From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Tue Oct 29 2002 - 23:18:01 MST
Eugen writes
> I am an upload, and maintain an incremental backup which is up to date
> within biological chronon (currently some 10 ms). I step up to a nuke in
> person, and detonate it. My hardware is destroyed within ms, and the
> remote backup is being instantly instantiated. What I see subjectively is
> that I'm teleported to a new location. No bifurcation had time to occur.
> I'm happy that I have kept a backup.
Thank you for addressing the heart of the difficulty with
the right tools!
But observe that you might have traveled for years via the
above mechanism, and persuaded any and all of its superior
accommodations. Then one day, unbeknownst to you, the
administrators allow a small delay between your remote
duplication and your local disintegration. But you continue
for years just as before.
(OF COURSE there are also versions of you that persist for
only the time of the delay, but as just said, there *is*
a you which goes on despite all that.)
I hope you do not find more reason to *identify* with the
one about to undergo disintegration than with the successfully
duplicated remote one. They are *both* equally you.
> I am an upload, and maintain an incremental backup which is up to date
> within biological chronon. Somebody tortures me for an hour, and then
> kills me. The remote backup is being instantiated. I see subjectively is
> that I'm teleported to a new location, after a harrowing experience.
Yes.
> I am an upload, and maintain an incremental backup which is up to date
> within biological chronon. Somebody severs the link to the archive,
> tortures me for an hour, and then kills me. The remote backup is being
> instantiated as soon as the link is severed (or after an hour, or two
> megayears). While I'm screaming and bleeding virtual blood all the way to
> /dev/null the new instance of me perceives to be teleported after the link
> has been severed (whew! it heaves a virtual sigh). The new instance of me
> which has forked of (and thus is no longer me) has no idea what is
> happening to me.
And thus is "no longer me"? What gives you such a strange
idea? Even though the local copy (soon to die) has harrowing
experiences, experiences *DO NOT* immediately make us into
someone else. (That requires years.) Remember the quasi-equation
memory_erasure + teleportation + memory_enhancement = survival_of_duplicate
(which of course PROVES nothing, I submit it ONLY for purposes of
abbreviating a long argument).
Recall that *PHYSICALLY* these are identical in their final
product. You are the final product. You survive if your
duplicate does because of the above equality.
None of the three operations above alter one's identity,
and that's why you and your duplicate are, for purposes
of surviving, the same person.
Lee
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