bodies into atoms and mixed them together, would you be able to tell which atoms belonged to which person? because what this question seems like to me is that you seem to believe that the atoms that make up your body belong to you and cannot be replaced, and that this assortment of atoms is what defines you. (which is completely wrong to begin with since most/if not all cells in your body break down and get replaced by new ones)
i would prefer to think of myself as similar to a computer program. it does not matter what machine the program runs on, it is the program and the way it runs that defines what it is.
The problem with people arguing as you do is that you see human bodies as something static. They are not they are biochemical processes. You cannot break down process and reconstruct it. You can create new process that is functionally identical. Problem is the original process is no longer. That is why any deconstruction whatsoever is irreversible, as at the point when the process stops, your existence ended for good. You are the process, you are not the static structure. Anyway, this is still a good discussion as it allowed me to understand the problem deeper, beyond the apparent nonsense of multiple people being one person. In the beginning that was the only apparent thing. But thinking about it I now also see the why behind the requirement for continuity. The continuity requirement follows from the fact that we are not in fact static structures. We are biochemical processes, and as such are intimately linked to the physical substrate in which those happen. Consciousness and all mental states are artifacts of those processes (or subprocesses themselves). Process cannot be deconstructed and reconstructed as it is defined by its continuous existence in time. By what metric are you saying the original process is no longer? As far as the OP states, the "copy" is identical to the "original", including the notion that it IS the original. So, why isn't it? Tell me how this teleportation is different from any other circumstance in which you lose conciousness (sleep being the most obvious one). Identical structure is not the same as "sameness". And the original process is no longer because it ceased to be completely for a time. Process is bound by existing continuously in time by its nature/definition. When I sleep my biochemical processes continue, I still function continuously. Consciousness does not need to be active at all times and I think it is not even needed for self-identity necessarily. You say you function continuously while you sleep, but how are you sure of that? You don't know anything except that which your senses tell you, and asleep you aren't being told anything. How can you be sure the world wasn't created this morning, right as you woke up? Here's a scenario for you. You're in deep sleep. Some scientists lift you up without waking you up, put you into the teleportation machine, which deconstructs you and reconstructs you 10 meters from your current position. The scientists take your "clone", still asleep, and put him into your bed. Your clone wakes up, without a clue as to what happened during the night. He thinks he's you. He is identical to you. He is you. How can you be sure this didn't happen last night?
I am not arguing subjective point of view, but objective one. I cannot be sure that something like that did not happen last night. It has no bearing on my point. If it did, the original dies yesterday and I am new entity not the same as the one that went to sleep last night. And if it happens today, I will die and something else will take my place. I can modify your scenario to show how it has nothing with the points being made. You went to sleep last night as an intelligent horse, during the night scientists changed the whole world and you woke up with changed memories so everything fits. What does it have to do with anything, nothing, the same as your scenario.
Your point is bordering in solipsism. If you are arguing there is no objective reality, we have nothing to talk about.
|
No, because I'm a Christian, despite any recent doubts, and still believe I'm my soul, and not my brain. Also, I don't believe in the logic of the copy of an old object being the same object. I'M DEAD. I got killed so I can save five fucking hours on a trip to the beach. Actually, I didn't save five hours. I sacrificed my life to save my CLONE five fucking hours. My clone will then sacrifice HIS life so that he can save his clone five fucking hours to drive back home. This will go on for about 80 years, with countless copies killing themselves while I'm forced to look on from the afterlife and observe my clones living the life I should have lived.
HELL NO. If I ever got a death teleportation machine, I would tie a heavy rock to it, take a boat out to the middle of the ocean and ditch the piece of shit. No way am I giving my life for some clone's convenience.
|
Edit: ninjaed
Question answered.
|
On April 17 2012 05:40 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote:
No, because I'm a Christian, despite any recent doubts, and still believe I'm my soul, and not my brain. Also, I don't believe in the logic of the copy of an old object being the same object. I'M DEAD. I got killed so I can save five fucking hours on a trip to the beach. Actually, I didn't save five hours. I sacrificed my life to save my CLONE five fucking hours. My clone will then sacrifice HIS life so that he can save his clone five fucking hours to drive back home. This will go on for about 80 years, with countless copies killing themselves while I'm forced to look on from the afterlife and observe my clones living the life I should have lived.
