the access to working physical bodies of cognitive algorithms, across all possible universes, that are within some reference class containing the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body
… etc, etc...
what happens to the physical body selected by the following process:
start with your physical body
go forward to some later time selected by the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body, allowing (or causing) the knowledge possessed by the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body to change in the interim
at that later time, randomly sample from all the physical bodies, among all universes, that implement cognitive algorithms having the same knowledge as the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body at that later time
(optionally) return to step b but with the physical body whose changes of cognitive algorithm are tracked and whose decisions are used being the the new physical body selected from step c
stop whenever the cognitive algorithm implemented by the physical body selected in some step decides to stop.
For 1, 2, and I expect for the vast majority of possibilities for 3, your procedure will not work. It will work for 4, which is apparently what you care about.
Terminal values are arbitrary, so that’s entirely valid. However, 4 is not something that seems, to me, like a particularly privileged or “rational” thing to care about.
At the current moment “I” am the cognitive algorithm implemented by my physical body that is typing this response.
Ten minutes from now “I” will be the cognitive algorithm of a green tentacled alien from beyond the cosmological horizon.
You will find that there is nothing contradictory about this definition of what “I” am. What “I” observe 10 minutes from now will be fully compatible with this definition. Indeed, 10 minutes from now, “I” will be the green tentacled alien. I will have no memories of being in my current body , of course, but that’s to be expected. The cognitive algorithm implemented by my current body at that time will remember being “me”, but that doesn’t count, that’s someone else’s observations.
Edit: to be clear, the point made above (by the guy who is now a green tentacled alien beyond the cosmological horizon, and whose former body and cognitive algorithm is continuous with mine) is not a complaint about the precise details of your definition of what “you” are. What he was trying to point at is whether personal identity is a real thing that exists in the world at all, and how absurd your apparent definition of “you” looks to someone—like me—who doesn’t think that personal identity is a real thing.
By “your observations”, do you mean the observations obtained by the chain of cognitive algorithms, altering over time and switching between different bodies, that the process in 4 is dealing with? Because that does not seem to me to be a particularly privileged or “rational” set of observations to care about.
Here are some things one might care about:
what happens to your physical body
the access to working physical bodies of cognitive algorithms, across all possible universes, that are within some reference class containing the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body
… etc, etc...
what happens to the physical body selected by the following process:
start with your physical body
go forward to some later time selected by the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body, allowing (or causing) the knowledge possessed by the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body to change in the interim
at that later time, randomly sample from all the physical bodies, among all universes, that implement cognitive algorithms having the same knowledge as the cognitive algorithm implemented by your physical body at that later time
(optionally) return to step b but with the physical body whose changes of cognitive algorithm are tracked and whose decisions are used being the the new physical body selected from step c
stop whenever the cognitive algorithm implemented by the physical body selected in some step decides to stop.
For 1, 2, and I expect for the vast majority of possibilities for 3, your procedure will not work. It will work for 4, which is apparently what you care about.
Terminal values are arbitrary, so that’s entirely valid. However, 4 is not something that seems, to me, like a particularly privileged or “rational” thing to care about.
It will work only if I care for my observations, something like EDT.
I now care about my observations!
My observations are as follows:
At the current moment “I” am the cognitive algorithm implemented by my physical body that is typing this response.
Ten minutes from now “I” will be the cognitive algorithm of a green tentacled alien from beyond the cosmological horizon.
You will find that there is nothing contradictory about this definition of what “I” am. What “I” observe 10 minutes from now will be fully compatible with this definition. Indeed, 10 minutes from now, “I” will be the green tentacled alien. I will have no memories of being in my current body , of course, but that’s to be expected. The cognitive algorithm implemented by my current body at that time will remember being “me”, but that doesn’t count, that’s someone else’s observations.
Edit: to be clear, the point made above (by the guy who is now a green tentacled alien beyond the cosmological horizon, and whose former body and cognitive algorithm is continuous with mine) is not a complaint about the precise details of your definition of what “you” are. What he was trying to point at is whether personal identity is a real thing that exists in the world at all, and how absurd your apparent definition of “you” looks to someone—like me—who doesn’t think that personal identity is a real thing.
“Your observations”????
By “your observations”, do you mean the observations obtained by the chain of cognitive algorithms, altering over time and switching between different bodies, that the process in 4 is dealing with? Because that does not seem to me to be a particularly privileged or “rational” set of observations to care about.