I've always thought - and this might just be betraying my lack of understanding - that these are simply two sides of the same coin: we can't distinguish between these quantum events, so we can consider ourselves as either being a classical being 'above' a sea of quantum noise, or as being a bundle of identical consciousnesses generated in many different interacting universes. In the 1st interpretation, we don't split. In the second we do, but the split doesn't change us.
-------------------------- - Did you ever hear of "The Seattle Seven"? - Mmm. - That was me... and six other guys. 2008/11/14 Brent Meeker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Kory Heath wrote: > > Sorry for the long delay on this reply. > > > > On Nov 2, 2008, at 7:04 PM, Brent Meeker wrote: > >> Kory Heath wrote: > >>> In this mundane sense, it's perfectly sensible for me to say, as I'm > >>> sitting here typing this email, "I expect to still be sitting in this > >>> room one second from now". If I'm about to step into a teleporter > >>> that's going to obliterate me and make a perfect copy of me in a > >>> distant blue room, how can it not be sensible to ask - in that > >>> mundane, everyday sense - "What do I expect to be experiencing one > >>> second from now?" > >> It's sensible to ask because in fact there is no teleporter or > >> duplicator or simulator that can provide the continuity of experiences > >> that is Kory. So the model in which your consciousness is a single > >> unified "thing" works. But there are hypothetical cases in which it > >> doesn't make sense, or at least its sense is somewhat arbitrary. > > > > If something like the many-worlds interpretation of quantum physics is > > correct, then this kind of duplication is actually happening to me all > > the time. But I should still be able to ask a question like, "What do > > I expect to be experiencing one second from now?", and the answer > > should still be "I expect to still be sitting at this computer, typing > > this email." If the many-worlds theory simply disallows me from making > > statements like that, then there's something wrong with the many- > > worlds theory. But if the many-worlds theory *allows* me to make > > statements like that, then in that same sense, I should be able to ask > > "What am I about to experience?" when I step into a duplicating machine. > > I think there is a misunderstanding of the MWI. Although the details > haven't > been worked out (and maybe they won't be, c.f. Dowker and Kent) it is > generally > thought that you, as a big hot macroscopic body, do not split into > significantly > different Korys because your interaction with the environment keeps the > Kory > part of the wave function continuously decohered. So in a Feynman > path-integral > picture, you are a very tight bundle of paths centered around the classical > path. Only if some microscopic split gets amplified and affects you do you > "split". > > I doubt that it will ever be possible to build a teleporter. Lawrence > Krauss > wrote about the problem in "The Physics of Star Trek". I'm not sure what > it > would mean for Bruno's argument if a teleporter were shown to be strictly > impossible; after all it's just a thought experiment. > > On the other hand, I think it's probably not that hard to duplicate a lot > of > your brain function, enough to instantiate a "consciousness" that at least > thinks it's Kory and fools Kory's friends. But would such an approximate > Kory > create the ambiguity in the history of Korys that is inherent in Bruno's > argument? > > Brent > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
