Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > > Finally, a variation on the type of thought experiments we have been > discussing (I'd be surprised if someone hasn't already brought this up > sometime, but I don't recall seeing it). We agree that if someone spends a > minute in Brussels, then is destructively teleported to Washington, where he > spends another minute, he will experience two minutes of continuous > consciousness, the first minute in Brussels and the second minute in > Washington, even if there is a delay between the disintegration and > rematerialisation. But what if, somehow, the minute's experience in Brussels > were run simultaneously with the minute's experience in Washington, just as > they would have happened consecutively, and then the person in Brussels > instantly disintegrates. We could even arrange it so that the minute in > Washington objectively precedes the minute in Brussels, as Greg Egan does > with uploaded beings in "Permutation City". Would the subject experience the > same linear progression of time in either c ase? Would there be a moral problem with "killing" the subject in Brussels which was not an issue with the "normal" teleportation? > > Stathis Papaioannou
Without really getting into your thought experiment, I want to ask a question. What does it mean to "experience a minute of continuous consciousness"? OK, we have a biological clock that gives us a rough sense of relative passing of time. But I don't think you maintain that our personal identity is tied to that, do you? In order to really be sure we are going through time, I think we have to get discrete input from the external world every once in a while to see how much time (roughly) has passed. If we are annihilated and duplicated with a delay, I think we would be interested in how much time actually *did* pass, in order to continue to live our life (identity) in the most effective way. Tom --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
