X-Message-Number: 11246
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: A short (?) reply to Mike Perry
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 1999 23:00:58 +1100 (EST)

Hi everyone!

and hi to Mike, once more.

If I understand the meaning of "digital", it implies the possibility (no,
not the probability) of two people who for a short time are identical but
do NOT share EITHER their past OR their future. That is the situation
I was discussing.

I have already discussed the case of two people who have (at least) the
same memories of their past. Once someone is duplicated, I have argued 
that in practice the duplicates will diverge from one another very fast.
Your discussion of Abel and Baker, and how one of them might be made
identical to the other, basically gives one more variety of this kind
of duplication. I have no problem with the possibility of your example,
though Baker might well have good reason to complain.

There is a fundamental issue here, however, and I personally would put
a lot of weight on experimental studies of consciousness and self. I doubt
that we can really settle this issue just by discussion. For that matter,
there may be NO good definition of "identity" when we speak about a 
person --- and this isn't necessarily a bad thing. Lots of ideas can only
be "defined" circularly, which means that our criteria for "identity" are
floppy and shady round the edges, just like our criteria for "love". What
experiments may do is to tell us just how this notion of identity works
in brain structure and activity. (And even perhaps something like what
we now know about memory: that there are several different kinds). After
a very long hiatus, neuroscientists have now once more begun to look
seriously at issues such as the "self". They can even exclude some 
possibilities, but that hardly settles the question.

For cryonics what we really want to know is whether or not a person
created (say) from a detailed description of us, and brought to life
in a world in which our own brains and bodies could not be revived,
would actually BE us. I will say that my belief in an objective universe
forces me to say that such a person will be "the same" as the original,
although I will add that we still may not have the proper information
needed to make that suitable detailed description --- yet. And yes, I
believe that the needed information can be discovered.

			Best and long long life to all,

				Thomas Donaldson

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