You tried to make a point about what pragmatists might call counterfeit money versus “philosophical purists”.
However, the latter group’s definition (that CfM is something intending to be used as legal tender that was not issued by the government) happens to match what you’d find in a dictionary, the legal definition and the everyday working definition.
Meanwhile, what you are calling the pragmatists’ definition (that it’s only CfM if it is of insufficient quality to match the real thing) is not a simplification, it’s actually a wholly different idea that few people would recognize, or agree with.
You’re free to make up your own terms, and you can suggest we use informal terms. But of course I am not going to agree with your personal redefinitions of standard terminology.
Probably best to leave our intuitions out of it; they are quite often wrong in the case of quantum phenomena.
The no-cloning theorem says that quantum material can’t be duplicated, but it can be moved; this seems to me to say that if it were possible to quantum teleport a macroscopic object successfully, then it would cease to exist in one location and start to exist in another. Whatever your consciousness is, your personal integrity, your soul if such a thing exists, your point of view, your ka, your ba, your ahk, whatever - these insubstantial things would travel along with the quantum information to the new location.
Of course it seems almost impossible that macroscale objects will ever be teleported as quantum information, so this will never be tested on humans. I have deep reservations about classical copying which are similar to the reservations that other people on this thread have expressed.
I do, however, think that in due course we will be able to transmit intelligent entities from one location to another; intelligent AI programs might be both possible and transmittable. It may even be necessary to use quantum teleportation to send these programs from location to location, since they may include qubits. Teleporting intelligent entities might become routine within a few hundred years, quite possibly much less.
[QUOTE=Trinopus]
Since that isn’t what I’m cool with, you are engaging in a straw-man fallacy. The “other guy” isn’t “someone else,” he is me. He is me in every conceivable way. He has my memories, my knowledge, my intentions. He is indistinguishable by every possible test.
Mischaracterizing someone else’s statements is, on the SDMB, “just bizarre.”
[/QUOTE]
I don’t believe I am mischaracterizing your statements. I am trying to restate them in a way that I feel is the same in order to examine them. Obviously, it is an analogy, and thus is inherently flawed. All analogies are inherently flawed. But I am not deliberately trying to put words in your mouth, I am trying to explore what it is you believe and how it looks to me.
So if you do not agree with my restatement, then please tell me how it is different. Because everytime you tell me you disagree, you then go on to say exactly what I think you are saying.
To me, the “other guy” is someone else. Sure, he has exactly your thoughts and thought processes and memories. There is no external means of telling the two of you apart, and no way to claim “he is the original and he is the copy”, except by virtue of the location, and that is only an artifact of how we got into this situation. My point has nothing to do with being provable by any external viewpoint.
My point is that from the internal viewpoint, there is a you that is standing in one place, having senses from the body in that location, having thoughts in that location. And there is a you in a different location, with a separate set of sensor inputs, a separate instance of consciousness and sapience and thought - whatever you want to call it. The one over here is not in the brain of the one over there, and vice versa. They may be similar enough to be thinking very similar thoughts, perhaps the exact same thoughts, but they are not linked, not sharing an existence, they are separate existences.
And in those two separate existences, the one over here is then okay with dying so the one over there can continue with “their” life. That is what I don’t get. On a fundamental, emotional response, I don’t get it.
[QUOTE=Miller]
I mean, what’s the fundamental difference between getting in a car wreck, dying, and being restored from a five year old copy, and getting in a car wreck, suffering severe brain damage, and being unable to remember the previous five years?
[/QUOTE]
This is difficult to state because our language is struggling to keep up with the concepts, and we don’t actually have knowledge to pin this on. To me, the difference is the continuation of being. Being in a car wreck, going into a coma, waking up with brain damage, and thereby having amnesia is still a continuous being with my prior self. Dying, and then being restored from some sort of digital backup has broken the chain of being, and is thus not me, from an internal perspective. The rest of the world may not be able to tell the difference, other than the five years of amnesia, and the restored “me” may feel like he just woke up and in every way is the continuous me, but it won’t be the same “me” that died in the car wreck.
As for brain damage, if we limit the damage to amnesia, it is easy to feel the resulting person is the same person from an external position. If the brain damage affects personality, it is much more difficult to see the person as the same person. Given that brain damage can affect personality, it is a very real likelihood that the person who wakes up from the car crash is no more “me” than the guy who is restored from the back up. Maybe moreso, from the perspective of the outside world. The internal me is still there, but thinks and acts differently than the outside world expects, so to them I have changed to a new person, even if interally I think I am behaving consistent with my thought processes, just my perspective on the world has changed.
