Cont: Proof of Immortality, V for Very long discussion

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Jabba said:
Jesse,
- In a hurry, I don't really understand your question...
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A perfect copy of someone is of course going to have perfect copies of all their attributes and properties, including their sense of self. That's exactly what you'd expect from a perfect copy of something.

You are arguing that a perfect copy of a person is somehow less than perfect, because it has a copy of their sense of self.

So you're objecting to a perfect copy being a perfect copy because it has exactly what you'd expect in a perfect copy.

- I have to repeat myself, but don't you agree that something is missing if I'm not brought back to life?
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Not only do I not agree with you, I've explicitly not agreed with you by addressing this precise point to you multiple times.

But here goes again.

A copy of you is not missing your sense of self. To say that a copy is missing something is to say that it should be there, but isn't. Because it's a copy, it has copies of all your properties, including your sense of self. Of course it's going to have a copy of your sense of self.

I fundamentally don't see where you're going with this anyway. Arguing the philosophical ramifications of duplicating a person in a Star Trek style transporter is a fun intellectual exercise, but in terms of your "Proof of Immortality", seems to me to be rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic.
 
Jabba said:
We don't have to worry about bringing the VW back to life.
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You haven't defined "bring back to life." You specifically haven't discussed what that means in terms of H, materialism, so you don't get to use it as your magic wand that refutes all criticism.

In materialism, anything that would fall under the umbrella of "life" would have to flow from the material. It would have to be certain properties and behaviors of the material organism. I couldn't be anything magical or immaterial. We don't explicitly bring an organism to life. Life simply happens, just as consciousness and the sense of self. The sense of self -- at least for higher order organisms -- would necessarily be part of the set of properties and behaviors we subsume under the title life.

Does such a concept exist for a VW? Most certainly, under materialism. It wouldn't be the same set of properties and behaviors as for an organism, but there could be described a set of properties and behaviors that correspond to a VW in good working order. Some of those properties would be emergent, such as self-propulsion. Some of them would be reasonably sefl-sustating: the engine runs until fuel or spark or air is exhausted. The act of causing these to happen (e.g., via construction or repair) would constitute bringing the VW to life, or back to life. In fact, when a large U.S. warship is taken out of mothballs and recommissioned, the orders are given to man the ship, set the watch, and "bring the ship to life."

We don't think of regeneration often in terms of materialism for biological organisms since we consider death final. But we've postulated a hypothetical cloning machine that can do just what we presently cannot -- completely duplicate the organism in all its physical particulars. Since above we define life under materialism as a certain set of properties and behaviors, that cloning process brings the organism to life (or back to life) as far as materialism can reasonably define the term. All properties and behaviors under materialism necessarily flow from the matter. And if you duplicate the matter, you duplicate all that necessarily comes with it -- including life.

Now that we've indulged your silly word games, perhaps you have some real arguments you'd like to make.
 
Jabba said:
I have to repeat myself, but don't you agree that something is missing if I'm not brought back to life?
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I answered this question yesterday at some length. Why are you asking it again? And why are you continuing to grovel for agreement on a point we already told your didn't turn out to be the "gotcha!" moment you tried to make it?
 
JesseCuster said:
...seems to me to be rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic.
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Indeed, I and several others have listed all the individually fatal flaws in Jabba's argument, none of which is answered by silly pseudo-platitudes such as "bring me back to life" or "looking out through two sets of eyes." These are just the same folksy evasions we've come to see are all we're likely to get out of Jabba. They contain no insight, no wisdom, no great erudition. They're the equivalent of the fleeing criminal throwing deck chairs into the path of his pursuers.
 
How about this:

- Every time you start the VW, you bring it back to life.
- Every time you wake up and start the day, you bring back your "sense of self" to your conscious awareness.
 
Jabba said:
Jesse,
- In a hurry, I don't really understand your question...
- I have to repeat myself, but don't you agree that something is missing if I'm not brought back to life?
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Let's try another tack (or did we already do this?) ... Well:

Let's say you have a computer. Lots of programs installed, pictures, text files, music, mail, links to internet forums, etc. etc.

Now, we build another computer exactly like it. We load every single bit on your hard disk to it, and everything else. We even make sure it has the same serial number end electronic ID. (Unlike copying a human, this is actually something we can do, rather easily)

Now we take away your old computer and put the copy in its place. And we take the original and scrap it.

- Has your old computer been revived?
- Will the copy work just like it?
- Will you even notice the change?

Now, Jabba: Under H, under materialism, the hypothesis is that you are just like a computer, albeit an extremely complex one. If you are copied, and the original dies, your copy will not bring the original back to life, because nothing can bring a dead person back to life, but everything you ARE will live on in the copy.