HELL NO. If I ever got a death teleportation machine, I would tie a heavy rock to it, take a boat out to the middle of the ocean and ditch the piece of shit. No way am I giving my life for some clone's convenience.
I'd love to use this argument against copyright law, haha. "This file isn't your file, it's a clone of your file. Look, I cut and pasted it. Your file was at 0x0000, but I moved it to 0x00CA."
|
On April 17 2012 05:36 urashimakt wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:32 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 04:46 urashimakt wrote:How is being disassembled (and "killed") and put back together exactly the same somewhere else any different than experiencing a length of time without being disassembled? I'm me because of my memory of my experiences. As each indivisible unit of time passes, I "die" and a new me with the memory of the "dead" me goes on. What's important is that the integrity of my memory remains intact and that I continue to exist in the same form for everyone around me. Whether I live normally for a moment in one place or use this "killing and teleporting" machine, the me from a moment ago will be gone and the me of the next moment will have his moment. I'd use it. On April 17 2012 04:46 Meatt wrote:
It's not, but the original is dead now. It's people's egos that just assume the universe is gonna grab their own specific first-person-view (or "soul" if that helps) and teleport it along with the deconstructed atoms. Negative. It's just going to start up a fresh new install of Windows, but also re-install all your programs and music again. But it's still technically different computer, even if it's identical. The idea that your perspective is anything more than a biological analog of a history of your chronologically ordered sensory inputs seems off. There isn't a "soul" to feel an intangible loss when our body stops functioning. The organism that's destroyed will simply cease to be and it'd have no qualms with that, because it doesn't exist anymore. The organism that is created would be you. It would have your memory and your form. It would carry on your existence as an entity to the rest of the universe. You would carry on living no differently than if you had stood still for a fraction of a second, since that version of you would just be you with your memory and form. When someone dies they don't weep. It's the people around them that experience loss. And that is what you miss, you are not just your memories. You are your body, and actually people arguing that this teleport kills you are the materialistic ones. As they actually argue that the matter that you consists of and the specific process that runs on this substrate is you and that is it and there is nothing else. Whereas you posit that you are not your body but you are the information about your body. Which is completely at odds with standard meaning of the word self and is much more idealistic approach. Isn't it given that our body is recreated exactly as it was? That's what I took from the OP. The body physically holds our memories, so since the body is granted I focused on the memory bit.
Yes, it is exactly as it was. But what does it has to do with my self-identification. Millions of beings can have bodies exactly like me and my memories. But I am just one of them or none of them. There are no other possibilities (not in this scenario anyway). Since I cannot be all of my copies, I am none of my copies. I am either the original or I am dead.
Disclaimer : When I say the above I am talking from the point of view of the being that went into the machine. And I am assuming objective reality, so please no arguments based on "how do you know".
