Yeah. It reminds me of questions like what if, 5 seconds from now, I will be Britney Spears?. I’m a little unclear on exactly what parts of “you” continue into the next incarnation (metaphors like “a lamp lighting another lamp” are not very precise)---I think you don’t get memories, but you do get mental habits and inclinations?
I could imagine a Less Wronger taking the position that “supposing for the sake of argument that everything in Buddhist metaphysics is correct, the similarities between two reincarnations are not great enough to preserve your personal identity in the philosophical/moral/my-utility-function sense. So you have no reason to care more about your future incarnation than about any other person”.
Furthermore, I could also imagine a Buddhist making that argument. Two recurring themes seem to be that it’s bad to focus on what you want, and that in fact you should abandon the idea that there is a “you” that wants things. If you follow that advice it seems you should not care about what will happen to “your” reincarnation in particular.
Yeah. It reminds me of questions like what if, 5 seconds from now, I will be Britney Spears?. I’m a little unclear on exactly what parts of “you” continue into the next incarnation (metaphors like “a lamp lighting another lamp” are not very precise)---I think you don’t get memories, but you do get mental habits and inclinations?
I could imagine a Less Wronger taking the position that “supposing for the sake of argument that everything in Buddhist metaphysics is correct, the similarities between two reincarnations are not great enough to preserve your personal identity in the philosophical/moral/my-utility-function sense. So you have no reason to care more about your future incarnation than about any other person”.
Furthermore, I could also imagine a Buddhist making that argument. Two recurring themes seem to be that it’s bad to focus on what you want, and that in fact you should abandon the idea that there is a “you” that wants things. If you follow that advice it seems you should not care about what will happen to “your” reincarnation in particular.