Bruno wrote: > > Saibal Mitra wrote: > > > Now there exists a class of universes, with a very low measure, in > >which the laws of physics are such that I am guaranteed to win. The > >probability that I find myself in such a universe will have increased > >substantially after each experiment. After a few years I will be sure to > >live in such a universe. It would be easy to check, all I would have to do > >is to buy a ticket and see if I have won without using the suicide machine. > > > Just do the computation. At each suicide you will survive in the nearer > world from the one you left. That is: the more normal world > relatively to you. > Of course you will be sure that you live in such a universe, but you will > be wrong. If you stop to use the suicide machine you will stop winning > (unless you are using explicitely the suicide machine for filtering just > a world where you win without suicide machine, but then that is an another > experiment). > Look at the iteration 64 times of simple self-duplication WM. Among > the 2^64 resulting person, one will believe ending up always at W, but > if you iterate *again* 32 times you know that this one will have 2^32 - 1 > descendant knowing that the expection was wrong, and only one > believing (more and more) having been magically linked to Washington.
There is a selection effect by the very use of the suicide machine. In the usual WM experiment this doesn't occur, so let's modify it slightly. First I measure the z-component of a spin ½ particle is measured 1000 times in succesion. Provided I don't find 1000 times spin up I will perform the usual WM experiment, otherwise I will only make copies that end up in Washington. Suppose you use the suicide machine to select W ten thousand times in a row, what would the probability be that I had found 1000 times spin up? Saibal