[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

[Loss Leader]

Except that self is constantly changing/evolving.

Without question. However, I think Jabba is right in that most healthy people experience their "selves" as being continuous. This experience is an illusion, but it seems to be the general feeling.

(How this helps Jabba, I have no idea. I feel like the earth is flat. I experience it as flat. The earth is not flat.)

 

[Aepervius]

Without question. However, I think Jabba is right in that most healthy people experience their "selves" as being continuous. This experience is an illusion, but it seems to be the general feeling.

(How this helps Jabba, I have no idea. I feel like the earth is flat. I experience it as flat. The earth is not flat.)

Most people sleep at night.

That much make the idea of a continuous self bunkum.

 

[jond]

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.

Try Prezens.

/derail

 

[jond]

Without question. However, I think Jabba is right in that most healthy people experience their "selves" as being continuous. This experience is an illusion, but it seems to be the general feeling.

(How this helps Jabba, I have no idea. I feel like the earth is flat. I experience it as flat. The earth is not flat.)

Jabba is saying that there's a part that stays the same. Which is very different from continuous. But I agree wholeheartedly that it doesn't help his case.

 

[dafydd]

- 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...

Hasn't the reason for that dawned on you yet?

 

[dafydd]

Can I assume that this thread is no longer about immortality, and that we agreed that immortality does not exist?

 

[Slowvehicle]

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

What. You trying to work my side of the street?

 

[Agatha]

Hey, if the feather boa fits, I say wear it!

 

[Aepervius]

What. You trying to work my side of the street?

What , jealous of my black feline beauty ?

 

[Slowvehicle]

Hey, if the feather boa fits, I say wear it!

I do, in fact, own a feather boa that gives 'em fits...

 

[Slowvehicle]

What , jealous of my black feline beauty ?

That's gotta be it...

 

[Innocuous]

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.

Tepidly, no. Is there any meaningful commonality between myself as a zygote and myself as a dying centenarian? (Yes, I am an optimist.) Or even between my 1-year-old self and my 30-year-old self? Do they even share the same atoms (calcium in the bone, maybe)? Some measurable attributes might rarely change, like fingerprints, or being mostly water, or the pattern of my DNA, but none of these uniquely identify me and I don't think they are meaningful in this context.

This is perhaps a weak analogy, but if you own a car for 20 years, but you have replaced all the parts, is it the same car, even if it still looks and behaves much the same?

I am still thinking about it. Thinking makes my brain hurt.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Tepidly, no. Is there any meaningful commonality between myself as a zygote and myself as a dying centenarian? (Yes, I am an optimist.) Or even between my 1-year-old self and my 30-year-old self? Do they even share the same atoms (calcium in the bone, maybe)? Some measurable attributes might rarely change, like fingerprints, or being mostly water, or the pattern of my DNA, but none of these uniquely identify me and I don't think they are meaningful in this context.

This is perhaps a weak analogy, but if you own a car for 20 years, but you have replaced all the parts, is it the same car, even if it still looks and behaves much the same?

I am still thinking about it. Thinking makes my brain hurt.

Welcome, Innocuous!

We have tried the Ship of Theseus/Lincoln's Axe/John Henry's Hammer route, with little of no acknowledgement from Mr. Savage.

Perhaps he will listen to you...

 

[Innocuous]

Welcome, Innocuous!

We have tried the Ship of Theseus/Lincoln's Axe/John Henry's Hammer route...

Ah, thanks. I will look those up to educate myself.

 

[Garrette]

Ah, thanks. I will look those up to educate myself.

No! Whatever you do, don't do that. Education and understanding are anathema to the transcendence of the OP.

 

[Pixel42]

We have tried the Ship of Theseus/Lincoln's Axe/John Henry's Hammer route, with little of no acknowledgement from Mr. Savage.

Have we tried the wave analogy? An ocean wave can travel for miles, its shape and the atoms of which it is made constantly changing, but it is still meaningful to say it is the same wave. It eventually hits the shore and its energy dissipates, of course, so Jabba probably won't like that analogy either.

 

[Loss Leader]

Tepidly, no.

Welcome. Without question, you are right. There is no continuous self througout life. However, giving Jabba's silly question all benefit of the doubt, I think that the self usually "appears" to be continuous to healthy people. This illusion seems to be an evolutionary necessity (as most people who do not experience a continuous self tend to be too sick to properly function).

None of this helps the gentleman from Schenectady.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Tepidly, no. Is there any meaningful commonality between myself as a zygote and myself as a dying centenarian? (Yes, I am an optimist.) Or even between my 1-year-old self and my 30-year-old self? Do they even share the same atoms (calcium in the bone, maybe)?

The same cells? Some of them, yes. The same atoms? Mostly no.

We have tried the Ship of Theseus/Lincoln's Axe/John Henry's Hammer[...]

/Trigger's Broom.

 

[Jabba]

But since, as Jabba has said he can prove, he is immortal, he can eat an infinite number of them.

What Rough Beast, I just recognized your name. I don't know why, but that's probably my favorite poem...

 

[Giordano]

What Rough Beast, I just recognized your name. I don't know why, but that's probably my favorite poem...

Hi Jabba! Back? Did you do the chores you mentioned?

Have you now the time to answer the so-far unanswered questions here?

Try these three first, please:

1. If the mind is independent of the physical brain, why does physical brain damage affect the "mind" and why does physical death of the brain appear to cause termination of the "mind?" In a related question, where does my "self" go when I am unconscious or asleep?

2. Why does your mathematical proof imply that only people, and not specific card hands and lottery ticket numbers, are immortal?

3. What is the specific citation that you mentioned that discussed categorizing?