[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

[Loss Leader]

2) Is there a way in which a self, at least, appears to be the same self throughout life?
A. Yes.
B. No.
C. Don't know.

A. Yes. The healthy individual tends to experience his/her ego as continuous throughout life.

I have no idea how this helps you as: 1) personal feelings are not evidence; 2) there is good evidence that the ego is not continuous; and 3) unhealthy individuals (schizophrenics, total amnesiacs, the seriously injured) may not experience a contunuous ego throughout life.

- From http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/self
Self

- From http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/soul
soul
noun

Who the hell cares about the dictionary definition of anything? You have a "self" that you want to show to be immortal or a "soul" that you want to prove actually is immortal. Either way, you have the same logical burden.

Rather than move on with your argument, you're just stuck on this soul/self thing. We all understand it. Move forward.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Joe,
- Can you change "soul" to "self"? If so, I can answer your question.

Wait, what?

What about this?

- In effect, I'm trying to show why that self is, in fact, equivalent to a soul -- with the souls implication of being immortal. The self I'm talking about carries no such implication on its own.

I have been asking a similar question for a long time...

What about traumatic aphasia? What about traumatic amnesia?

What about my own, personal experience?

 

[Loss Leader]

- 1) If the brains of two different people were exactly the same, would they be the same person in the sense that they would share experiences (IOW, would each person be looking through two sets of eyes)?
A. Yes.
B. Probably
C. No idea
D. Probably not
E. No

E. No.

We've already been over this again and again. Identical molecular twins are two separate people because: 1) they're made up of different matter; and 2) as soon as their experiences diverge, they will no longer be identical. You can create more than one "identical" person.

I am baffled at how this might help your argument. On the one hand, it might get you a larger number of possible souls and you are keen to have as many possible souls as you can get.

On the other hand, if each identical individual is a new soul, you appear to have shut out the possibility of that person inheriting his soul from a dead person. How can a soul be in two different bodies separated by time when each new body comes complete with its own soul?

And, of course, you're still ignoring the fact that matter, time and energy in the universe are finite. Thus, there are a finite number of people who could be made.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Joe,
- That is not the question you asked.
- If you quit with the insults, and just ask that last question, I'll try to answer it. If you can't quit with the insults, I won't bother.

Good morning, Mr. Savage:

I think it is important to point out that I have been asking the same question for a long time, now, and you have ignored it, too.

Perhaps you could simply address the fact that one of the things that makes it clear that consciousness is an emergent property of a neurosystem is that trauma to the neurosystem produces changes in the consciousness emerging from that neurosystem. Even more telling,specific types of trauma produce specific types of changes--for instance, our ability to manufacture "NDE" and "OOBE" my manipulating the brain's supply of oxygen.

Or, as I have been patiently asking, consider traumatic aphasia.

 

[Agatha]

- 1) If the brains of two different people were exactly the same, would they be the same person in the sense that they would share experiences (IOW, would each person be looking through two sets of eyes)?
A. Yes.
B. Probably
C. No idea
D. Probably not
E. No

No. Absolutely not.

2) Is there a way in which a self, at least, appears to be the same self throughout life?
A. Yes.
B. No.
C. Don't know.

Depends on the definition of self. Am I the same self as I was when I was five? The same person as I was when I was fifteen? Am I the same self as I was fifteen minutes ago?

 

[Giordano]

- 1) If the brains of two different people were exactly the same, would they be the same person in the sense that they would share experiences (IOW, would each person be looking through two sets of eyes)?
A. Yes.
B. Probably
C. No idea
D. Probably not
E. No

As pointed out by others here, you asked, and received answers, to this question, and the one following it, very recently on this thread. Is that your idea, of effective debate, to ask the same question over and over again until you get the answers you like? Seems ineffective to me. Or, to be kind, perhaps you forgot.

To avoid you having to page up, I again pick essentially E., with Slowvehicle's answer, post 4279, being so excellent and so close to mine as to make any further explanation on my part redundant. I add the reminder to you that identical twins, and cloned animals, have identical GENETICS, but different brains because of different experiences (starting with different spots in the womb for identical twins) and different outcomes to small random processes (whether a neuron turns left or right at some point in development).

 

[jond]

A. Yes. The healthy individual tends to experience his/her ego as continuous throughout life.

Except that self is constantly changing/evolving. Our perspectives on all manner of things change, sometimes minimally, sometimes extremely. Everything we take in through our senses impacts us. That moment when I first heard David Torn's solo on "Three Minutes of Pure Entertainment" shocked me to my core, and I've never heard guitar the same way since.

So while we may experience it as continuous, it is most certainly not "the same".

