From: Emlyn (emlyn@one.net.au)
Date: Tue Dec 12 2000 - 02:37:54 MST
> Emlyn <emlyn@one.net.au> Wrote:
>
> > I agree, absolutely. The bio-brain that you reassembled is a copy
>
> But the "copy" has all the original neurons all in place exactly as they
were before.
>
> >The artificial brain, however, includes the original stream of
consciousness
>
> Thought experiment time. I make a copy of you and of course both insist
they
> are you. I take one particular neuron in the brain of "The Original" and
"The Copy"
> and swap them, both still insist they are you and in fact report
absolutely no
> difference. Two questions:
>
> 1) I do this 50 billion time so that half the brains have been
transplanted, both
> still insist they are you, but which one is "REALLY" you?
>
> 2)I do this 50 billion times more so that the both brains have been
entirely
> transplanted, both still report no change in their subjective
experience,
> not even a little. Both can still remember being you before all this
started too.
> Which one is "REALLY" you?
>
> I'll bet you can guess my answer to these questions, but I'd like to hear
yours.
>
> John K Clark jonkc@att.net
What you are doing is incrementally replacing substrate. It doesn't matter
where this substrate comes from.
We've got person O (original) and person C (copy)
Half the neurons are swapped. As long as this is transparent (undetectable,
or negligibly detectable, or interruptive below some unknown threshold), O
is still the original; C is still the copy.
All the neurons are swapped. O, with C's neurons, is still the original, and
C, with O's neurons, is still the copy. The conscious streams were never
moved; the continuous identity from before the experiment is still in O.
Emlyn
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