Hans
 
godless dave said:
I'm what way would a copy of such a thing or process be different from the thing or process it would be a copy of?
That's what isn't communicating.
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Dave,
- If B is missing something that A has, are A and B different?
 
Jabba said:
Dave,
- If B is missing something that A has, are A and B different?
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If B is a perfect copy of A, then B is not missing anything that A has.

Can you answer the following questions Jabba:

Is a perfectly accurate photocopy of a document missing the information contained in the original document?

Is it different because it has a copy of that information while the original retains the information?
 
JesseCuster said:
A perfect copy of someone is of course going to have perfect copies of all their attributes and properties, including their sense of self. That's exactly what you'd expect from a perfect copy of something.

You are arguing that a perfect copy of a person is somehow less than perfect, because it has a copy of their sense of self.

So you're objecting to a perfect copy being a perfect copy because it has exactly what you'd expect in a perfect copy.

Not only do I not agree with you, I've explicitly not agreed with you by addressing this precise point to you multiple times.

But here goes again.

A copy of you is not missing your sense of self. To say that a copy is missing something is to say that it should be there, but isn't. Because it's a copy, it has copies of all your properties, including your sense of self. Of course it's going to have a copy of your sense of self.

I fundamentally don't see where you're going with this anyway. Arguing the philosophical ramifications of duplicating a person in a Star Trek style transporter is a fun intellectual exercise, but in terms of your "Proof of Immortality", seems to me to be rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic.
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It's simple — he's trying to talk about his unique, immortal soul. He's been flailing about for years trying to find the precise words (I know, ironic) that would get us all to equivocate just enough for him to be able to point to it and say, "see? Scientifically, this is what is meant by 'soul' and so therefore I'm right."

This of course means he really doesn't understand the science and why we've reached the logical conclusions that we've reached. He just cannot believe that everything he's been taught and thought about religion, 'God', his 'soul', is not provable and it's nothing but literal faith.




MRC_Hans said:
Let's try another tack (or did we already do this?) ... Well:

Let's say you have a computer. Lots of programs installed, pictures, text files, music, mail, links to internet forums, etc. etc.

Now, we build another computer exactly like it. We load every single bit on your hard disk to it, and everything else. We even make sure it has the same serial number end electronic ID. (Unlike copying a human, this is actually something we can do, rather easily)

Now we take away your old computer and put the copy in its place. And we take the original and scrap it.

- Has your old computer been revived?
- Will the copy work just like it?
- Will you even notice the change?

Now, Jabba: Under H, under materialism, the hypothesis is that you are just like a computer, albeit an extremely complex one. If you are copied, and the original dies, your copy will not bring the original back to life, because nothing can bring a dead person back to life, but everything you ARE will live on in the copy.

Hans
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Great analogy. I might insert the part of "take the original away and not tell him what happened." Then, the next time he sits down at his computer, he'd not notice a single thing different. As you said, the exact copy is exact in every way.
 
Jabba said:
Pixel,
- We don't have to worry about bringing the VW back to life.
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Perfect copies have the same characteristics as the originals. If one of the characteristics of the original is being yellow the copy will also be yellow, if one of the characteristics of the original is being alive then the copy will also be alive. There is nothing special about that particular characteristic.
 
godless dave said:
Yes. But in this case the copy is not missing anything the original has.
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This is easy. Jabba will say that because his self awareness is not inhabiting 2 bodies, then the other body must have its own self awareness. A separate but identical self awareness.
This somehow means that he can maintain that the particular instantiation of self awareness in the body he is inhabiting is a distinct thing. Now he will argue that the odds of that particular instantiation is really really unlikely, therefore it must be recycled.......or something...........immortal.

Once again Jabba. Same for bananas or a bucket of sand. The amount of possible variations of an item does not mean that a particular instantiation of an item cannot occur. It happens ALL THE TIME, we have bananas and buckets of sand. We have particular specific bananas and buckets of sand.
 
jsfisher said:
Jabba,

Let's go back to the Jabba Replicator 5000: You step in, there is a brilliant flash of light, and then two Jabba's step out.

Which one is you?
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Jabba said:
js,
- The one wearing clothes.
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They are both wearing identical clothes, because the Jabba Replicator makes perfect copies of everything put into it.

Which one is you?
 
Jabba said:
- No, I'm not. I'm just saying that "limited pool" is not nearly the same as "unlimited pool,' and that the word "pool" by itself, implies (to me) "limited pool." And, while I think that there is no limited pool of potential selves, I do think there is an unlimited pool of potential selves. I'll cease using the word "pool" by itself.
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And you'll resume using it and misusing it the first time you think it gives you a momentary advantage.
 
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