X-Message-Number: 9127
From: 
Date: Sat, 7 Feb 1998 10:12:01 EST
Subject: the cat's meow etc.

Rand Simberg (#9122) says he would not be interested in saving himself through
cryonics if he knew "he" would be revived as an amnesiac, because the amnesiac
would be a different person.

This is merely an attitude or feeling, not based on knowledge of what "really"
constitutes identity, because we don't have that knowledge yet. But one should
also remember that an "amnesiac" has only lost SOME of his memories, perhaps
those relating to his personal history. If someone decides that this sort of
memory constitutes his identity, or if that is what he values most, then that
is his decision, but it is premature.

Steve Bridge (#9123) says we cannot assign a meaningful probability to the
revival of any particular patient. This is somewhat similar to Paul Wakfer's
statement that we can't find a probability for revival because we don't know
the anatomy/physiology of important aspects of the self such as
memory/personality/consciousness. 

To see the fallacy, look again at my football example. The AP writers poll
picks MSU over WSU, and the poll has a long history of about 70% accuracy in
picking winners. However, since the poll this week was taken, many things
might have happened. Maybe the MSU star caught a cold. Maybe someone on one of
the teams was bribed. Maybe this and maybe that; there are countless things we
don't know that, if known, would modify our estimate. IRRELEVANT. The FACT is
that, if we repeatedly make a bet based on the AP poll, and if the poll
methodology etc. remain reasonably constant, we will win the bet about 70% of
the time. That is what probability MEANS, and that is ALL it means.

Thomas Donaldson (#9124) asks what I mean by saying that my procedure works.
See paragraph immediately above--also the booklet, which will be sent to him
as requested.

As for Thomas' cat, which meows for food because that tactic sometimes
succeeds--yes, the cat is indeed doing something EQUIVALENT to acting on an
implicit probability calculation. The cat knows that the tactic sometimes
works, and that sometimes it doesn't. It meows because it figures the chance
makes the effort worth while--even though it doesn't think in those explicit
terms. 

But the main point, once more, is that each observer must choose that series
of experiments that best reflects his most relevant information store at the
moment. If he does that, and if conditions do not change too radically too
rapidly, that series of experiments will continue to reflect past results, and
he has a useful probability in hand.

Robert Ettinger
Cryonics Institute
Immortalist Society
http://www.cryonics.org

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