X-Message-Number: 17002
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 22:37:17 -0700
From: Mike Perry <>
Subject: Cloning and Coming Back

Olaf Henny, #16995, writes

>While I believe, that there is a point in preserving recordings,
>photos etc. in order to augment a memory, which might be left
>"spotty" after revival, I see no benefit in keeping such records,
>when only the DNA is preserved.  If the purpose is to create a
>clone, or several, of myself, then preserving genetic material may
>be of some use.  However the preserved recordings and photos will
>do little to integrate themselves into the consciousness of a
>clone, growing up in an entirely different environment than the
>original, beyond being interesting historic information.

The recordings and photos won't just "integrate themselves." *But* have you 
considered the possibility of not just creating a clone, a tabula rasa, and 
have it learn something from records as it grows up, but instead creating a 
*programmed* clone, that *starts off* with information derived from records 
and suitably encoded in its memory structure? There is also no reason why 
the new individual would start as a baby. Instead, nanotechnology should 
make it possible to create a fully formed and *in*formed adult, right at 
the start. Now granted, the reconstructed memories might be a bit skewed or 
pushed around, amplified or shrunken, from what would have been obtained 
from a good cryopreservation. Still it might be good enough to qualify as 
more-or-less the original person, even by hard-nosed critics (those who, at 
least, are willing to be lenient on the issue of original material). The 
reconstruction, if done properly, should produce an individual in no 
identity-critical way distinguishable from the original either by 
him/herself or others. That would follow just on informational grounds, if 
you assume that information is the deciding factor, as I do. So you'd be 
doing something right, and maybe it would be enough, depending on how you 
look at "enough."

Mike Perry

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