Thought experiments in Continuity of Self

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So here's the scenario:

A mad scientist has figured out a way to scan your material being and then create a duplicate of you from that scan ... given that your predispositions and experiences are evident in your material being (e.g., as genetic codes and contingent morphology to include plastic synaptic connections in the brain), the duplicate will have your exact predispositions and life memories.

1. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then after your death a duplicate is created ... as far as the duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... but is he/she really?

2. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then a duplicate is created immediately ... as far as the duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... but since you are still alive, can he/she really be?

3. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then after your death multiple duplicates are created ... as far as each duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... which one(s) (if any) really is you?

4. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then frozen ... at some point in the future, you are unfrozen and at the same time a duplicate is created ... your conscious experience stopped when you were frozen ... then two consciousnesses that claim to be you are started up in the future ... which one (if any) is really you? ... and why?

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@paulhanke,

paulhanke wrote:

1. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then after your death a duplicate is created ... as far as the duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... but is he/she really?

Well IMO, the copy created is going to be identical to the being that was scanned in the instance of scanning. So no, the duplicate is not going to be the same 'you' when you died. The copied person will immediately start to differ from the original as time progresses. The conditions can never be the same for the two bodys so it is not going to be the same 'you'.

paulhanke wrote:

2. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then a duplicate is created immediately ... as far as the duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... but since you are still alive, can he/she really be?

I don't get what you're trying to get at. Two bodies, so two minds.

paulhanke wrote:

3. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then after your death multiple duplicates are created ... as far as each duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... which one(s) (if any) really is you?

None are you though, they are the you that was scanned, not the you that is dead.

paulhanke wrote:

4. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then frozen ... at some point in the future, you are unfrozen and at the same time a duplicate is created ... your conscious experience stopped when you were frozen ... then two consciousnesses that claim to be you are started up in the future ... which one (if any) is really you? ... and why?

Well now its getting interesting Laughing

. I'd say all 'you' 's are going to tangent in different directions because the conditions and influences for the body are going to be different. But at the instance of being created, all the you's are the same (if they can be created at the exact same time ofcourse).

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@paulhanke,

Very interesting set of hypotheticals here.

paulhanke wrote:

1. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then after your death a duplicate is created ... as far as the duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... but is he/she really?

No, that'd be a duplicate. But as you say, as far as he/she is concerned, they are the "you".

paulhanke wrote:

2. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then a duplicate is created immediately ... as far as the duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... but since you are still alive, can he/she really be?

At the moment of creation - that instant - there wouldn't be two "you's", there's be you and a duplicate. But the instant any thought, any action, any neuron fires the identical-ness halts. Since our thoughts, actions and experience are the self, you'd almost instantaneously have two different people.

paulhanke wrote:

3. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then after your death multiple duplicates are created ... as far as each duplicate is concerned, he/she is you ... which one(s) (if any) really is you?

None, they're copies. At the moment of duplication they'd be identical; but of course as soon as they begin to experience, they'd become no longer exactly the same.

paulhanke wrote:

4. Assume you are scanned prior to your death and then frozen ... at some point in the future, you are unfrozen and at the same time a duplicate is created ... your conscious experience stopped when you were frozen ... then two consciousnesses that claim to be you are started up in the future ... which one (if any) is really you? ... and why?

Well... we'd be in one heck of a fix then.

Good mind-tickler. Thanks

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@Khethil,

... thanks guys! Smile

... what I'm looking for here are alternative answers to these questions, because my own answers (particularly to #4) don't feel quite solid yet ... here's how I waded through these:

1. Given that the life process that is "me" stops when I die, there is a remote (but non-intuitive - to me, at least) possibility that when the copy of "me" gets fired up subsequent to my death that it is really "me"

2. This situation refutes the possibility raised in answer to #1 - if the copy of "me" is alive at the same time as "me", it cannot be the original "me" ... the implication here is that it is the continuity of the life process is what distinguishes the original "me" from the copy (whose own life process begins discontinuously relative to the predispositions and experiential memories it has been given) ... therefore, while the scanning process may capture the essence of the material that "me" currently occupies, it does not capture the processual essence of "me"

3. This situation also refutes the possibility raised in answer to #1 - if multiple copies of "me" can be created simultaneously, they are either all "me" or else none of them are "me" ... the latter is the least ridiculous of the two to assert.

4. This one's a little harder ... given that two life processes get fired up at some point in the future, they seem to be hard to distinguish - specifically because the "continuity" identified in #2 doesn't seem to apply here ... are neither of them me? ... but then, maybe - just maybe - "continuity" does apply here ... life processes flow through the world of matter, never really attached to any matter in particular, yet unable to persist independent of matter ... so if you "freeze" the particular matter that my life process is flowing through at a given instant in time, does that frozen matter capture anything? - in particular, does it capture the essence of my life process such that when you unfreeze the matter allowing the life process to proceed that the life process is still "me"? ... my intuition says "yes!" - freezing the matter by definition puts the life process into a period of stasis ... and so there is subjective continuity as far as the life process is concerned

The weakness here is that there is also subjective continuity as far as the consciousness of the copy of "me" is concerned - as far as the copy is concerned, he is "me" and always has been ... a distinguishing factor here is that his subjective continuity is at the level of consciousness, whereas my subjective continuity is at the level of life process ... but is this just splitting hairs?

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@paulhanke,

I find impossible scenarios have to have even more impossible answers...the atoms have to be different the complexity of the material has to be different or are we replicating the atoms that are so closely related you cant tell the difference?...so if the atoms are identical so why is my brother different to me.?..we are all as one but we are different..then if we are made of atoms our identity can be recorded...My reasoned response is you can not replicate the "i" because there is only one "i"...dont say its illogical when you are considering replicating a human down to his last and minutest imperfections..

