From: gts (gts@optexinc.com)
Date: Tue Oct 22 2002 - 17:58:42 MDT
Dan Fabulich wrote:
> Actually, I explicitly want to bracket that question. It's
> my argument that we can solve the moral problems and questions
> posed by personal backups/dupes/xoxes etc *without* settling the
> question as to whether your dupe is "really you".
Maybe so.
> [In fact, I think something stronger:
> we *must* do this, because there can be no answer to the identity
> question, as it is malformed.]
I don't see it as malformed. What is needed here is, I think, a
generalized answer to the question "Who are you?" When asked this
question, people will typically respond first with name, serial number,
occupation, social security number, driver's license number, etc.
Pressed for a more detailed answer, they will begin to say such things
as "I am a supporter of the xyz political party," "I am a member of the
xyz religious faith," "I am a lover of rock and roll," "I am someone who
opposes/supports abortion rights," "I am a quiet person who likes to
read," "I am a tall fat person," etc, etc, etc. The person will be
listing the attributes of his body and personality that together make
him a person distinct from other persons. It is to those attributes that
he refers when he refers to himself as "I" or "me." *Those* things are
who he *is*.
So then to determine if a dupe is equal to his original, we need only
compare the list of attributes. Given that our personality changes
through time in response to events in our lives, and given that the life
experiences of duplicates differ from their original's, it seems quite
obvious to me that the dupe's personal attributes will be different from
the original's personal attributes, even if only slightly. Thus we can
answer the question of identity in the negative. A dupe is not the
original. The original and the dupe begin to diverge immediately after
the moment of duplication.
Lee's argument for the equivalency of dupes (which leads him to make
nonsensical statements such as "A person can be in two places at the
same time") fails to account for changes in personality. He focuses only
on the duplication of memories, forgetting that personalities change
through time.
>> The key point here is that the son's decision to keep or break the
>> promise will depend on the son's moral assessment of his
>> father's past promise -- *not* on some false belief that
>> "father equals son."
>
> This is a perfect example from my point of view, because we
> often think that it's morally correct for family members to
> lay down their lives to protect each other, despite their relatively
> limited causal origins.
Yes.
I used this father-son analogy because it also has some reality in
society in terms of estate law. If a father dies before he keeps his
promise to pay back a loan then his son (as executor and heir) will be
compelled by law to keep his father's promise. However he will fight to
break the promise if he can prove it to be illegal. The analogy is
appropriate to the extent that law attempts to mimic morality.
> That special relationship that connects you with your
> past-person in the context of promises holds as well for present
> personal duplicates; whatever it is that's motivating us to keep
> past promises is the same thing that's going to motivate us to
> "lay down our lives" for our xoxes.
I think brother-brother might be the best analogy for our relationship
to our xoxes when both us and they are alive. They are not us, but it
would be natural to feel fond of them and morally obligated to them in
the same way that siblings usually feel toward one another.
For that matter, there is no important difference in my mind between an
xox and an identical twin sibling. Fortunately identical twins have
enough sense to know they are not the same person in two places at one
time.
-gts
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