Identity as intertemporal solidarity with any other being is a choice, whether the being has “identical” structure or not. It’s a choice for your attitude toward the “you” of tomorrow morning. Or your attitude toward a parakeet 3000 years ago.
But going back to a recurrence of “the same” structure, the notion of a low probability of a being with “the same” structure popping into existence is based on an ultra extreme tail end extrapolation from our current models. Have you validated those models to the gazillionth decimal point? Me neither.
Also, the math is just wrong. An infinite number of chances (let’s make them independent, but not necessarily equal) need not sum to a certainty.
Alright, what about the whole transporter thing? That is, if you were suddenly went into a star-trek like transporter, you would be disassembled, and reassembled on the other side of the solar system. Would that still be you? Now, I could try and convince you that that is the case from a reductionist point of view, but I think that the arguments themselves are pretty clear, and I don’t have much time. If you want me to though, I can, just message me.
Anyway, if you do accept that this other you is still the same you, because it has the same thoughts, the same memories, the same outlook on life, the same propensity to do such and such, then you should be okay with this whole thing. Because what I’m talking about is pretty much the same as the transported scenario, just with a much longer time gap in between. And in these cases, the whole universe itself gets recreated, along with you. Sure, you could pop up alone, or missing five organs, but there is still a chance that it will occur. And could you clarify your last point? Because I was under the impression that the expected number of an events with probability P happening in a time T (which is infinite) is p*T. Which is infinite, and so not P approaches zero as T approaches zero. The whole limits thing. If I’m wrong, then please show me, so that I can learn why I’m wrong, and stop wasting people’s time.
Identity as intertemporal solidarity with any other being is a choice, whether the being has “identical” structure or not. It’s a choice for your attitude toward the “you” of tomorrow morning. Or your attitude toward a parakeet 3000 years ago.
Or your attitude toward the whole transporter thing.
Some will consider a “transporter” a mode of transportation, and some will consider it a disintegrator/creator.
I don’t accept the transported person is me, also from reductionist grounds. Incidentally I wonder what you would think if the machine was not destructive, or if it got stuck in a loop and kept outputting copies, etc.
I consider a person to be a certain structure extending throughout space time. So, if two structures are identical, as in the loop scenario, I’d say that they were the same person. Of course, that’s only if these accidental clones have the structure, which they will not, as one clone will be in position A, and the other will be in position B, and so be different people, albeit very similar ones. The same goes for the first scenario, they are going to be different people since they will be in different situations. In the case where they have the same experiences for the rest of their lives, and so the same structures in space time, they will be the same person. But that could only happen in two universal configurations which were the exact same… which is what will happen in an infinite universe. But might I ask, why do you not think that they shall be the same person?
Yay, the Eternal Recurrence Lives!
Not so much.
Identity as intertemporal solidarity with any other being is a choice, whether the being has “identical” structure or not. It’s a choice for your attitude toward the “you” of tomorrow morning. Or your attitude toward a parakeet 3000 years ago.
But going back to a recurrence of “the same” structure, the notion of a low probability of a being with “the same” structure popping into existence is based on an ultra extreme tail end extrapolation from our current models. Have you validated those models to the gazillionth decimal point? Me neither.
Also, the math is just wrong. An infinite number of chances (let’s make them independent, but not necessarily equal) need not sum to a certainty.
Alright, what about the whole transporter thing? That is, if you were suddenly went into a star-trek like transporter, you would be disassembled, and reassembled on the other side of the solar system. Would that still be you? Now, I could try and convince you that that is the case from a reductionist point of view, but I think that the arguments themselves are pretty clear, and I don’t have much time. If you want me to though, I can, just message me.
Anyway, if you do accept that this other you is still the same you, because it has the same thoughts, the same memories, the same outlook on life, the same propensity to do such and such, then you should be okay with this whole thing. Because what I’m talking about is pretty much the same as the transported scenario, just with a much longer time gap in between. And in these cases, the whole universe itself gets recreated, along with you. Sure, you could pop up alone, or missing five organs, but there is still a chance that it will occur. And could you clarify your last point? Because I was under the impression that the expected number of an events with probability P happening in a time T (which is infinite) is p*T. Which is infinite, and so not P approaches zero as T approaches zero. The whole limits thing. If I’m wrong, then please show me, so that I can learn why I’m wrong, and stop wasting people’s time.
I wrote:
Or your attitude toward the whole transporter thing.
Some will consider a “transporter” a mode of transportation, and some will consider it a disintegrator/creator.
I don’t accept the transported person is me, also from reductionist grounds. Incidentally I wonder what you would think if the machine was not destructive, or if it got stuck in a loop and kept outputting copies, etc.
I consider a person to be a certain structure extending throughout space time. So, if two structures are identical, as in the loop scenario, I’d say that they were the same person. Of course, that’s only if these accidental clones have the structure, which they will not, as one clone will be in position A, and the other will be in position B, and so be different people, albeit very similar ones. The same goes for the first scenario, they are going to be different people since they will be in different situations. In the case where they have the same experiences for the rest of their lives, and so the same structures in space time, they will be the same person. But that could only happen in two universal configurations which were the exact same… which is what will happen in an infinite universe. But might I ask, why do you not think that they shall be the same person?