On Oct 27, 11:52 am, benjayk <benjamin.jaku...@googlemail.com> wrote: > Jason Resch-2 wrote: > > > On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 6:00 PM, Nick Prince > > <nickmag.pri...@googlemail.com>wrote: > > >> QTI, Cul de sacs and differentiation > > >> I’m trying to get a picture of how David Deutsch’s idea of > >> differentiation works – especially in relation to QTI. With a > >> standard treatment it looks as if there might be cul de sacs for a > >> dying cat. However I think I can see why this conclusion could be > >> wrong. Maybe someone could check my reasoning for this and tell me if > >> there are any flaws. > > > Nick, > > > I think such cul de sacs exist only from third person perspectives. E.g., > > the experimenter's view of what happens to the cat. When considering the > > perspective from the first person (cat) perspective, there are no cul de > > sacs for a much simpler reason: The cat might be mistaken, dreaming, or > > even > > an altogether different being choosing to temporarily experience a cat's > > point of view. > > > No matter how foolproof a setup an experimenter designs, it is impossible > > to > > capture and terminate the cat's continued consciousness as seen from the > > perspective of the cat. > > > The lower the chance the cat has of surviving through some malfunction of > > the device, the more likely it becomes that the cat survives via > > improbable > > extensions. For the same reasons, I think it is more probable that you > > will > > wake up as some trans- or post-human playing a realistic "sim ancestor" > > game > > than for you to live to 200 by some QTI accident (not counting medical > > advances). Eventually, those alternatives just become more probable. > > > Jason > > One thing I wonder about: Do the extensions necessarily become improbable? > Why is it not possible that the cat just forgets that it is that particular > cat, and wakes up as new born cat, or dog, or other animal (maybe human?). > It even seems more plausible that as long as the cat is alive, relatively > improbable extensions/narrow are required (since there are less futures > where the cat is alive, than where it is not). > > It seems to me it is one step to far to assume that after its death the cat > has to continue in a unlikely future in a form very similiar to its current > form. > That is taking egocentric notions of survival for granted. Maybe it is not > required that much of memory or personality or physical form survives for > the experience of survival. For example, during dream states, meditation or > drug experiences, (almost) all memory and sense of personhood may be lost > and still consciousness experiences surviving. > > This would be an argument in favor of a modern form of reincarnation. When > the form is destroyed, consciousness just backtracks (maybe through some > dream like experience) and is born anew. > We don't even need much assumptions in terms of QTI or non-physical plane > for that. All individual memory is lost, and thus consciousness can continue > in very many probable futures, namely all newborn individuals that share a > similar collective consciousness (which may just be the environment - or > "world" - of the dead one, which obviously does not die). For the person, > this is not really immortality, but this isn't required. Only consciousness > has to survive in order for basic subjective immortality. > It is a quite natural notion of immortality, with natural consequences with > regard to immortality experiments (the subject just dies, and consciousness > continues from memory loss). > > This would also explain positive near death experiences: As the person dies, > consciousness feels itself opening up, as more consistent future experiences > become available. > > benjayk > -- > View this message in > context:http://old.nabble.com/QTI%2C-Cul-de-sacs-and-differentiation-tp327213... > Sent from the Everything List mailing list archive at Nabble.com.- Hide > quoted text - > > - Show quoted text -
This is similar to my speculations in an earlier topic post http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list/browse_thread/thread/4514b50b8eb469c3/c49c3aa24c265a4b?lnk=gst&q=homomorphic#c49c3aa24c265a4b where I suggest that very old or dying brains might deterorate in a specific way that allows the transition of 1st person experiences from an old to a young mind i.e. the decaying brain becomes in some way homomorphic to a new young brain which allows an extension of consciousness. It is re incarnation but, as you suggest might be more a continuation of consciousness than any remembering of who I am/was. Nick -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
