On Monday, 18 July 2016, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> On 18/07/2016 7:59 pm, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > > On 18 July 2016 at 17:10, Bruce Kellett <bhkell...@optusnet.com.au > <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','bhkell...@optusnet.com.au');>> wrote: > >> On 18/07/2016 5:00 pm, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: >> >> On 18 July 2016 at 15:42, Brent Meeker < >> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','meeke...@verizon.net');> >> meeke...@verizon.net >> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','meeke...@verizon.net');>> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On 7/17/2016 10:04 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: >>> >>>> The problems arise because each copy has memories of being the original >>>> and, because of the phenomenon of first person experience, feels that he is >>>> the one true copy persisting through time >>>> >>> >>> How would it feel any different if he weren't? He doesn't know and >>> neither does anyone else. So it's really meaningless to say he feels he's >>> the one true copy. He's just relying on his previous prejudice that he was >>> unique. >>> >> >> Yes - it's a prejudice, but an important one nonetheless. I can be >> radically sceptical about the existence of the world and other minds, but >> still go about life as if it matters. >> >> >> But do the pronouns "I and you" have a referrent? It has been said about >> Descates' 'cogito ergo sum' that Descartes cannot conclude that he is >> thinking, he can only conclude that thinking is going on. >> > > From the fact that I think, it follows only that there is a thought at > this moment, not that there is an entity that has a stream of thoughts. The > entity, the "I", is not fundamental but emergent, the set of related > thoughts. These thoughts are not necessarily connected through sharing a > physical substrate. Sharing a physical substrate is a convenient method of > producing thoughts with the right sort of relationship to each other, but > as the sort of duplication experiments we are considering show, there can > be discontinuities in time, space and across non-interacting universes, and > continuity of identity, which is not meaningfully different to the illusion > of continuity of identity, persists. > > > But you haven't shown continuity of identity without some substrate to > provide coherence. > It's trivial to show this. I feel I am a continuation of the person who went to sleep in my bed last night. If you now demonstrate that overnight there was a discontinuity (of whatever type you like) in my physical substrate, that would not change my feeling that I have survived the night, and hence would confirm that this discontinuity does not affect personal identity. > You have relied on a particular notion of personal identity that has some > serious problems in the examples that have been used. For instance, the > loss of transitivity of identity throws into question the whole notion of > an identity persisting in time. > If you accept that the whole notion of an identity persisting in time is an illusion it makes things simpler. -- Stathis Papaioannou -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