[QUOTE= Miller]
Because that person doesn’t have my memories, he has a description of my behavior supplied by a third party. Again, my identity, who I am as a person, is a fantastically complex pattern of ideas and memories. That’s not something that can be transmitted through normal human communication, or adequately duplicated by playacting.
[/QUOTE]
The point of the example I provided was that the person would have enough of your thought processes and memories to be indistinguishable by anyone you knew. They would never be able to tell you apart. The only difference was the method by which he became just like you. Was he created out of some energy pattern and molecular assembly, or was he created by surgical reconstruction, brain training, conditioning, etc? The results is someone that no one can distinguish from the original you.
I know it’s hard to conjecture about. I was exploring a specific claim, that if the person over there was exactly like me and indistinguishable by my family and friends, and there was a benefit to letting him be me from now on, I would off this instance of me and let that instance go on being me in the future. I was trying to find a way to recast how the other person became indistinguishable from you.
Now you seem to want to argue that he can never be perfectly like you, never be indistinguishable. Well, that’s not accepting the premise. The premise is that he can.
[QUOTE=Trinopus]
Does the talented actor know the passwords to my online banking? Does he know my old college nickname? Does he know the twist ending I’m planning for my next story? Does he know where I buried my mother’s ashes?
No. He isn’t even close to “me.” The guy who steps out of the transporter can answer “yes” to all of these.
[/QUOTE]
In my proposed example, yes, he would answer yes to all of those. He is a sufficiently talented and prepared actor to replace you and nobody would know the difference. Externally, there would be no way to prove it wasn’t you.
As I said, you are rejecting the premise. I am trying to examine your position with regards to a duplicate who is indistinguishable from you taking over your life from you.
For the external world, sure. But are you okay with him taking your place, simply because the world can’t tell you two apart?
Either language is failing us, or you are intentionally refusing to see the point of distinction: there is an identity in this body and an identity in that body. The identity in this body is not continuous with the identity in that body. You’re okay with that body going on to be you and the identity in this body coming to an end? That’s the same thing to you?
[QUOTE=drewtwo99]
No I would not continue to exist if nobody cared whether or not I lived, and if I felt I was a net negative to the world, I’d kill myself.
[/quote]
I agree that is not crazy. If nobody loves you and you feel you are a detriment to the world, and you do not wish to be a detriment, then offing yourself is a solution to the problem. Perhaps not the best solution, but a solution.
Fair enough. I’m not ready to accept that the discrete nature of time affects the notion of a continuous identity. It may be that breaks smaller than some infinitesimal size are acceptable. It may be that if the transporter works on the quantum time scale, that it is okay, but if it works on larger timescale, then it is not okay. This is purely speculation without a deeper understanding of what consciousness is.
And this is, ultimately, the place where our fundamental beliefs/conceptions just seem to be different. Some of you are okay with the POV you are in ending as long as there is another POV you to take over your life. Others of us are hung up on being the original POV that ends, and are not comforted by the fact that someone else will take over where we left off. It’s still the end of the road for our POV.
Perhaps this is a roadblock that cannot be bridged. Some people are butter-side up and some are butter-side down, and they will never agree.
[QUOTE=Miller]
If you could perfectly record my memories, and download them into the head of another person? Assuming I have sole tenancy, that would be “me,” just as much as in the teleporter scenario.
[/QUOTE]
I believe that a person or identity is more than the sum of memories. Rather, there is an underlying perspective that accesses and is shaped by those memories, but is not just the memories.
However, assuming that “identity” in whatever form could be contained and relocated to another brain, I would expect that to be “me”. If that brain were cohabited by another identity, then we would be in for a real pickle.
[QUOTE=Chronos]
I’m never transformed into data in any scenario. I am always data.
[/QUOTE]
I do not understand this statement.
I’m not sure I understand your example and how it relates to a transporter. Suffice it to say that I am uncomfortable with the process for transferring my pattern information to another medium. That process looks a lot like death to me. I’ll stay in the pitcher.
