X-Message-Number: 23811
From: "David Pizer" <>
Subject: Memories are not the most important part of "you"
Date: Sun, 4 Apr 2004 17:23:50 -0700

A Philosophical Look at Memories and Survial of the Individual
From:  David Pizer



The recent discussions about memories on Cryonet are more evidence for the 
conclusion I have been arguing (on the philosophical nature of identity survival
that is concerned with survival of a person) for the last 20 years.  --- that 
conclusion is:  Memories are not the most important thing that makes you you.  
The most important thing about you is your ability to feel awareness.  Each 
person *is* a unique awareness sensor.  This thing (UAS) is a part of your brain
and it is made of brain meat.  It is the central part of any person and all the
rest of the brain and body are accessories of it.  It exists over time in 
specific space, therefore it is a one and only.


This leads to an important conclusion --  that the ONLY way for a person to 
survive is to save his UAS (unique awareness sensor).  One cannot survive by 
creating a so-called duplicate, (in fact it is impossible to really duplicate a 
specific UAS),  nor can one survive by uploading or downloading.  Nor can one 
survive by only saving DNA or only saving memories.  The only way to survive is 
for your brain to survive (the part of your brain that senses awareness).  So if
you are really serious about survival, at the present time your only option is 
to have your brain saved, and at present the only way to do  that (should you be
unfortunate enough to suffer legal death) is through cryonics.


If you want eternal life (if that is even possible because physical immortality 
alone is not enough, we need the universe to also be or become eternal - which I
also have an argument below that it is) you are going to need for your UAS to 
become an un-aging hunk of living tissue.  Reversing aging should not be very 
hard to do in the next couple hundred years.  Once that is done, you then need 
to get this hunk of tissue to the safest place in the universe.  After that you 
merely need to work with other UAS's to keep the universe from winding down.  
You should have billions of years to work on that problem.


So I hope I have laid out an interesting plan for those who want to live 
forever.  If any part of this interests you, then I suggest you check out the 
Society for Venturism.  This is the religion for those who think they want to 
live forever.

David Pizer



Why is the universe eternal?  

Something cannot come from nothing.
Something exists now
Therefore something has always existed
Therefore something will always exist

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