KFL@MIT-MC.ARPA (09/13/85)
From: Keith F. Lynch <KFL@MIT-MC.ARPA>
From: mtgzz!leeper@topaz.rutgers.edu (m.r.leeper)
Date: 8 Sep 85 02:12:05 GMT
I think that there is a misconception here. Your species remains
reconstructable while your genetic code is on file, but you do not.
Genetic code only allows somebody to make something that looks sort
of like you, not to remake you.
Sorry I didn't make myself clearer. You can keep genetic code on file
and that will specify an identical twin, at best. Or you can also keep
your mind on file. The latter is much harder, and is independant of the
former. Nobody yet has any idea how large the mind is, how to read it,
or how to write it into a new brain. I maintain that if that were possible,
the newly constructed person would be you, or would at least think that
he/she were you. (Interesting plot twists when you have multiple people
who are the same person. See for instance Varley's _Ophiuchi_Hotline_.
For same mind but different body, see for instace Niven's _World_Out_
Of_Time_.)
Please note that we didn't know how to read or write or determine the
size of a genetic code 30 years ago. Today, it's almost commonplace. In
30 more years, will the technology of mind reading/writing/copying be well
developed? Would that mean that some people alive today will never die?
...Keith