--- Randall Randall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > On Jun 28, 2007, at 11:26 PM, Tom McCabe wrote: > > --- Randall Randall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > wrote: > >> and > >> What should a person before a copying experiment > >> expect to remember, after the experiment? That > is, > >> what should he anticipate? > > > > Waking up as a copy, as this will be true for all > the > > copies which later remember his anticipation. If > he > > anticipates waking up as copy A, copy B will think > he > > was wrong. > > Exactly. If the experiment is run 10 times (as in > an earlier iteration), the end copies will find that > a 50% anticipation of waking up as the first copy > and a 50% anticipation of waking up as the second > copy works out closest to accurate viewed across all > of their experiences. > > >> Obviously, the only way to determine the answer > to > >> the second question is to answer the first. Once > >> you've answered the first, and noted the various > >> answers from various viewpoints of people that > all > >> remember being the "original", it seems obvious > >> that the way to handle the anticipation question > >> is via probability. If A goes to sleep and B and > >> C wake up remembering having been A, since B > doesn't > >> remember having been C and C doesn't remember > >> having been B, it's clear that the original, A, > >> should have expected to wake up B 50%, and C 50%. > > > > This would be true if A were some magical > conserved > > essence that *could not be created or destroyed* > and > > was split evenly between B and C. In reality, of > > course, A never wakes up (we're assuming A is > > destroyed and B and C are preserved, right?) and > so > > the statement is moot. > > I don't understand why you would think that magic > or conservation has anything to do with this. There > are two individuals after the copying. One is B, > and the other is C. Since B will say, "Hey, I woke > up as B, and not as C! How about that!", and C > likewise in reverse, it seems clear that there are > two cases which happened to the set of people who > remember having been A (leaving to the side the > ever argumentative question of whether they "are" > A; it's not important for this). So, there are > two cases, which are exclusive (neither of them > remembers being the other, only A).
Agreed. The point is, that when A goes to sleep, he doesn't have a 50/50 chance of waking up as B or waking up as C. Since consciousness isn't conserved, you can create more of it during the copying process, and so A can wake up as B and C, and isn't forced to choose between them, or have a probability distribution over possible wakings up that sums to 1. As for magic, I simply reference it because there's no physical support whatsoever for any "stuff" that makes people conscious independent of their brain information. I don't know whether you in particular believe in it, but quite a few people do. > I'm not sure how you could come to any other > conclusion, except by asserting that the question > of "what should A expect" is nonsensical. > > I've snipped quite a bit of this, because the parts > I snipped don't seem germane to the "what should A > expect?" question that we (I?) started with. > > -- > Randall Randall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > "This is a fascinating question, right up there with > whether rocks > fall because of gravity or being dropped, and > whether 3+5=5+3 > because addition is commutative or because they both > equal 8." > - Scott Aaronson > > > ----- > This list is sponsored by AGIRI: > http://www.agiri.org/email > To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: > http://v2.listbox.com/member/?&; > - Tom ____________________________________________________________________________________ Bored stiff? Loosen up... Download and play hundreds of games for free on Yahoo! Games. http://games.yahoo.com/games/front ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604&user_secret=7d7fb4d8
