Thanks Bruce, that was quite illuminating. I know Bruno will say that these other notions of personal identity contradict COMP - and I can see that considering the original copy as dead, and two new persons being created directly contradicts the "Yes, doctor" postulate. But I can see it may be pertinent to discuss these alternate notions of personal identity in a computationalist setting.
On Mon, Apr 13, 2015 at 01:31:45PM +1000, Bruce Kellett wrote: > > If I might jump into this protracted argument here, I think that > John does have a point in what he is saying about the confusion over > personal pronouns. This refers back to the very old philosophical > problem of personal identity. The philosophical literature is full > of extended discussions on this, and it is widely understood that > ideas such as brain transplants and duplicating machines play merry > havoc with our intuitive notions of personal identity. > > This problem is brought to the fore with the first few steps of > Bruno's argument, but he does not really discuss this. The closest I > can see is a footnote to step 5 to the effect that Nozick's 'closest > continuer' account of personal identity is contradicted. This is > true, but one needs to replace this relatively intuitive notion of > personal identity with something a little more worked out. The basis > of personal identity in computationalism seems to be just the > computations underlying a particular consciousness, under which > theory a person's identity can be duplicated any number of times. > Hence the problems that John has from his more intuitive > perspective. > > The philosophical literature has not come to any consensus on this > matter. One could follow Parfit (Reason and Persons, 1984) and claim > that because the original person is not preserved in the > teleportation/duplication experiments of steps 1-4, new persons are > created each time, and the original person is killed (cut) each > time. There is, then, no first person indeterminacy because the > first person is always eliminated. > > There is a difference in step 5, where the original is duplicated > but not destroyed. Then one could follow the standard intuition and > say that the original person survives intact in Brussels, and some > new person is transported to Amsterdam. Such an approach to person > identity would solve John's problems and remove all the ambiguity > about personal pronouns. > > Because the problem of person identity is not resolved in the > philosophical literature, much less in popular intuition, it is > clearly premature to simply take over a comp version without further > discussion. Sure, in order to succeed, comp needs personal identity > to be associated exclusively with some abstract computations that > might or might not be performed by a physical brain. But one is > equally at liberty to argue that the physical body (extended even to > immediate environs and so on) is an essential part of our > understanding of personal identity. In other words, Bruno begs the > question here, and really does have to give an independent > justification of the notion of personal identity which he wants to > use. > > Bruce > > -- > 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. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- 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.
