X-Message-Number: 4171
Date: Sat, 8 Apr 1995 12:42:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: Bruce Zimov <>
Subject: SCI.CRYONICS: LEGO Uploads

1) Eugene Leitl has given a very interesting snapshot of hardware evolution, 
its problems and issues. I hope he will explain how redundant holography 
contributes to functional robustness.

2) Regarding the discussions on the self-circuit: I prefer calling the 
circuit a subjective circuit, because the end result of the circuit is 
subjectivity and has nothing to do with the higher concept of a person 
with a psychological concept of himself.

John Clark is wrong to think that the issue is one of explaining the 
difference between the soul and the self-circuit. The issue is, and has 
been one of how you upload subjectivity in a numerically identical way.

By way of a simple example, say I have two LEGOs, each with six 
protruding dots, and they are connected in a pattern where 4 of their 6 
protruding dots are linked. How would I upload these 2 LEGOS?

I imagine taking another two LEGOs and connecting them in the same pattern.
So, the pattern gained another instance through a copying 
process, but the numerical identity of the source did not change. It is 
still sitting there.  In a material view of subjectivity, the neural 
causes of subjectivity are a pattern of parts just as the LEGO example 
employed a pattern of parts. Subjectivity ITSELF is an instance, NOT a 
pattern of parts, so you can copy the pattern of causes and get another 
instance, but it is not apparent how this helps personal survival at all.

To survive, a particular subjectivity must extend ITS causal chain. Now, 
you might think why does it have to be an instance, why couldn't it be a 
pattern?  Patterns are abstract entities, like Plato's forms. Moravec in 
MIND CHILDREN has the view that subjectivity is just a pattern, not an 
instance.  But, patterns are not material. In fact, they are more like 
souls than instances are!  This turns on its head, the notion that the 
causal view of the subjective circuit is like a soul, and points out that 
its more likely that the information view of subjectivity is more like 
the soul since in that view subjectivity is NOT material, even if it can 
be stored materially.

Neither the information nor the causal view has a decent theory of 
subjectivity, but in the history of explanation, the non-material views 
have ultimately always bit the dust in favor of the material views.

Uploading is copying. It is parenting.  We require personal subjective 
extension, not another sibling/identical twin.

Bruce Zimov



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