X-Message-Number: 5612 Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 09:43:27 -0800 From: (Dwight G. Jones) Subject: Re: CryoNet #5601 - #5608 References: <> 1 > From: Peter Merel <> > Subject: Memories > Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 01:36:04 +1100 (EST) > > Dwight Jones writes, > > >what is the ESSENTIAL difference between successful cryonic rebuilding > >and regeneration from DNA seed? What is it about today's memories that > >we MUST them to deem ourselves successful in this venture? > > Software and hardware, Dwight. Without software, what good is a > computer? Doesn't software exist in your philosophy? Do you imagine > that software is somehow implied by hardware? Or do you believe that all > programs are equivalent to one another? > > We spend our lives writing our own internal software - it determines how > we behave, who we love, the people and qualities and dimensions of our > worlds. Perhaps your philosophy devalues this software, but for > most of us here that's the whole point; the hardware can be replaced > by some other machine with sufficient power to express our software, > and we won't fuss - many of us even look forward to it! I'm not denying that such memories would be nice to have. But as the years (and lifetimes) go by, we learn to let go of childhood, adolescence, and so on, just as we go to sleep each night confident of prospects in the coming day. Could we not look at lifetimes, gracefully surrendering each as we surrender the day? Realize that our views are likely to be self-centric, it's hard to have any affect for externalized reality. It is this value set that allows us to see the World as our own, for example, and not something we share with 3 million other species. If we begin to consider existence as pluralistic, (more than one lifetime, more than one phenotype, concurrent phenotypes, and so on), it is conceivable that we may come to see cryonics as overkill. That would be a relief to all of us who have been daunted by the dimensions of the problem. What I am discussing is largely unexamined, and that is why I appreciate your input. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5612