On 16 May 2014 10:25, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > On 5/15/2014 2:57 PM, LizR wrote: > >> Comp and the capsule theory of memory (and "Memento") suggest that a >> "person" is a series of person-moments, each of which is considered to last >> somewhere around 1/10th of a second (it could be longer or shorter and the >> idea would still hold) and assumed be the same person due to being linked >> by memories. >> > > I think there's an implicit assumption here that 'person-moments' refers > only to conscious thoughts. Subconscious thoughts, e.g. information > processing, may take longer and overlap and occur in different parts of the > brain. Just because they are not conscious thoughts, I don't think we can > ignore them. After all, acting from habit, "without thinking", is part of > a person's character.
There isn't particularly an implicit assumption, because at some point the subconscious thoughts have conscious consequences, and *those* are part of the "person moment". The rest is like memory retrieval, for example - at some point the memory becomes conscious, and contributes to a PM. The implicit assumptions are that there is something important about consciousness (i.e. eliminative materialism <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliminative_materialism>is wrong), plus the idea that a PM (or OM) is a well defined notion. (Personally I'm agnostic on these points.) Generally this is considered to be because of physical continuity, but > comp-style thought experiments, at least, can deconstruct that idea. The > question is whether physical continuity has some bearing on identity, or is > just incidental (i.e. nature hasn't found any other way to do it). The > usual argument against the importance of physical continuity is that we > replace our cells - even our brain cells, apparently - every few > hours/days/years/whatever. > I don't think we replace our brain cells, but even if we do, isn't the fact > that they are replaced and the replacements are functionally similar > important to who we are? > > We do, apparently. http://www.theguardian.com/science/neurophilosophy/2012/feb/23/brain-new-cells-adult-neurogenesis (I know I could do with some new ones ... or do I mean "neurones" ?) I'm not sure why you asked that question, however. What would make you think that this ISN'T important to who we are? Obviously the capsule theory of identity says that functional similarity is important to who we are and that it's important on a far shorter timescale than brain cell replacement. (Or is this just another of those "buts" you like to throw in occasionally when not actually disagreeing? :) > > And more specifically, the atoms involved in a thought might go on to do >> something else - take part in a different thought, form a memory, pay a >> visit to the big toe... they're constantly being moved around, even without >> being lost from the system. >> > > Replacing atoms is not problematic since we think any two of the same > species are strictly identical. The question is whether the brain could be > implemented in some completely different medium and still instantiate the > same consciousness. I think it could only do so approximately - so it > might be close enough to fool your friends but still not be exactly you. > But does this imply, per Bruno's MGA, that no physical instantiation is > needed at all - just the existence in Platonia of those computations is > enough? I think the argument only proves that there could be another > world, in which you are instantiated in whatever is the physics of that > world, e.g. Turing machine computations. > > Imho this depends on whether comp and the capsule theory are correct - i.e. whether "yes doctor" is a good bet. It can only be a good bet if there is nothing supernatural involved, if physical continuity isn't important (which requires that eliminativism is wrong, I think), and if there aren't any infinities getting in the way of perfect duplication (e.g. if space-time is a continuum then exact duplication is unlikely, even in an infinite universe). If exact duplication of a conscious person is possible at any level, then it should be possible to instantiate the same person in other parts of an infinite universe, in other parts of the multiverse, in computer simulations, and in Platonia (the last one assuming Bruno knows what he is talking about and computations exist in some useful sense in Platonia). -- 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/d/optout.
