On 4/13/2015 8:13 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 14 April 2015 at 13:03, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 14 April 2015 at 12:18, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au>
wrote:
Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 14 April 2015 at 11:26, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au>
wrote:
It's an illusion even in a dualist model, because dualism does not
logically rule out copying. The illusion, to spell it out further, is
that I am a unique entity persisting through time. That is what I feel
to be "personal identity" at the visceral level, and even though
intellectually I know better, I can't shake the feeling.
It's stubborn, even if an illusion, eh? If you were duplicated, would
you
be
prepared to kill your duplicate? Who would you kill?
If it came to a fight over the last place in a lifeboat I might be
prepared to kill my duplicate and he would be prepared to kill me (I
can say this since I know how he thinks). I would feel bad about
killing him because he can then anticipate no future experiences:
there will be no future entity that remembers being him so the
illusion of being a person persisting through time would end. I would
not worry about destructive copying of myself or someone else because
then the illusion would persist. This is a rough answer and it is not
difficult to think of situations that cause problems. For example,
taking a drug such as midazolam which causes amnesia could be seen as
equivalent to killing your copy.
Wouldn't it be easier just to commit suicide? You are still killing the
same
person on your account.
If I commit suicide the illusion of persisting through time is
destroyed. If I kill my copy or if I enter a destructive duplicator
the illusion is maintained.
So the illusion really is important, then. If you commit suicide, you do
continue through time because your duplicate survives. Or is that different?
If I commit suicide but a duplicate survives with my memories at the
time of suicide then I feel that I survive; this is what happens with
destructive duplication. Another way to put it (in terminology which
has been more commonly used on this list in the past) is that if I
have successor observer moments then I survive. But this definition of
survival can cause problems, because if you take an amnesia-inducing
drug, you have no successor observer moments.
But that is only because you place all importance on stream of consciousness and none on
subconscious processes and propensities that make up what is commonly called "character".
Or by "amnesia-inducing drug" did you mean one that prevents the formation of *any* new
memories as well as wiping out old ones? In that case I would equate that with "death",
you might as well be in a coma.
Brent
It is equivalent to
committing suicide with a copy made a while ago in the next room -
which I would be reluctant to do. There is no consistent theory of
personal identity (or of how to maintain the illusion of personal
identity) that covers all eventualities.
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