X-Message-Number: 3712 Date: Fri, 20 Jan 1995 19:49:24 -0800 From: John K Clark <> Subject: SCI.CRYONICS Uploading -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- "Bruce Zimov" <> Wrote: >The copy, however similar, is just a brother. I think our key disagreement is that you think we are an object, I think we are a process. I can make an exact copy of a poem, millions of copies of the poem may exist in the world but, they are all the same poem. A concrete block can't be copied exactly so it doesn't have this property thus it makes sense to talk about two different concrete blocks. The fundamental question you have to ask yourself is; are we (our subjective existence) more like bricks or symphonies? >>An outside observer might be able to >>distinguish between the things having the experience but >>that is of no importance,it's subjective feelings >>were interested in and want to survive. >I'm glad you've finally abandoned the Turing test. I haven't. In my thought experiment I just postulated that the two would have the same subjective experience, in the real world the only way to know if that was really true is to observe behavior. The Turing test is not needed for our own consciousness, we can detect it by direct experience, we only need it when dealing with others. I never claimed it was perfect but I do claim it's the best we have and almost certainly good enough. It had better be because we'll never find a better one. >>If two subjective simultaneous experiences are identical >>and running in parallel then there is only one subjective >>experience. >They are not numerically identical, if they are in 2 different >places at the same time I'm glad you've finally embraced the Turing Test. Subjective experience can indeed be deduced from observable characteristics but the similarity in physical structure to our own is a MUCH better test of consciousness than similarity of position ; and similarity in behavior is a MUCH better test than similarity of physical structure. Consider a man awake and a hour latter in a deep sleep or in a coma. One brain is conscious one is not, the behavior of the man is radically different in the two cases, it could hardly be more so, but the difference in physical structure of the brain is tiny and very hard to find. Even the experts haven't worked out all the details yet but a child can tell if a man is conscious or not. I don't know what you mean by " numerically identical". If the subjective experience is different then you have two, if they are identical then you have one. The number of brains involved and their exact position is as relevant as the number of knee caps involved and their exact position. >and if they are experiencing anything they will be >perspectively different. Your assuming the brain is in the same location the eyes are, no reason to think this must always be true. Your senses could be in Paris and your brain in New York or in a place unknown to you. >Two hydrogen atoms one at A and one a B at the same time where >A and B are sufficiently distant in terms of space and >time to not be affected by the Uncertainty Principle That won't help, there always subject to Quantum Physics and the Uncertainty Principle. The key element of Richard Feynman's quantum electrodynamics is that electrons are interchangeable. When an electron moves from point A to point B it can take a infinite number of paths through space and time to get there, including backwards in time. Feynman's genius was in finding a practical way to calculate the behavior of the electron by adding together all the possible paths. This wouldn't work if electrons could be differentiated, indeed, according to Feynman the reason all electrons have exactly the same charge and mass is that there is only one electron in the universe, it just looks like more because it keeps zigzagging in space and time. Atoms have no individuality, If they can't even give themselves this property I don't see how they can give it to us. Also You haven't explained how we remain the same person ( do we?) if our atoms change constantly. Your interesting speculation about the "subjective circuit" gives me the courage to engage in some speculation of my own, though I don't claim to have proof for any of it, I'm not even sure I agree with it. An early version of Microsoft Flight Simulator had a bug , if you flew upside down and pushed the stick forward you would fall up. Did the laws of Physics really change? Yes and no, it depends on what level your talking about. To the objects in the simulated world the laws of physics did indeed change, you can make them anything you want. To the objects in our own world nothing changes. Perhaps consciousness is like this. At the level of quantum jumps or neuron firing my mind is not real but to another conscious being it is real because were both on the same level. Our entire universe could be a simulation, the strangeness in Quantum Mechanics could be the result of flaws or lack of resolution in some vast cellular automation that we only notice if we look too closely. In a similar way we could say that nothing means anything without an interpretation. imagine a parallel world in which the people use the same English words we do but they mean different things, sky means dog, beauty means potato etc. In one such world this post would mean a vigorous defense of deathism, in another it would mean hard core pornography and in another it would mean the operating instructions for a new type of can opener. The words and the shape of the letters are the same in all cases but they really don't mean anything, its just a bunch of squiggles, until you use an interpretation, in this case the rules of language. Change the interpretation and the meaning changes. Hans Moravec calls these ideas "Universal Realization" and is currently writing a book about it. His main points: 1) Anything can simulate anything. 2) A simulated object is a real object in it's own world. 3) Nothing means anything without an interpretation. 4) A thing can have more than one interpretation. 5) A mind is the one thing that has it's own self consistent interpretation inherent within it; in fact that is the definition of a mind (although you would still need an interpretation to make contact with it). Concerning #5, to communicate with another person the interpretation is straightforward, if the person smiles he is happy, if they make sounds with their mouth we find meaning in them from the rules of grammar, but Moravec goes as far as to say that a interpretation must exist that can find a mind even in a rock. The reason we can't detect them is that were too stupid. The interpretation is so hideously complex that as a practical matter their workings are indistinguishable from random thermal vibrations. Minds in rocks? Well... maybe. John K Clark -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.i iQCzAgUBLyB/fH03wfSpid95AQHu6QTuP7NMmeTnvPGKII7+gBMYW5qWjxIknvhD QqHs494a6ERTBBOhCLISnius4yi9igBC5BljlCCi13VuV41Y33UMoXgpexYs5YFc zaAFwaj+KSDRrfmRhJwupblpaqBXU4sjaYASHCGzR8sFr5RO5xUirqyi0PyJ6egN xwHCv9oPy71jM3nA0g1hfRA/hK3iL//9lXSVgqRliW++0SqHm8g= =tzLk -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=3712