|
On April 17 2012 05:47 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:36 urashimakt wrote:On April 17 2012 05:32 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 04:46 urashimakt wrote:How is being disassembled (and "killed") and put back together exactly the same somewhere else any different than experiencing a length of time without being disassembled? I'm me because of my memory of my experiences. As each indivisible unit of time passes, I "die" and a new me with the memory of the "dead" me goes on. What's important is that the integrity of my memory remains intact and that I continue to exist in the same form for everyone around me. Whether I live normally for a moment in one place or use this "killing and teleporting" machine, the me from a moment ago will be gone and the me of the next moment will have his moment. I'd use it. On April 17 2012 04:46 Meatt wrote:
It's not, but the original is dead now. It's people's egos that just assume the universe is gonna grab their own specific first-person-view (or "soul" if that helps) and teleport it along with the deconstructed atoms. Negative. It's just going to start up a fresh new install of Windows, but also re-install all your programs and music again. But it's still technically different computer, even if it's identical. The idea that your perspective is anything more than a biological analog of a history of your chronologically ordered sensory inputs seems off. There isn't a "soul" to feel an intangible loss when our body stops functioning. The organism that's destroyed will simply cease to be and it'd have no qualms with that, because it doesn't exist anymore. The organism that is created would be you. It would have your memory and your form. It would carry on your existence as an entity to the rest of the universe. You would carry on living no differently than if you had stood still for a fraction of a second, since that version of you would just be you with your memory and form. When someone dies they don't weep. It's the people around them that experience loss. And that is what you miss, you are not just your memories. You are your body, and actually people arguing that this teleport kills you are the materialistic ones. As they actually argue that the matter that you consists of and the specific process that runs on this substrate is you and that is it and there is nothing else. Whereas you posit that you are not your body but you are the information about your body. Which is completely at odds with standard meaning of the word self and is much more idealistic approach. Isn't it given that our body is recreated exactly as it was? That's what I took from the OP. The body physically holds our memories, so since the body is granted I focused on the memory bit. Yes, it is exactly as it was. But what does it has to do with my self-identification. Millions of beings can have bodies exactly like me and my memories. But I am just one of them or none of them. There are no other possibilities (not in this scenario anyway). Since I cannot be all of my copies, I am none of my copies. I am either the original or I am dead. Disclaimer : When I say the above I am talking from the point of view of the being that went into the machine. And I am assuming objective reality, so please no arguments based on "how do you know".
Self-identification is a tool we use, it isn't any sort of universal truth. When it helps us simplify things, we refer to it. It almost always does help us simplify things because we don't usually ask questions like "what if I melted myself down and got built up again?"
Edit: If there are a million beings that are all exactly like you, you'd feel like that one that sees the other 999,999. The moment any of you start experiencing anything, it would differentiate you from the others.
|
On April 17 2012 05:50 urashimakt wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:47 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 05:36 urashimakt wrote:On April 17 2012 05:32 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 04:46 urashimakt wrote:How is being disassembled (and "killed") and put back together exactly the same somewhere else any different than experiencing a length of time without being disassembled? I'm me because of my memory of my experiences. As each indivisible unit of time passes, I "die" and a new me with the memory of the "dead" me goes on. What's important is that the integrity of my memory remains intact and that I continue to exist in the same form for everyone around me. Whether I live normally for a moment in one place or use this "killing and teleporting" machine, the me from a moment ago will be gone and the me of the next moment will have his moment. I'd use it. On April 17 2012 04:46 Meatt wrote:
It's not, but the original is dead now. It's people's egos that just assume the universe is gonna grab their own specific first-person-view (or "soul" if that helps) and teleport it along with the deconstructed atoms. Negative. It's just going to start up a fresh new install of Windows, but also re-install all your programs and music again. But it's still technically different computer, even if it's identical. The idea that your perspective is anything more than a biological analog of a history of your chronologically ordered sensory inputs seems off. There isn't a "soul" to feel an intangible loss when our body stops functioning. The organism that's destroyed will simply cease to be and it'd have no qualms with that, because it doesn't exist anymore. The organism that is created would be you. It would have your memory and your form. It would carry on your existence as an entity to the rest of the universe. You would carry on living no differently than if you had stood still for a fraction of a second, since that version of you would just be you with your memory and form. When someone dies they don't weep. It's the people around them that experience loss. And that is what you miss, you are not just your memories. You are your body, and actually people arguing that this teleport kills you are the materialistic ones. As they actually argue that the matter that you consists of and the specific process that runs on this substrate is you and that is it and there is nothing else. Whereas you posit that you are not your body but you are the information about your body. Which is completely at odds with standard meaning of the word self and is much more idealistic approach. Isn't it given that our body is recreated exactly as it was? That's what I took from the OP. The body physically holds our memories, so since the body is granted I focused on the memory bit. Yes, it is exactly as it was. But what does it has to do with my self-identification. Millions of beings can have bodies exactly like me and my memories. But I am just one of them or none of them. There are no other possibilities (not in this scenario anyway). Since I cannot be all of my copies, I am none of my copies. I am either the original or I am dead. Disclaimer : When I say the above I am talking from the point of view of the being that went into the machine. And I am assuming objective reality, so please no arguments based on "how do you know". Self-identification is a tool we use, it isn't any sort of universal truth. When it helps us simplify things, we refer to it. It almost always does help us simplify things because we don't usually ask questions like "what if I melted myself down and got built up again?" Edit: If there are a million beings that are all exactly like you, you'd feel like that one that sees the other 999,999. The moment any of you start experiencing anything, it would differentiate you from the others.
