On 9/15/2019 6:13 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 13 Sep 2019, at 22:28, 'Brent Meeker' via Everything List
<[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On 9/13/2019 10:59 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
On Wed, Sep 11, 2019 at 6:38 PM Bruce Kellett <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On Thu, Sep 12, 2019 at 2:55 AM Jason Resch
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On Tuesday, September 10, 2019, Bruce Kellett
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On Wed, Sep 11, 2019 at 10:18 AM 'Brent Meeker' via
Everything List <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On 9/10/2019 4:30 PM, Bruce Kellett wrote:
> Another argument that has been given here before
is that if quantum
> immortality is true, then we should expect to see
a number of people
> who are considerably older than the normal life
expectancy -- and we
> do not see people who are two or three hundred
years old. Even if the
> probabilities are very low, there have been an
awful lot of people
> born within the last 500 or so years -- some must
have survived on our
> branch if this scenario is true.
My argument was that each of us should find
ourselves to be much older
than even the oldest people we know.
That is probably the best single argument against
quantum immortality: if QI is true, then the measure of
our lifetime after one reaches a normal lifetime is
infinitely greater than the measure before age , say,
120 yr. So if one finds oneself younger than 120 years,
QI is false, and if MWI is still considered to be true,
there must be another argument why MWI does not imply QI.
Why do you think that measure only increases with age? On an
objective level it only decreases.
As Bruno would say, "you confuse the 1p with the 1pp." I am
talking about my personal measure of the number of years I have
lived. As I get older, the number of years I have lived
increases. If I live to 1000, I have lived more years between
100 and 1000 than between 1 and 100. This is arithmetic, after all.
I see. This reasoning works only under the assumption that finding
yourself in any particular year across your infinite lifespan is
equiprobable (i.e. you can ignore the effects of the number or
measure of the various yous in other branches). This is what I
thought you mean by measure, in terms of how to calculate
probabilities / weights of the various branches.
But this discussion has gone off the rails. It started as a
discussion of quantum immortality, and the arguments against
this notion, even in MWI. The arguments against QI that have
been advanced are that life-threatening events tend not to be
binary or quantum, but rather we enter a period of slow decline,
due to illness or other factors. Consequently, there is no
reason for us to expect to be immortal, even in MWI.
I don't see how that last sentence follows. It is true MWI doesn't
guarantee we should expect to always survive in the same condition,
but it does guarantee we should survive in some form.
But what does "we" refer to. Are you saying Jason, with the memories
he has at this moment, will always have a successor in the future.
Or are you saying there'll always be a Jason that shares my childhood
memories or my memories of last year when that lightning bolt just
missed me.
The other argument is that if QI is true, then you would expect
to be very old.
We only know we are very old if our memories accumulate without
limit, but MWI does not guarantee persistence of memory. It also
follows from this that to know one is immortal (has lived an
infinite number of years) requires an infinitely large brain and
memory capacity.
I don't have to remember everything that happened over 80yrs to know
I'm 80yrs old. In fact I only need to remember my birthday.
And memory is fallible, and memory of age has no more meaning when
your age is bigger that the nameable or describable number, which
happens very soon, relatively, for the immortal being trying to keep
track of their birthday.
Immortality is when you are to old to be able to even name your age.
After that, you have always the same age.
Nice aphorisms. But irrelevant. The question is why don't we see
almost everyone else as younger?
Mortality is an illusion enjoyed by the gods when tired of eternity.
It is very long ....
Brent
"Eternity is very long. Especially near the end."
---- Woody Allen
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