X-Message-Number: 11347
Date: Wed, 03 Mar 1999 02:31:33 -0700
From: Mike Perry <>
Subject: Re: CryoNet #11336 - #11337

>Message #11336
>From: Thomas Donaldson <>
>Subject: comments to Dave, Mike, and Bob
>Date: Mon, 1 Mar 1999 22:49:44 +1100 (EST)
>
>Hi everyone!
>
>More discussion with Mike Perry: Basically, if we suppose that quantum 
>theory will hive off worlds constantly, I'm saying that THOSE WORLDS will
>be the worlds in which their particular versions of people or animals 
>should be resurrected. Not ours.

The situation is not quite so simple though, because "those worlds"
don't contain enough information to uniquely describe all their
beings, which in turn acquire some ambiguity in terms of the
"world" they are part of.
>
>Now given an infinity of time and space, no doubt it would be POSSIBLE to
>do the kind of resurrection you advocate. We are basically discussing
>its morality. I see the morality of reviving particular people, with
>whatever understanding of history we might discover. I just don't see 
>the morality of reviving quadrillion quadrillions of people, some close
>but not identical copies of others, others entirely imaginary, etc etc.
>

Basically, within large limits there are no "imaginary" people, if you
take the many-worlds idea seriously.

>If you do so because you think these revived people will be grateful
>to you and therefore give you an advantage, then you are doing a
>calculation rather than a moral act. 

I think to a large extent you will be able to tell in advance of the
actual instantiation of a person, what that being's basic dispositions
plus or minus will be, so you'll not just be creating a continuer
doomed to unhappiness, but one that will likely be grateful
for what you have done. This would, of course, involve
the use of advanced technology of the future, say, a machine
with far, far more intelligence and processing power than the
present human brain. So it would be dealing with far simpler
entities than itself.

>Some may well be grateful, others
>quite ungrateful, and a few may turn into enemies. If you revive all those
>people at once,

Whoever said you had to do that?

>If someone revives ME, not as an example of 20th Century Man or any other
>extraneous reason, but because they want to have ME alive, I would
>certainly feel grateful. But that just does not seem to be the situation
>you are discussing.

Think again. There are lots of possibilities. The resurrection, as I see it,
is to be a Labor of Love in the fullest sense, with due consideration
for all the feelings of the beings affected.

>
>Message #11337
>Date: Mon, 1 Mar 1999 11:03:29 -0500 (EST)
>From: Charles Platt <>
>Subject: Unsubscribing
>
>At this point I am unsubscribing from CryoNet since it serves no useful 
>purpose whatsoever. Those who wish to discuss quantum states, machine 
>intelligence, and all the rest of it have been politely encouraged to use 
>a more appropriate forum, but have shown no interest in doing so.

Some of us, myself included, genuinely think that topics like this *do* serve
a useful purpose *alongside* more "mainstream" cryonics. What I also think
is that a lot of people outside of cryonics are concerned about the
philosophical issues as well as the technical ones, and failure to resolve
certain
problems with the former is one factor in their reluctance to commit
themselves to the latter. True, with impressive enough technical 
breakthroughs alone, you could overcome all this reluctance,
but that would take substantial commitment already; i.e. you tend to have
a chicken-and-egg problem. More power to 21st Century Medicine, of

course; but they and this forum are different things with different, if related,
roles to play.

Mike Perry

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