The point is at one point they were not differentiated and if you put them into exactly the same virtual worlds they would remain the same structurally forever. And yet I would never be all of them even if they do not differentiate ever. So being structurally identical to me is not the same as being me.
|
On April 17 2012 05:22 lorkac wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 04:21 TheRealPaciFist wrote:On April 17 2012 00:16 lorkac wrote:
What if we're thinking of this backwards. Would you be okay with the clone being killed off? They clone you for war or something--would you be okay with sending your clone off to die in your stead? Now would you reverse those roles? If nothing mattered--just that one of you survived--then it wouldn't matter if the death was supposedly instant (teleportation) or if the death took years (war, torture, PTSD, etc...) I really like your idea of trying to think about the situation in a different way (though I disagree that instant death and torturous deaths would be the same scenario). As soon as two beings exist, I'd say it's best for neither to die (don't kill my clone!). However, if one being can only exist as a byproduct of the destruction of another being, and then it turns out that both beings are equivalent in worth, than it doesn't matter either way (and if we say the reconstructed being is preferable to our current being, because the new teleported location is preferable, then the logical thing to do would be to teleport). However... I see why the breaking-of-continuity thing is messing with some people (and not with others). My answer is that I would not choose to teleport, unless I really needed or wanted to teleport for some reason. And then after the first teleport I'd probably be okay with doing it more often. Which I realize isn't entirely rational... but hey. I too believe that there is a big difference between a painless teleport death and a painful teleport death. But I you honestly believe that the clone living on in place of you is as goods you existing--then it wouldn't matter whether your death was painful or not. We could make the hypothetical "the clone doesn't remember the pain" argument--and I still wouldn't be able to handle the idea of willfully going into a painful/painless death for the sake of some clone. Because, in the end, that's what this debate is about right? Is the clone good enough to replace me? Is the clone good enough to take over my life. For example, say you dont die. Your clone takes over your job, your kids, your wife, your life. Would it be okay since he has you memories anyway? Would it be okay if someone shot you after the cloning process as opposed to it being a by-product? People keep comparing it to sleep because they want to believe that it is a seem less transition from old you to new you. Because they're still having a hard time accepting the concept that when you die--you die. The new you is a different you. He will have your experiences--but you wont have his.
He will have your experiences, but you won't have his, but who would care? He will exist as if he has always existed (a continuous strand between the originator and the new version), and you won't have any complaints either, because you'd be dead.
I agree with the fresh-install-of-Windows metaphor. The new-me would still be me, and instinctively I want to continue living, and I can continue living through new-me, so everything should be copacetic. However, I also have an internal fear of death, of ceasing to live, of my continuous stream of thoughts (well, apparently continuous - I've been unconscious before, and it feels like no time passed whatsoever) ending, and going through this teleportation would end that stream of thoughts... I think (even though it gets started up elsewhere). So that's why I would be willing to teleport, but only if it was important: The fact that my thoughts get started up elsewhere means I continue to live, but I'd rather not end this current stream if I could avoid it.
