From: Dickey, Michael F (michael_f_dickey@groton.pfizer.com)
Date: Fri Oct 25 2002 - 09:00:08 MDT
-----Original Message-----
From: John K Clark [mailto:jonkc@att.net]
"Dickey, Michael F" <michael_f_dickey@groton.pfizer.com> Wrote:
> Aside from the unusual special case you noted above, if you accept that to
> be one person one must share sensory input with oneself, then noting and
> accepting that a copy and an original *do not* share sensory input would
> acknowledge that they are two, separate, distinct individuals.
"Yes. In most cases the two would start to diverge almost immediately and
the
differences would only increase as time went by. That's why the prospect of
getting vaporized would make me rather unhappy if my backup was older than a
second or two."
> But both are not made up of the *same* atoms.
"The way to tell if two objects are the *same* is to exchange them and note
the changes; if you do this for atoms absolutely nothing changes. Atoms have
no individuality, if they can't even give this interesting property to
themselves how can they give it to us? I'll give you an example."
That is one way to tell if objects are the 'same'. If I change one atom in
my pattern, you are right, there are no discernable changes. But if I
change *all* atoms in my pattern, there is a discernable change. Because if
I did the equivalent of recreating my pattern with a new group of atoms, the
original pattern with the original atoms will not experience the same
subjective events that the new pattern with the new group of atoms
experiences, thus they are different beings. This is the core of my
argument. If you copy and original, the original and the copy do not share
the same sensory experience, so they *must not* be the same person (that is,
*one* entity) They may be the same as in they are both identical to one
another (as the change in time approaches zero) but they are two distinct
separate entities. Similarly, if you copy an original and destroy the
original, there is no reason to suspect that this new copy is a continuation
of the subjective experience of the original. To presume as much would
imply that the original and the copy are telepathically linked in some way,
this is quite unscientific. It would be easy to prove they are not by just
not destroying the original, and then asking them both if they are sensing
the same events. If they are not, then a copy is not the continuation of
the consciousness of the original. I have asserted through these logical
arguments that to maintain a continuation of consciousness or subjective
experience one must retain the same pattern in the same atoms (that is, in
the atoms that make up that pattern)
To use your example of vaporization, if you backed yourself up, and then
were vaporized, your backup would not remember being vaporized. *you* were
the one who was vaporized. If your backup does not remember that, then it
is not *you*, it is a copy of you from a few seconds before. You would not
feel as though you woke up after being vaporized.
"In my right hand I'm holding a hydrogen atom,... but according to the laws
of physics it is imposable to tell even in theory who
is Ed and who is Ted, both now have the same history. Stuff like that
happens all the time at the quantum level. "
It does not happen at the macroscopic level, so the analogy is flawed. A
better analogy would be to assume that you were to take to hydrogen atoms
and mix them up and then ask which was the one in your left hand before you
mixed them up. I could not tell, of course, but that does not mean that at
one point in time one of them was in your left hand and it does not mean
that they are actually 'one' hydrogen atom, as I can clearly see one in each
hand.
> Just because someone/everyone is unable to
> distinguish between two items doesn't mean
> they aren't an original and a copy.
"Here we have a case where the laws of Physics say it is imposable to ever
tell the difference between two things and you say nevertheless there is a
huge difference between the two."
The huge difference is that they are two distinct separate entities. In the
case of sub-atomic particles, one is at point xyz in space and the other is
at point x+1,y+1,z+1 in space. They exist in two separate spaces, thus they
are two different entities. I can point at them, one with each finger, and
say 'see, they are two different particles, they may be the 'same', but they
are two distinct particles' In the case of an original and a copy, they may
also not have any test to tell them apart, but one of them came out of the
copy end of the scanner copier and the other came out of the scanner end.
Also, the most significant factor telling them apart is that there are *two*
of them, one on my right side on my left. Again, I can point at them and
say 'see, they are two distinct separate entities that exist independently
from one another' To assert that there is 'no difference' between them is
to not acknowledge that there are two of them.
"You could state exactly the same thing more concisely and honestly simply
by saying they are different because they have a different soul. You could
say it, but I don't care to."
A soul is not necessary to invoke, it is only necessary to look and see two
distinct separate entities to realize that there are two of them.
> Just because you don't know, or can't know, the
> difference, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
"I think I'll stick to the scientific method."
If so, them demonstrate to us, logically and scientifically, that it is
reasonable to assume a copy of me shares the same subjective experience as I
do.
Michael
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