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@paulhanke,

Then one has to assume the self is only present in the original and not in the copies. For if that is not so, the copies would be identical to the original in respect to self.
Where is this self then?
Surely none of the copies would ever know they were not the original.
And if one single neuron firing would break the identity of the copy and the original, would it not also break the identity between original(before) and original(after). Is then the original itself still the original?

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@sarek,

sarek wrote:

Then one has to assume the self is only present in the original and not in the copies. For if that is not so, the copies would be identical to the original in respect to self.
Where is this self then?
Surely none of the copies would ever know they were not the original.
And if one single neuron firing would break the identity of the copy and the original, would it not also break the identity between original(before) and original(after). Is then the original itself still the original?

Then all you have is belief that the there is only one and the others are other ones but not the same..

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@xris,

... like I said - it feels like splitting hairs Wink

One thing I do find interesting here ... I am used to having things disappear during reductive analysis ... for example, if you reduce the level of description down to mere life, consciousness disappears; if you reduce the level of description down further to mere chemistry, life disappears; and so on ... the case here seems a bit reversed ... at the level of consciousness, I and all of my copies can be said to be "me" - sure, they're all flying off in different experiential directions, but as far as each is concerned they are "me" ... and who's to say they aren't? ... it is only when you reduce the level of description down to, say, mere life that all of a sudden the authentic "me" appears evident within the crowd of copies - the "me" that is the life process that actually lived the experiential memories that the crowd of copies merely inherit.

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@paulhanke,

paulhanke wrote:

... so if you "freeze" the particular matter that my life process is flowing through at a given instant in time, does that frozen matter capture anything? - in particular, does it capture the essence of my life process such that when you unfreeze the matter allowing the life process to proceed that the life process is still "me"? ... my intuition says "yes!" - freezing the matter by definition puts the life process into a period of stasis ...

... I picked up an intriguing book today - "Process Metaphysics" (Nicholas Rescher) ... it turns out that I'm not the only one willing to look upon life as a process that flows through the world of matter ... but the process metaphysicians (e.g., Whitehead) take it a step further and give ontological priority to process over matter ... looks like it's going to be a fun read! :a-ok:

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@paulhanke,

Your thread did stay with me...I pondered on identical twins or even ten indentical children born at the sme time...Their life will describe them as individuals..if they all had identical experiences in life would they all be the same....These impossible scenarios dont in my opinion answer questions only pose academic quandries..My problem with them is the acceptance that we could do it and by so doing this impossible act it concludes the individual is a figment of our belief system...

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@xris,

... I'm sure you're right and that in many instances academic scenarios can easily be misleading ... but in this case, I think that wading through these scenarios is answering a question for me that until now I didn't even know enough to ask: which metaphysics better aligns with the real world - substance metaphysics or process metaphysics? ... process metaphysics seems to work better here (in these scenarios, an individual as process seems much more "solid" than an individual as substance) ... and as one who has had increasing brushes with chaos/complexity/nonlinear-dynamics in their work, I have to say that reading the first couple of chapters of Rescher's "Process Metaphysics" was like deja-vu-all-over-again ... the two seem to be extraordinarily well-fitted to each other!

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@paulhanke,

stealing my ideas paul? Wink

jk jk

To answer: none of them will ever be the real you. Its subjective experience, not shared experience.

But the real tickler here is: if all the material criteria are met then what is missing?

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@Kielicious,

Jumping in a little late, here. It seems these thought experiments stretch our definition of "self". What definition do we begin with?

Great subject, and great responses so far.

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@Kielicious,

Kielicious wrote:

stealing my ideas paul? jk jk

... yep!

... your thread got me thinking off on this tangent, so I decided to see where it leads ...

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@Didymos Thomas,

Didymos Thomas wrote:

What definition do we begin with?

... whatever definition you want Smile

... we're still flinging spaghetti at this point, just trying to see what sticks and what doesn't ...

1 Reply

@paulhanke,

Well, we could turn to popular definitions (like Locke's) and work from there. Personally, I'm skeptical that self exists - I wonder if it's a delusion, but that's also why I'm interested in this thread.

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@Didymos Thomas,

Didymos Thomas wrote:

Personally, I'm skeptical that self exists - I wonder if it's a delusion...

... now that's a mind-bender! ... if "self" is delusion, who (what?) is experiencing the delusion? ...

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@paulhanke,

An answer to that question depends upon the definition of self.

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@Didymos Thomas,

Didymos Thomas wrote:

An answer to that question depends upon the definition of self.

... such as ... ... ...

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@paulhanke,

paulhanke wrote:

The weakness here is that there is also subjective continuity as far as the consciousness of the copy of "me" is concerned - as far as the copy is concerned, he is "me" and always has been ... a distinguishing factor here is that his subjective continuity is at the level of consciousness, whereas my subjective continuity is at the level of life process ... but is this just splitting hairs?

... process metaphysics seems to offer a way out here:

Quote:

... processes generally consist of processes: microprocesses that combine to form macroprocesses. Process theorists often use organismic analogies to indicate this idea of different levels of units: Smaller, subordinate (or subsidiary) processes unite to form larger, superordinate (or supersidiary) process-units, as in cells combining into organs that, in turn, constitute organisms.

(Rescher in "Process Metaphysics")

... so, whereas I was approaching things from a "levels of description" perspective and running into problems, process metaphysics appears to dissolve the problem ... instead of a "consciousness" level of description and a competing "life" level of description, "I" am at once a composite of a mental process of "consciousness" and a physical process of "life" (among other contributing processes) ... if any of these sub-processes are discontinuous, then the macro process is discontinuous ... "I" am the only macro process from among the horde of copies that is fully continuous (and not just continuous for the singled-out mental process of "consciousness") ...

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Thought experiments in Continuity of Self

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