I agree that Option B is essentially making a choice to be “born” into existence, but wouldn’t that appeal to you more than non-existence? Perhaps I am just operating on that age-old human fear of the unknown, but I think I would take a generically decent existence over non-existence any day of the week, even if that new existence were not the one I was used to having.
Don’t we continually choose to be “re-born” into existence as someone minutely different every moment we try to stay alive? I suppose committing suicide is like choosing Option A. So if you are the sort of person who would contemplate suicide, then Option A might have some appeal I suppose....
I’m in the “death isn’t that bad” camp, which I know is a minority here on LW. If you lose all your memories and personality, I don’t see the point of choosing to be reborn. It’s a flip of a coin sort of thing to me. Our identity seems to be tied to our memories and personality, if “identiity” has any meaning at all.
I’m of the philosophical view that death shouldn’t be feared/hated because it’s essentially the same state of affairs we were in pre-birth. Non-existence just isn’t that big a deal. We’re hard-wired to fear it...but we should be rational enough to recognize that’s nothing but evolution’s pressure on all species who made it this far.
I agree that Option B is essentially making a choice to be “born” into existence, but wouldn’t that appeal to you more than non-existence? Perhaps I am just operating on that age-old human fear of the unknown, but I think I would take a generically decent existence over non-existence any day of the week, even if that new existence were not the one I was used to having.
Don’t we continually choose to be “re-born” into existence as someone minutely different every moment we try to stay alive? I suppose committing suicide is like choosing Option A. So if you are the sort of person who would contemplate suicide, then Option A might have some appeal I suppose....
I’m in the “death isn’t that bad” camp, which I know is a minority here on LW. If you lose all your memories and personality, I don’t see the point of choosing to be reborn. It’s a flip of a coin sort of thing to me. Our identity seems to be tied to our memories and personality, if “identiity” has any meaning at all.
I’m of the philosophical view that death shouldn’t be feared/hated because it’s essentially the same state of affairs we were in pre-birth. Non-existence just isn’t that big a deal. We’re hard-wired to fear it...but we should be rational enough to recognize that’s nothing but evolution’s pressure on all species who made it this far.