X-Message-Number: 3781
Date: Fri, 3 Feb 1995 01:33:35 +1030
From: Nexus User floeber <>
Subject: SCI.CRYONICS Uploading

I enjoyed reading Steven B. Harris' contribution re identity and quantum
states. I would like to reflect on some of Steven's inferences from this
changing natureof brain-states and so of behaviour. Is iT enough for one
to claim to be "the same person" or is it up to society to decide if
identity has been preseved despite change? I suggest that it depends upon
the purpose for which identity needs to be established AND who wishes to
establish it.

I would like to reflect on some of Steven's inferences from this changing
nature of brain-states and so of behaviour. Is iT enough for one to claim
to be "the same person" or is it up to society to decide if identity has
been preseved despite change? I suggest that it depends upon the purpose
for which identity needs to be established AND who wishes to establish it.
As Steven Harris observed there are sometimes differences between the
claim of an individual to be the "same" individual and legal claims
concerning the individual's identity, such as when identity needs to be
established for the sake of rightful inheritance. We might also say of a
person that they are "not the same person" and in this sense we mean that
something IS the same, but something that we consider to be a significant,
or even crucial, quality of that person is now altered or absent.    The
claim of society serves a multitude of various and even conflicting
purposes. To accept legal definitions of identity is to accept
incoherence. For example, the legal status for individuals undergoing
gender reassignment vary depending upon legal jurisdictions and for
different purposes. A person may therefore be one gender in relation to
marriage laws and another in relation to nationality, and their legally
defined gender may differ as they cross territorial boundaries. But the
person IS the same person regardless of location. In this case it is easy
to see that legally defined identity is internally inconsistent and that
in speaking about legal identity we need to ask "Why do we want a
definition, what do we want to use it for, and why do we "need" it?" A
legal definition of identity seves a specific purpose and its use should
be limited to the context in which it exists and for which it was defined:
A legal definition cannot help us to understand our "existetial" !
identity or even to define the identity of others for the purposes of
personal recognition.

The claim of society serves a multitude of various and even conflicting
purposes. To accept legal definitions of identity is to accept
incoherence. For example, the legal status for individuals undergoing
gender reassignment vary depending upon legal jurisdictions and for
different purposes. A person may therefore be one gender in relation to
marriage laws and another in relation to nationality, and their legally
defined gender may differ as they cross territorial boundaries. But the
person IS the same person regardless of location. In this case it is easy
to see that legally defined identity is internally inconsistent and that
in speaking about legal identity we need to ask "Why do we want a
definition, what do we want to use it for, and why do we "need" it?" A
legal definition of identity seves a specific purpose and its use should
be limited to the context in which it exists and for which it was defined:
A legal definition cannot help us to understand our "existetial" !
identity or even to define the identity of others for the purposes of
personal recognition.    It would be interesting to hear Steven Harris'
views on "false memory syndrome". If a person is given a "false
memory",(and in the context of the highly selective nature of memory it
would be difficult to define a "true" memory) say through hypnotic
suggestion - intetionally  - and that person claims to be the "same"
person, despite holding beliefs about themselves that HAVE changed, then
are they the same person. In other words, as orwell said: "He who controls
the past controls the future" ("1984"-I THINK that's correct, if my memory
serves me).And if this is the "same" person to themselves , are they still
hte same person to themselves if it is suggested to them that they are
someone else. I suggest that they would claim, at least in the absence of
contradictory evidence, that their identity had survived intact . In
relation to cryogenics isn't it our own belief in the survival of our
identity that we would regard as important POST cryogenic suspension? Only
pre- cryo!  genic  suspension would  we adopt the perspective of an
objective observer - Iwould want to know if *I* would survive. My
criterion of success NOW would include , crucially, the continuity of
myself as a person who remembers having BEEN me. Perhaps this perspective
avoids the problem of continuation of idetity( or rather "preservation" of
identity) despite inevitable change. After all, any defginition of
PERSONAL (i.e. "living" )identity that did not include and allow for
change would be deficient. Essetial to understanding ourseves AS people is
that we DO  change: We are not discussing inanimate identity or quantum
identity when we speak of personal identity -although these forms of
identity are relevant to an understanding of personal identity. Like a
fountain, which retains its shape throughout constant change, definitions
of human identity must include change as an essential quality of identity

Steven Harris - please respond...!


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