I have no idea how this helps you as: 1) personal feelings are not evidence; 2) there is good evidence that the ego is not continuous; and 3) unhealthy individuals (schizophrenics, total amnesiacs, the seriously injured) may not experience a contunuous ego throughout life.

Quite!

 

[Giordano]

2) Is there a way in which a self, at least, appears to be the same self throughout life?
A. Yes.
B. No.
C. Don't know.

Again, to save you the effort of paging up. I again pick B. Our idea of who we are changes with time as we experience different things and eperience physical development and aging. As has been mentioned, I interpret and see things very differently now than at 8 years old. Girls, for example. I have seen a person's idea of "self" change radically to another "self" with certain brain damage, such as some strokes.

I could ask you here to define self, but please don't. We've been down that road before.

 

[Giordano]

- I wasn't convinced before... Now, you've convinced me.
- But, I take it that you still don't see any difficulty in effectively communicating about this issue -- except, when it comes to communicating with me.

It isn't clear from your sentence. Of what are you now convinced? That a DVD changes physically as different information is stored on it? That there cannot be an infinity of different DVDs?

How many times did we need to repeat this until you became convinced? If we knew, this information could save us a lot of time in the future.

 

[Giordano]

- I wasn't convinced before... Now, you've convinced me.
- But, I take it that you still don't see any difficulty in effectively communicating about this issue -- except, when it comes to communicating with me.

It isn't clear from your first sentence. Of what are you now convinced? That a DVD changes physically as different information is stored on it? That there cannot be an infinity of different DVDs? How many times did we need to repeat this until you became convinced? If we knew, this information could save us a lot of time in the future.

The second part of your reply confuses me a great deal. I thought that godless dave was very clear to being on the same page as you in terms of "self" for purposes of your "proof" and repeatedly made that very clear to you on this thread.

 

[Giordano]

Joe,
- Can you change "soul" to "self"? If so, I can answer your question.

You can yourself in your reply, Use "self" in your answer instead of "soul" and explain the difference again, if you wish.

 

[godless dave]

- Cause, a long time ago, I started complaining about how difficult it was to communicate this stuff effectively, and no one seemed to agree with me...

The only difficulties in communication here seem to be your insistence on asking questions that have already been answered.

 

[Akhenaten]

I've lost track a bit.

Who's wearing the Least Critical Poster™ mantle today?

 

[Giordano]

Joe,
- That is not the question you asked.
- If you quit with the insults, and just ask that last question, I'll try to answer it. If you can't quit with the insults, I won't bother.

He now quotes the exact post, so the question is exactly the same. Should he add "pretty please answer it" too to get you to reply?

If you think someone is insulting you, rather than your views or posting style, you can report them by using the ! icon on the lower left of your screen. To my knowledge, I don't think anyone here has insulted you as a person, although I have been tempted.

 

[Giordano]

- Cause, a long time ago, I started complaining about how difficult it was to communicate this stuff effectively, and no one seemed to agree with me...
- I need to get to my chores, so I won't be able to communicate for awhile...

I pointed this out already: if you have trouble communicating your views, setting aside the time, remembering your and others posts, or constructing a mathematical proof, perhaps you should chose a less difficult thread?

I am poorly coordinated and clumsy. I therefore chose not to pursue basketball or dancing as a hobby or career. See how it works?

 

[Slowvehicle]

I've lost track a bit.

Who's wearing the Least Critical Poster™ mantle today?

Only Mr. Savage can say...

 

[Aepervius]

Wait, what?

What about this?



I have been asking a similar question for a long time...

What about traumatic aphasia? What about traumatic amnesia?

What about my own, personal experience?

or my favorites :
Anterograde amnesia
retrograde Amnesia
Cotard Delusion...

 

[Giordano]

Jabba,

When you do get back, please provide the exact citation to which you were referring when you stated that one can place things into categories without being able to identify them. I am certain I want to read it- it sounds interesting.

Also when you do get back, if your proof of immortality relies on the previous low probability of there being a Jabba, even though there is a Jabba (current probability = 1), you will want to explain why this "proof" does not also apply to specific card hands and lottery ticket numbers. You haven't yet.

 

[Aepervius]

I've lost track a bit.

Who's wearing the Least Critical Poster™ mantle today?

If I look positively Fa-bu-lous in it, I will glady wear it

 

[calebprime]

...David Torn's solo on "Three Minutes of Pure Entertainment" ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIG5mBwOPP8

Caleb likes. That's pretty amazing.

Without too much of a derail, what are some other Torn ECM albums I might like?

I still think, however, that some of the CD covers designed here by Shemp, et al, are better than the ECM CD covers.