On 23 Jun 2015, at 06:09, Bruce Kellett wrote:
John Clark wrote:
I confess that I had never heard of the "Closer Continuer Theory"
until today, so I typed it into Google and read the first thing
that came up. http://www2.drury.edu/cpanza/continuer-theory.html
A quick glance at this indicates that it is not a very good or clear
exposition of the closest continuer theory. You should look at the
original sources.
In any case, we can't actually duplicate people, so we can't perform
experiments on this.
But we can assume people can be duplicated in principle, at some
level. We can derive observable consequences of that, and get
performable experiments. (And that is actually the case).
Bruno
Even the discussions of split brains and the like are not really
about duplication.
Bruce
And my original snap judgement was correct, it is a pretty silly
theory. > To be sent to the moon is not a violation, but to
be beamed to
the moon while the original stayed behind on Earth would involve a
branching continuer -- the branch on the moon would introduce a
"break" with the past causal history of the person (which the
person
on Earth maintains).
How is that a break with past causal history? There was a cause, a
reason, that the guy on the moon is the way he is, he is the way he
is because of the way things happened to the guy on earth. a clear-
cut case of cause and effect. And given that the atoms in your body
and brain are in a constant state of flux, just what is so original
about "the original" anyway? > Nozick's theory suggests that
if a branching event occurs, the
branch that is the closest in terms of psychological continuity
will
be the branch that maintains personal identity.
What in the world does that even mean? Suppose I'm not the "closest
continuer", does that mean I have no identity even though I vividly
remember being John Clark as a child? Has some mysterious force
emanated from that closer guy reach out and found me and destroyed
my consciousness? > If a person is duplicated, at the moment
of duplication -- up to
the time when the closest continuer can be established -- neither
branch maintains a personal identity with the original chain.
Then,
once the closest continuer is established, the closest one takes
on
identity with the former chain. This, to be frank, is quite odd.
For
a small amount of time a person would not be identical with his
former self, and then that person will once again be identical
with
that self. So for a small time a person loses personal identity
with
his former self.
That sounds like a parliamentary procedure dreamed up by a
committee of human politicians to determine which decedent of a
recently deceased Duke should receive that royal title; it does not
sound like a law of nature. John K Clark
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