[QUOTE=Trinopus]
This is one of the reasons the discussion is abstract and debatable. We can’t examine the matter scientifically. We’re stuck using the philosophical method, and that is altogether too much like going to the elves for advice.
[/QUOTE]
On this point we are agreed.
[QUOTE=Tibby or Not Tibby]
The Big Question: Are “you” in the hardware, or in the software?
[/QUOTE]
Obviously this is unjustifiable speculation, but to follow the computer metaphor, I would propose there is the hardware that is the physical brain, the memories are the data files, and the identity is the firmware running on the brain that makes the system able to access the software and pull up the data. So I would put the identity in the software.
If we somehow could separate the software from the hardware, I would argue to keep the software. Of course, I don’t think identity is in the copy of the software, but in the running of the software. Power on the computer, load the system, it starts running. Going into hibernate is sleeping. Shutting down the computer/disconnecting power is dying. If you reboot, repower the system, is that the same me? That is the conundrum.
Fair enough. In this case, however, your re-statement varied from my actual view, making the “that’s just bizaree” condemnation both unfair and excessive.
Cute. Okay, he could lie and claim he knows the answers to my private questions. I don’t consider that a valid claim to equality, but, sure, nobody would know.
How about things that only I and one other person know? My sister and I, for instance, know some things that no other person on earth know. The actor cannot fake that.
Yes, I am rejecting the premise, because it fundamentally misrepresents the position I’m arguing. The important part isn’t that the outside world can’t tell the difference between us. The important part is, I can’t tell the difference. You take me, and you take my transporter duplicate, and put us in a room together, and there’s no way for either of us to determine which of us was the original. You put me and a talented actor in the same room together, he might be able to convince me that he’s my double, but he knows he’s lying.
Well, “memories” was a bit of a short hand for “information stored in the brain.” We may very well be more than the sum of our memories, but if there is some sort of essential interpreter through which we view our experiences, surely that interpreter is also stored in the brain, and would be copied along with the memories?
But that’s exactly what happens in a transporter. A duplicate body is made at your destination, your identity is copied from your original body, and transferred into the new body. Your identity has been “contained” in the form of some fantastically long and complex algorithm and beamed directly into the brain of your newly reconstituted body. Unless you’re talking about a literal, physical brain transplant, any process that “contain[s] and relocate[s]” your identity to another brain is going to be a process of copying the data from one piece of hardware and pasting it into another.
So, for instance, one possible test would be to give him a “truth drug” that compels him to 'fess up that hey’s lying. (It isn’t a practical test now, at our level of psychopharmacy, but it is a conceivable test.) Add in that he doesn’t have the same fingerprints, DNA, body scars, and the like.
I just can’t believe in an actor good enough to fool my very closest friends and family. But, as you note, he’d have to go farther, and fool himself.
In any case, there absolutely is information known only to me and to certain limited numbers of other persons.
One of my questions was, “Does he know the password to my online banking?” He can lie about that all he wants, but let’s see him open the account and make a withdrawal!
I can’t believe this is what you’re hanging your hat on in regards to self-identity. A trivial, easily transferable bit of information? If that’s what you consider the core of your self-identity, this shows you really don’t understand the concept of self-awareness, and the change that takes place when you get disintegrated and reconstituted.
In fact, I can’t believe that someone with actual self-awareness would even make that argument. Are you sure you’re not just a forumbot, Trinopus? :dubious:
It’s my rebuttal to the claim that an actor could be “me” as easily as a transported person was. It explodes a thought-experiment provided by Irishman.
I’m not saying “Knowing my passcode proves that I’m me.” I’m saying “Not knowing my passcode proves that the purported actor isn’t me.”
And once again you’ve given a short response where you haven’t addressed the actual content of what I’ve said. I’m not saying my way is the only way or anything like that. I’m pointing out to you that the term “counterfeit money” has a clear meaning that seems to differ from your own “pragmatists’” definition.
You accused me of using “personal redefinitions of standard terminology.” I was doing no such thing. I threw out an example I thought might be enlightening; you didn’t care for it. Okay, so it goes. They can’t all be winners. But I vehemently reject your accusation of, if not dishonesty, impropriety. I never did any such thing, and the accusation itself stops the possibility of further conversation.
It seems obvious to me that we have reached an impasse, beyond which our communications skills cannot take us. It’s like a pro-choice and pro-life advocate coming to an ultimate impasse over the most basic foundational beliefs.
