[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

[Giordano]

- I have a sense of "self" that was with me when I entered first grade, was with me when I went on active duty and was still with me when I retired. Whether a process, or illusion or what, my sense is that this self, or this aspect of my self, has remained the same throughout my life and environment and personal changes. That's the self that I think is immortal.
- I had thought that at least many of you understood what I was referring to. But now, everyone seems to be denying the existence of this sense of continuation -- saying that there is no sense in which the self, or an aspect of the self, remains the same during a lifetime.
- Who, here, accepts that there is such a sense?

An attorney, as you have often compared your role here, is not supposed to ask questions to which he/she does not already know the answers, He/she certainly does not ask the questions that he/she already asked, and to which the answers helped prove his client guilty! You already essentially asked this question, and NO, virtually everyone here has answered that they disagree with you.

Again, everyone understands what you mean, but disagrees with you. Your image of yourself as an "unchanging self" is an illusion as we see it (=science and the SM), but you are welcome to this illusion (=religion). I realize that you believe it strongly, but can you not also realize that others understand what you mean, but do not accept it?

 

[Akhenaten]

- I did read some of what I was directed to, but must have misread what I did read -- and otherwise, didn't read enough.

This has been a well-established pattern since the very first page of this woe begotten thread.

Sorry about that -- with my typical excuse that I only have so much time to use on my hobby, and was in a hurry...

I have no words with which to describe the antics of someone whose hobby is posting utter bilge finding himself with so little time on his hands that the only recourse is to post even utterer bilge.

Well no, that's not quite true. The truth is I have many words which would adequately describe such behaviour.

Damn you, Rule 10!

 

[Giordano]

That's the self that I think is immortal.

One proof of this: tell me after you are dead.

 

[Giordano]

Good morning, Mr. Savage.

I am going to indulge this derail, just a bit.

I frequently imply the convention of scare quotes; for instance, when I refer to the"soul" (a concept I maintain does not exist), putting the quotes around it indicates that I am nor accepting the common usage of the word as indicating some sort of immaterial extra-corporeal existence of a self-concept.

Think about the difference between:

"The senator and his wife checked into a sleazy motel."

and,

"The senator and his 'wife' checked into a sleazy motel."

The operative condition is not the number of diacritical marks, but their position, as ruled by other typographic conventions.

Using scare quotes (as the links I provided indicate--did you read them?) shows that the writer is casting aspersions upon the way the word is being used.

[/derail]

Now:

How about that evidence that the "soul" exists, and is "immortal"?

Very well said!

 

[Giordano]

1.0. Your understanding of you is borked.

1.1. Your understanding of agreement is borked.

1.2. Your understanding of (somehow) is as yet undefined, although the smart money is on it being borked.

2.0. Your concept of infinity is borked.

3.0. Your understanding of potential is borked.

7.8.3.5.2.1.0.0. Your understanding of selves changes daily. Nevertheless, it has yet to rise above the lofty heights of borked.

6.0. The odds of you probably understanding the concept of likelihood is 1/borked.

4.3. Your ideas about current existence are borked multiplied by the square root of chaos minus the first number you thought of.

5.0. None of what you refer to as given has ever, since the dawn of time, actually been considered as given.

42.8.5.3. You calling "something" "something else" doesn't make it so unless you're the captain of the Enterprise.

5.1. "Your" use of "scare quotes" when "referring" to what "you" "refer" to as the ""scientific model"" is "apparently" a "joke" that's gone "far" enough "over" your head that it's "achieved" escape "velocity".

8.∞. Would be? All manner of things """"would be"""" if the Universe was other than it is.

8.∞.1. I suspect that your understanding of zero is as borked as your understanding of infinity.

8.∞.1.1. something else.

8.∞.1.2. etcetera . . .

Oh darn, now Jabba will have to look up and have trouble understanding "borked."

 

[Jabba]

I accept that you sense such a thing. Do you understand that, to the extent that such a thing can even be said to exist, in the scientific model, it is part of your brain? Not attached to your brain, part of your brain.

Dave,
- Do you have such a sense?
- In the scientific model, part of my brain? Yes.

 

[Akhenaten]

Oh darn, now Jabba will have to look up and have trouble understanding "borked."

That would only be a problem if he ever read my posts.

Crisis averted!

 

[godless dave]

Dave,
- Do you have such a sense?
- In the scientific model, part of my brain? Yes.

I have a sense of a continuous self, but not an unchanging self.

 

[carlitos]

I have a sense of a continuous self, but not an unchanging self.

+1

Really, and Jabba will ignore this...

My tired self isn't the same as my wide-awake self.
My sleeping self isn't the same as my awake self (I can't dream when awake).
My meditating self isn't the same as my jogging self.
My drunk self isn't the same as my sober self.
My first-grade self isn't the same as my adult self.
If I were to have a stroke or brain trauma, I would have yet a different self.

These concepts too elusive for you, Jabba? Are you really the "same" as when you were 3 years old?

 

[Akhenaten]

Dave,
- Do you have such a sense?

Do you have any idea what is meant by objective evidence?

- In the scientific model, part of my brain? Yes.

