Lippard.Multics@HIS-PHOENIX-MULTICS.ARPA (09/13/85)
From: "James J. Lippard" <Lippard@HIS-PHOENIX-MULTICS.ARPA> [Keith Lynch:] >> Postultimate thought: if you put yourself on file could >> you ever truly die? >> >> Sure. If all the copies get wiped out. Just as books, >>music, and computer data can become irretrievably lost. The >>more copies, and in the more places, the better. Keep one >>in another solar system (it's called supernova insurance). [Mark Leeper:] > I think that there is a misconception here. Your species remains > reconstructable while your genetic code is on file, but you do not. *If* just the genetic code is on file. If all the information about your identity was put on file, you *could* come back. In fact, there could be more than one of you. This is assuming a materialist point of view--if there's a soul which flies away at death then the copy isn't the same. Jim Lippard (Lippard at MIT-MULTICS.ARPA)
leeper@mtgzz.UUCP (m.r.leeper) (09/24/85)
>From: "James J. Lippard" <Lippard@HIS-PHOENIX-MULTICS.ARPA> > >[Keith Lynch:] >>> Postultimate thought: if you put yourself on file could >>> you ever truly die? >>> >>> Sure. If all the copies get wiped out. Just as books, >>>music, and computer data can become irretrievably lost. The >>>more copies, and in the more places, the better. Keep one >>>in another solar system (it's called supernova insurance). > >[Mark Leeper:] >> I think that there is a misconception here. Your species remains >> reconstructable while your genetic code is on file, but you do not. > >*If* just the genetic code is on file. If all the information about >your identity was put on file, you *could* come back. In fact, there >could be more than one of you. This is assuming a materialist point >of view--if there's a soul which flies away at death then the copy >isn't the same. > OK, so there is more of you on file than just your genetic code. Then a new copy is made. I think the point still is valid. As far as the world is concerned you are alive, but that is an illusion. You are dead. There just is a perfect copy around that thinks it is you. The fact that two or three of these things can be made is the clincher. They can't all be the original. Take my word for it, if you are destroyed and replaced by an exact copy with your mind, you are dead. The exact copy is only that. I know. It happens to me every night. Mark Leeper ...ihnp4!mtgzz!leeper
grafton@idec.UUCP (S. Grafton) (09/24/85)
In article <1180@mtgzz.UUCP> leeper@mtgzz.UUCP (m.r.leeper) writes: >They can't all be the original. Take my word for it, if you are >destroyed and replaced by an exact copy with your mind, you are dead. >The exact copy is only that. I know. It happens to me every night. > > Mark Leeper This reminds me of another one of those short stories that I can remember reading, 'The Tunnel under the World' by Fred Pohl (if my colleague's memory serves him right). The above comment jogged the old memory. It was about a man who found himself in a very strange situation. Every day people about him were doing exactly the same things that they were doing the day before. It was always the same day, there were always the same progs on the tele (so whats new) and so on. Anyway he and a chum hide away somewhere but are eventually found. He finds out, much to his dismay, that he is in fact a Robot. His whole town was distroyed when a factory exploded and everyone had been killed. An advertising agency had brought the town , 'reincarnated' the people as robots, and tested out different advertising techniques on them. They were reprogrammed every night. Who knows, this may already have happened ...... -- _____________________________________________________________________________ 'Hey ! You sass that Hoopy Ford Prefect, there's a frood who really knows where his towel is.' - HGTTG. - Steve. grafton@idec.UUCP mcvax!ukc!stc!idec!grafton though more reliable is "EH! YOU" (not recomended for North America) _____________________________________________________________________________
ewiles@netex.UUCP (Ed Wiles) (09/25/85)
> >[Keith Lynch:] > Postultimate thought: if you put yourself on file could > you ever truly die? > >[James J. Lippard:] > Sure. If all the copies get wiped out... > >[Mark Leeper:] > I think that there is a misconception here. Your species remains > reconstructable while your genetic code is on file, but you do not. > >[(Sorry, I lost the name.)] > *If* just the genetic code is on file. If all the information about > your identity was put on file, you *could* come back... > >[Mark Leeper:] > OK, so there is more of you on file than just your genetic code. Then > a new copy is made. I think the point still is valid. As far as the > world is concerned you are alive, but that is an illusion. You are > dead. There just is a perfect copy around that thinks it is you. ------------ (Key words!) I seem to remember something called the Turring Test. In effect, if you cannot tell the difference between two "things/people/etc...", then there *is* *no* *difference*!!!! > The fact that two or three of these things can be made is the clincher. > They can't all be the original. By the definition above, why not? At the time of their creation/construction (whatever), they *are* the original. (Remember, A difference that you cannot see is not a difference. And don't pick on the word "see", you know what I mean.) I do agree, that with time, they will probably not develop in the same way as the first would have. If you inform them that they were not the first in the series, this would have an effect on them that the first would not have encountered. If you attempt to hide this from them, that attempt would also have an effect on them. Though not as severe as the prior one would. > Take my word for it, if you are destroyed and replaced by an exact copy > with your mind, you are dead. The exact copy is only that. I know. > It happens to me every night. The first sentence is apparently an attempt to "prove-by-authority", I knew about, and disregarded, this method long before my college class in logic. The second sentence I have already dealt with above. The third, and fourth sentences seem to be mildly sarcastic and, if that is how they were meant, should have had a "smiley" after them. (I could be wrong, maybe he does die every night. My question then: Do you beleive in, and or have proof of, reincarnation? :-) ) E. L. Wiles ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Quote: Time, Aug 12 1985, pg 23, William Safire: "...Politics without a villain is like a lens without a focal point." Disclaimer: My remarks are related only to my own mind, and sometimes not even to that!