On 12 December 2013 11:53, LizR <[email protected]> wrote: > On 12 December 2013 11:25, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> On 12/11/2013 1:18 PM, LizR wrote: >> >> ISTM that "Yes Doctor" sums up comp. If a digital brain made below my >> substitution level can substitute for my organic one, then I literally have >> a 50% chance of waking up as the digital version. >> >> However if the Subst Level is quantum, no cloning stops it being actually >> possible. >> >> >> But I don't think "substitution level" is sharply defined. You brain must >> be mostly classical (otherwise it would be evolutionarily useless) and so >> one might well say "yes" to the doctor, while realizing that the immediate >> state of your brain at the micro-level would not be duplicated. But this >> would be no worse than losing the state under anesthetic - which I hope the >> doctor was going to use anyway. >> > It depends what is the important level for maintaining selfhood. It seems > reasonable to assume that the self remains the same when the brain is > duplicated at the quantum level (if one believes the MWI this is happening > all the time). It's possible that the self is retained during duplication at > higher levels, but it isn't guaranteed. If my brain was duplicated at, say, > the cellular level, I might simply die, and someone who thinks she's me > would be created. (Or then again, that might be happening all the time > anyway.) > > These are the sort of consideration that make me think that if you say "yes" > to the Doctor, you've already effectively swallowed all the implcations of > comp.
The required substitution level cannot be the quantum level since we know that people can survive with their cognitive faculties intact even with gross brain changes, such as after a stroke or head injury. -- Stathis Papaioannou -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