|
On April 17 2012 06:23 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:50 urashimakt wrote:On April 17 2012 05:47 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 05:36 urashimakt wrote:On April 17 2012 05:32 mcc wrote:On April 17 2012 04:46 urashimakt wrote:How is being disassembled (and "killed") and put back together exactly the same somewhere else any different than experiencing a length of time without being disassembled? I'm me because of my memory of my experiences. As each indivisible unit of time passes, I "die" and a new me with the memory of the "dead" me goes on. What's important is that the integrity of my memory remains intact and that I continue to exist in the same form for everyone around me. Whether I live normally for a moment in one place or use this "killing and teleporting" machine, the me from a moment ago will be gone and the me of the next moment will have his moment. I'd use it. On April 17 2012 04:46 Meatt wrote:
It's not, but the original is dead now. It's people's egos that just assume the universe is gonna grab their own specific first-person-view (or "soul" if that helps) and teleport it along with the deconstructed atoms. Negative. It's just going to start up a fresh new install of Windows, but also re-install all your programs and music again. But it's still technically different computer, even if it's identical. The idea that your perspective is anything more than a biological analog of a history of your chronologically ordered sensory inputs seems off. There isn't a "soul" to feel an intangible loss when our body stops functioning. The organism that's destroyed will simply cease to be and it'd have no qualms with that, because it doesn't exist anymore. The organism that is created would be you. It would have your memory and your form. It would carry on your existence as an entity to the rest of the universe. You would carry on living no differently than if you had stood still for a fraction of a second, since that version of you would just be you with your memory and form. When someone dies they don't weep. It's the people around them that experience loss. And that is what you miss, you are not just your memories. You are your body, and actually people arguing that this teleport kills you are the materialistic ones. As they actually argue that the matter that you consists of and the specific process that runs on this substrate is you and that is it and there is nothing else. Whereas you posit that you are not your body but you are the information about your body. Which is completely at odds with standard meaning of the word self and is much more idealistic approach. Isn't it given that our body is recreated exactly as it was? That's what I took from the OP. The body physically holds our memories, so since the body is granted I focused on the memory bit. Yes, it is exactly as it was. But what does it has to do with my self-identification. Millions of beings can have bodies exactly like me and my memories. But I am just one of them or none of them. There are no other possibilities (not in this scenario anyway). Since I cannot be all of my copies, I am none of my copies. I am either the original or I am dead. Disclaimer : When I say the above I am talking from the point of view of the being that went into the machine. And I am assuming objective reality, so please no arguments based on "how do you know". Self-identification is a tool we use, it isn't any sort of universal truth. When it helps us simplify things, we refer to it. It almost always does help us simplify things because we don't usually ask questions like "what if I melted myself down and got built up again?" Edit: If there are a million beings that are all exactly like you, you'd feel like that one that sees the other 999,999. The moment any of you start experiencing anything, it would differentiate you from the others. The point is at one point they were not differentiated and if you put them into exactly the same virtual worlds they would remain the same structurally forever. And yet I would never be all of them even if they do not differentiate ever. So being structurally identical to me is not the same as being me.
I'd agree with that. "Me" is a reference that depends on a lot of parameters. If time already differentiates "me" from "me 10 seconds ago", I feel that there's no difference between a lapse in duration of time to the idea of being destroyed and rebuilt.
|
On April 17 2012 05:40 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote:
No, because I'm a Christian, despite any recent doubts, and still believe I'm my soul, and not my brain. Also, I don't believe in the logic of the copy of an old object being the same object. I'M DEAD. I got killed so I can save five fucking hours on a trip to the beach. Actually, I didn't save five hours. I sacrificed my life to save my CLONE five fucking hours. My clone will then sacrifice HIS life so that he can save his clone five fucking hours to drive back home. This will go on for about 80 years, with countless copies killing themselves while I'm forced to look on from the afterlife and observe my clones living the life I should have lived.
HELL NO. If I ever got a death teleportation machine, I would tie a heavy rock to it, take a boat out to the middle of the ocean and ditch the piece of shit. No way am I giving my life for some clone's convenience.
I don't think that the string of deaths (while appearing morbid at first) is quite as extreme as that, because none of those clones would have ever existed without the teleportation machine.
If we assume that:
1) Life is valuable
2) Teleportation death is painless
3) My existence is slightly better when I am in the teleported location than I would be otherwise
Then, if addition represents life and subtraction represents death
(Teleported me) - (old me) > (old me)
but only slightly
However, under this logic, then more life is always better, so everybody should be cloning themselves for the sake of more life... so maybe a defining component of life is individuality? And if that's the case, that supports my argument even more: It's not countless corpses of clones that should have lived, because they were never destined to have lives, they were just following one particular life (unless of course the intent was to have multiple clones having different lives, same genetically and up to a certain point in memory, but then branching off into different people... but then we get serious overpopulation issues)
...but I don't feel certain about all of this. I feel like dumping the death teleportation machine into the ocean could actually be the right move... but again, I don't think it's actually that morbid (as long as there's no continuous drowning, a la Prestige)
|
Why would it matter if the machine makes an identical copy of you, it wont be me that gets teleported, its a copy of myself. So while I die to teleport somewhere, a copy of myself will continue living.. why would I want to do that?
|
Dont know what to answer.