Type mismatch.

 

[Agatha]

- I have a sense of "self" that was with me when I entered first grade, was with me when I went on active duty and was still with me when I retired. Whether a process, or illusion or what, my sense is that this self, or this aspect of my self, has remained the same throughout my life and environment and personal changes. That's the self that I think is immortal.
- I had thought that at least many of you understood what I was referring to. But now, everyone seems to be denying the existence of this sense of continuation -- saying that there is no sense in which the self, or an aspect of the self, remains the same during a lifetime.
- Who, here, accepts that there is such a sense?

Not me.

I can't think of any aspect of the self which remains the same throughout a lifetime. Your thoughts, feelings, likes and dislikes and motivations are very different now than they were in first grade (I don't know what age that means), and your experiences over your life are an inextricable part of you (barring some kinds of brain damage).

Every aspect of the 'me' that I am is in a constant state of change. I'm not even exactly the same 'me' as I was when I first hit the quote button on your post to begin writing mine. In that time I've heard chatter and songs on the radio, I've observed my cat, I've spoken to one of my sons, I've planned, written, deleted, and rewritten bits of this post. The changes to 'me' during this time are tiny but all these incremental changes add up to a continuously changing self. Which is unsurprising since the brain is continuously receiving information, and the consciousness which is an emergent property of that living brain is a process and not an object. My sense of self is continuous but not unchanging.

Can you explain what part of the 'self' you believe remains unchanging throughout a person's life?

 

[Giordano]

Dave,
- Do you have such a sense?
- In the scientific model, part of my brain? Yes.

Congratulations to Godless Dave! Jabba talks to you! Sorry...

 

[Agatha]

- In the scientific model, part of my brain? Yes.

No, not in the scientific model. There is no part of the brain which contains your consciousness - your 'self' is not a part of your brain any more than a traffic jam is part of a car.

In the non-scientific model/Jabba model/Rich Savage model, consciousness or the 'self' might well be a part of the brain. But not in the scientific model, which describes the reality in which we all live.

 

[Giordano]

I have a sense of a continuous self, but not an unchanging self.

That is a very good and clear answer! Expect Jabba to mis-interpret it in his next post.

Jabba: evidence?

 

[jt512]

Jay,
- Would you agree that if (somehow) there was an infinite number of potential selves, the likelihood of my current existence, given what I'm calling the "scientific model," would be zero?

I've posted on this at least twice. Please try and actually read what I write. For the third time, my answer is no. I assume that your reasoning is that if the sample space is infinitely countable then the probability of each element of the space must be 1/infty=0. But, in fact, that would violate the axioms of probability, because the sum of the probabilities of each element would be 0, and not 1, as the axioms require. When the sample space is uncountably infinite, the probbilities must be unqual, so that they can sum to 1. A couple weeks ago, I gave an example of a valid set of such probabilities in which (furthermore) none of the individual probabiliies were 0.

 

[jt512]

FWIW, I did the sound for Melanie once, and she's always hated that song.

Hated it all the way to the bank, as they say.

 

[godless dave]

No, not in the scientific model. There is no part of the brain which contains your consciousness - your 'self' is not a part of your brain any more than a traffic jam is part of a car.

I don't really agree with this.

 

[jt512]

Would you agree that if somehow there were an infinite number of potential ice cream flavors, the likelihood of Ben & Jerry's producing one, given the manner they choose new flavors, would be zero?

That's a good analogy.

How does stipulating that we cannot exist due to an infinite amount of souls in the scientific model get you any closer to your goal? Surely, if 1/inf. is zero for us, it is also zero for God. What will you do with your other side of the equation? How will you keep infinity out of that side?

But stick with it. If there are an infinite number of things in the sample space, then by your own ice cream analogy, it is not necessary for each of them to have equal probabilities, and indeed mathematically it is not permitted for them to have equal probabilities.

 

[Agatha]

I don't really agree with this.

No worries. How would you phrase it?

 

[Monza]

- I have a sense of "self" that was with me when I entered first grade, was with me when I went on active duty and was still with me when I retired. Whether a process, or illusion or what, my sense is that this self, or this aspect of my self, has remained the same throughout my life and environment and personal changes. That's the self that I think is immortal.
- I had thought that at least many of you understood what I was referring to. But now, everyone seems to be denying the existence of this sense of continuation -- saying that there is no sense in which the self, or an aspect of the self, remains the same during a lifetime.
- Who, here, accepts that there is such a sense?

Everyone here knows what you are talking about. We all experience the same thing. In a way, this sense of a continuous and unchanging "self" is an illusion. It is an artifact of how our brain processes thoughts and memories. Consider what would happen to this "self" if you had a traumatic brain injury and lost all memory of your life before last Tuesday. There are some brain injuries that result in drastic, even 180°, differences in personality. Is this the same "self"?

Here is another analogy. Is your physical body the same one throughout your whole life? It seems like you have always had the same body, except in reality it changes. And quite drastically too! It's not even made of the same atoms, as cells are replaced over time. There is an illusion that your body has housed your "self" throughout your entire life. However, both are constantly changing.