X-Message-Number: 25228
Date: Sun, 5 Dec 2004 20:14:18 -0800 (PST)
From: Scott Badger <>
Subject: Identity

Richard (and those still following the thread):

Consider two scenarios:

(Case #1)  Suppose I could see beyond 3 dimensions and
into time. So when you walk across a room, you appear
to me as a worm, one end starting at the time when you
entered the room and the other end when you left the
room. I would see not only the  you  that entered the
room, but every instantiation of  you  every
microsecond as you passed through the room.

From my 4th dimensional perspective, there would be
millions of versions of  you  in the room
simultaneously. Each one would appear to be an almost
exact duplicate of the instantiation that preceded it
in time. Still there would be very minor changes in
terms of location and the arrangement of your
molecules, etc. So which one is the original and which
the copy? Ridiculous question, of course! They are all
 you . If you had to choose one to survive, which one
would you select? The one that exited the room? OK.
But would you settle for the one that entered the
room? Would you consider that to still be you? What
about 5 minutes ago? What about 3 days ago?  Where is
the line and how can you justify the existence of a
line?

You insist that you and a duplicate in the same room
at the same time would be two different people. But
how is that scenario really different from the you
 now  and the you just before now? Just because you
can t see in 4 dimensions as you can see in 3
dimensions doesn t mean a real difference exists
between the cases I describe.

(Case #2)  A surgeon cuts the corpus callosum of a
patient, separating the two hemispheres of the brain.
What happens to your hypothetical QE? Is it still
intact? Clearly it is from the reports of those who ve
undergone such surgical procedures. What is happening
here? Are there two QE s created? Let s take it
further. What if (and I believe Mike Perry already
addressed this but I missed your response if there was
one) a cryonically frozen brain is devoid of damage
except it has been split into 3 parts instead of 2 and
then put back together? You insist that disassembly
destroys the original QE, so is it destroyed at this
level of disassembly? Remember, the QE apparently
wasn t destroyed when the brain was cut in half. What
if we split the brain into 10 pieces and successfully
reassemble it? What about 100 pieces or 1 billion?
Where is the line and how can you justify the
existence of a line?

To me, despite your assertion that super intelligent
computers in the future will most likely agree with
you (such hubris), your arguments are still
unconvincing. Nothing personal, of course, but your
hypotheses, despite their traditional foundations, are
no less speculative than Perry s, Donaldson s or mine.
You seem to think that we are seeking comfort in
non-traditional definitions of identity, but is it
possible that you are seeking comfort in traditional
definitions of identity? Adopting your traditional
view makes everything very black and white, and my
years tell me that topics of this magnitude are rarely
resolved with plainly obvious and simple black and
white solutions.

I do agree that you should provide your cryonics firm
with an advance directive stating your preference with
respect to uploading vs. biological re-animation. The
only policy cryonics firms need to have in place is
that they will honor such advance directives to
whatever degree is feasible and reasonable.

Best regards,

Scott

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=25228