If it is a 100% copy then i guess i would have no problem with it, asuming that thats the way teleporting will work.
This question raises other questions for me btw.
What about we let the machine make a copy of us to teleport and NOT destruct us.
Its basicly the same question beside for killing you lol, so this should even be more atractive.
Still i feel that more people would say no to this question then to the one asked in op.
Dont think we will ever be able to copy for 100% btw, not even 1 million years from now.
Some things are impossible to determine according to quantum mechanics, so thoose properties would be impossible to copy, at least till we found better physics.
|
On August 05 2010 18:49 BrogMaN wrote:
No, absolutely would not even consider it. I've thought about this concept a lot after reading Michael Crichton's(RIP) Timeline. The whole idea terrifies me. Sure it may be an exact copy of me down to the molecule, but it won't be ME. I'll be dead. Gone. Maybe if I was a religious type i would be willing but since i'm pretty atheist and don't really think anything happens after i die there's no way i would willingly kill my current body just to travel somewhere. Unless THIS body would die if I didn't teleport, like if the Earth was about to explode. Then yeah, sure, I would want to keep my ideas alive and have the chance for my genes to be carried on, but that would be the only acceptable reason to teleport for me.
it is very painful to me how little sense this makes.
|
On April 17 2012 05:31 urashimakt wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 05:22 lorkac wrote:
People keep comparing it to sleep because they want to believe that it is a seem less transition from old you to new you. Because they're still having a hard time accepting the concept that when you die--you die. The new you is a different you. He will have your experiences--but you wont have his. I have the experiences of me from 20 seconds ago, but he doesn't have my experiences from those 20 seconds. Am I still the same me? The me of the future will always have experiences the me of the past didn't have, that seems like faulty logic.
To me this doesn't make any sense at all...
You are still you when the time is passing but using the machine destroys your current form and copies the information to reconstruct an identical clone of yourself in another position. This person is no longer you, he's a perfect copy but you are dead.
|
On April 17 2012 06:46 oldahe wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2010 18:49 BrogMaN wrote:
No, absolutely would not even consider it. I've thought about this concept a lot after reading Michael Crichton's(RIP) Timeline. The whole idea terrifies me. Sure it may be an exact copy of me down to the molecule, but it won't be ME. I'll be dead. Gone. Maybe if I was a religious type i would be willing but since i'm pretty atheist and don't really think anything happens after i die there's no way i would willingly kill my current body just to travel somewhere. Unless THIS body would die if I didn't teleport, like if the Earth was about to explode. Then yeah, sure, I would want to keep my ideas alive and have the chance for my genes to be carried on, but that would be the only acceptable reason to teleport for me. it is very painful to me how little sense this makes.
It makes perfect sense to me. The teleporter destroys your body and you die.
Nothing else makes a difference to you since death is permanent.
You are not going to wake up from the dead if by some freak accident an identical copy of yourself is formed somewhere a billion years from now.
|
It always amazes me that anyone would go for this. The discussion stops at "you die"...... even if there is another collection of atoms out there that are an exact replica of yours, it doesn't affect you in any way.... maybe your family, friends and job could go on like nothing happened, but YOU would be dead. You would never see whats on the other end of the transporter, why would it make it any better that someone just like you would?
Think of it like this.... say a replica of yourself walked into the room your in right now. Would you feel okay about killing yourself all of a sudden because he would live on?
|
You dont simply die,else the question would be to easy.
This is a way of teleportation.
If the copy is 100% (wich it is in this case) you wont notice a difference.
You stay you,
You are now made of different atoms and particles, but the configuration is the same.
Its not that much different from reality.
All the elemental particles and atoms in our body are changed and replaced by other particles and atoms throughout our live, i think at least once for every particle (someone with more knowledge on this feel free to correct me).
Now this just happens all at once.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
