X-Message-Number: 25120
Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 00:26:07 -0700
From: Mike Perry <>
Subject: Comments on Comments on Qualia, Etc.

Robert Ettinger:

>It is even conceivable that there is a kernel of truth in
>the Oriental notion of everybody being part of everyone else--horrible
>thought.

Maybe *a little bit* part of--not to worry.

Olaf Henny:

>But the real gist of my previous posting was to point out the
>inadequacy of brain uploading.  Even when you should have that
>feeling of satisfaction at popping back up to reality, it won't
>be there, since the pituitary gland and all its subordinate
>helpers in the endocrine system are no longer with you and cannot
>give you that chemical impulse that creates the 'feel good' in
>your (mechanical?) brain.

You overlook the anticipated power of uploading. It should, if it works as 
intended, be able to supply a convincing replication of all those feelings 
you hold dear.

Scott Badger:

>Perry wrote: "There is no qualia experiencer. There is
>no separation between the events defined as an
>experience and the body-mind in which those events
>take place."

Actually it was Robert Ettinger who wrote this, though it sounds basically 
right to me. Richard's theory seems to equate the qualia experiencer to a 
general purpose device, leaving behind the elements: memories, 
dispositions, and so on that uniquely make up one individual. So you could 
re-imprint the QE with totally different memories and such, obtain what on 
the face of it is a different individual, yet we still must regard it as 
the same person as before. Not the way I see it.

>Richard further seems to contradict himself by writing
>to Perry:
>"Now here we come to the root of the problem: a
>process, or a pattern ... cannot experience anything.
>Processes do not have physical existences;.."
>
>Maybe I'm confused here but Richard appears to equate
>pattern and process. Did Perry make that claim? I
>didn't think so.

No, actually I didn't *equate* pattern and process (and Richard didn't 
exactly say I did either, but notes that I associate the two). On the other 
hand, I see no reason a process "cannot have physical existence"--does an 
ocean wave not have physical existence?--and I mean qua a wave and not just 
as a changing mass of particles. How about a computer ap you are 
interacting with? Maybe it's just a matter of point of view, but I find it 
compelling that such processes have physical existence, or at least are 
something every bit as "real" as what we call physical objects. (And I've 
also made the point that solid matter is not so solid when examined 
closely. The wave-particle duality seems to further strengthen the case 
that processes are as real as objects--or maybe more so.)  Persons are 
processes of a certain sort, I've indicated before--that's my view at any 
rate. A Pattern or chunk of information captures the details of a person 
(process) at a particular time. From that you could make a duplicate 
(assuming enough details are captured, a very tall order by today's 
standards but possible in principle). You could start the duplicate 
"running"--that would be another process which would almost certainly start 
to diverge from the original but in theory might not for a time. In that 
event you'd have what I call two instantiations of one individual, and in 
effect your two processes would form one process with, again, two 
instantiations. (The "one process" would consist of an equivalence class 
rather than a single item. In mathematics this sort of thing is no biggie, 
but I realize it creates confusion if you try to apply it to the real 
world.) If this is clear as mud only, well, I hope it's a more translucent mud.

Best to all,
Mike Perry

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