On Sun, Nov 11, 2012 at 12:48 PM, Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> wrote:

 >> the main problem is that you're striving to somehow get the Helsinki
>> man to remember the future,
>
>
> > To predict it. Precisely to predict its personal memory of the past, in
> the future.
>

I have no idea what " its personal memory of the past in the future" means
or who "its" refers to but I can predict that in the future there will be 2
people who call themselves John Clark and BOTH of them will remember being
me, the Helsinki man of right now. I can also predict that one of those
people will feel like he's in Washington and only Washington and the other
will feel like he's in Moscow and only Moscow. So Bruno, what part of my
prediction do you think I got wrong? Just like any prediction the only way
to tell if it was correct or not it to wait until the future arrives and
examine the evidence, in this case that means interviewing the Washington
man and the Moscow Man and BOTH will say that my prediction was 100%
correct.

Speaking of predictions I can predict what you're response to this will be,
you'll start peeing again and insisting that I'm confused. But the fact is
you can't interview "the Helsinki man of right now" after the experiment
and see if he still thinks his prediction is (was?) correct because the
Helsinki man of right now will not exist in the future and nobody can
remember the future, only the past.

> But the helsinki guy is sure that it will be W or M.
>

That's one reason this thought experiment is so weak, it depends entirely
on who the Helsinki man is; if he's you then yes he is sure it will be W or
M, but if he's me then no because he is sure it will be W AND M.  And it's
important to keep in mind that predicting is not the same as remembering
and being sure is not the same as being correct.

  John K Clark

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