(I almost said “conceptual” beliefs, but as puns go, it’s too close to the bone.)
It’s a pointless rebuttal though. Information is easily transferred. That would be one of the simplest things to teach in duplicate training.
A better rebuttal would have been to say their memories will never exactly match your own no matter how much time you spend teaching them. But our question is does that matter? If no one else can tell that it’s no longer you, but someone acting exactly like you, who knows everything you knew, what is it about that scenario that bothers you?
Whatever it is that bothers you, is exactly the same reason the anti-transporter people don’t want to step into the thing.
I didn’t read the whole thread, because I’m sleepy. But we know that people can talk in transport. I suggest that you are broken into bits, and those bits are still connected by subspace, or something. You get sliced up, but weird physics keeps the bits attached via superscience. I’d say that the only loss of consciousness you’d have is if you’re arrested in the buffer (like the TOS Klingons that one time, or Data or Scotty in TNG). Even then, you’re in stasis, not obliterated.
But I don’t think it varied from your actual view. At least, not in any substantial way. Again, the whole point of the “actor” argument is that it is some other guy who is sufficiently prepared, which means not only has he been surgically altered, but he’s been told all your secrets, even those special secrets between you and your sister, and your banking passwords. Is it a ridiculous premise? Sure, but we’re discussing a ridiculous premise - transporter technology.
Let’s look specifically at this statement. Are you claiming that you cannot tell which is the original, or are you claiming you don’t know which head you are in, are sharing thoughts telepathically, or are feeling the senses from two bodies simultaneously? That is the issue I take.
I don’t care that there is no way to know which was the original. I don’t care that the other guy has just as much valid claim to being “Irishman” as I do. I don’t care that my family won’t notice the difference, that there is no objective difference. I care that the locus of my thought is in this body, not that body. If one of the two bodies is to be terminated, make it the other me. And he will say the same thing about me, because his locus of thought is in his body, and he doesn’t want to be the one disintegrated, either.
Fair enough. As I said, this is all conjecture, so we don’t know what it is that is the seat of the identity, and how it relates to memories. But yes, I do think it comes from the brain. But when we start potentially separating parts of thought from the physical brain, then I think it’s important to differentiate because I think there is an interpreter separate from the memories. But that is only my belief, I can’t prove it.
But that overlooks the essence of the process itself. Is my identity and awareness continuous across that transfer, or is it interrupted. I am uncomfortable with the idea of an interruption of the process.
I know you feel it is the same as sleep. I disagree. For some reason, it seems different. Because the process of ripping a brain apart is typically fatal, I have a hard time of conceptualing a process to rip a brain apart and it not be fatal. The idea of putting pieces of a brain together in the right order and my existence starts back where it left off feels different than going to sleep. I don’t know if there is any other way to explain it, and maybe it’s just that - an unsubstantiated and unexplainable uneasiness with an unknown process.
Well, I think being able to talk during transport is hooey. How do you talk when you have no mouth, no lungs, no diaphram, no voicebox? How do you communicate between two people? Digital telepathy?
But here is where we reach a critical distinction point. If the thought process is active through the transport, if I can feel myself during it, or feel mometarily myself in two places, then that seems acceptable for me. My concern comes in with a discontinuous process, a “going to sleep and waking up”. I’m also mildly concerned with an instantaneous I’m here then I’m there. I can’t say it’s a rationale fear, merely that it makes me uncomfortable. I’d rather not find out I died and some clone took my place.
No, I’m not claiming that there’s some sort of telepathic link between the two copies.
Neither, for the record, is anyone else in this thread.
Yeah, I get it. I got it back on page one. You don’t have to keep explaining it.
Of course you think sleep is different. You’d already done it thousands of times before you were even capable of understanding the concept of “consciousness.” It’s not at all surprising that it got grandfathered in when you were old enough to actually consider the question of self-identity.
I submit, however, that the question of sleep remains a flaw in your conception of consciousness, as demonstrated by the topic of this thread.
But you said you can’t tell the difference. I’m saying you can tell the difference - you’re the one over here, he’s the one over there. That may be the only difference, but for me over here it is enough of a difference.
And I’m saying we don’t know enough about the nature of identity and consciousness to say that with certainty. It might be a flaw in my concern, in which case I’m being unreasonably resistant. But we need far more information on identity before I can overcome that resistance.
