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[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

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Jabba said:
- You guys figure that I need to keep rewording my ideas because my ideas don’t make sense.
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Partly true.

Your ideas are wrong. Rewording them can't possibly help. You do it anyway.

I figure that I need to keep rewording them because they’re especially difficult to communicate.
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And you are, of course, wrong again.

Though sometimes, I reword them just to remind you of something I’ve already said. That latter is my reason for this current paragraph. The former is my reason for the following.

- My claim:
1. Your sense of self had no prior existence, or “representation,” of any kind prior to its current existence.
2. “Prior representation” would be chemistry such that identical batches of it would produce your sense of self, and only your sense of self.
3. Apparently, there is no such chemistry re your sense of self.
- Problems so far?
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Yes. Everything you just said is complete nonsense. Self is brain function. If you have two brains, you have two selves.
 
To me, the main promise of reincarnation is that there would be more time to learn and to do new things. The idea of endlessly repeating myself with no intellectual growth and no new insight is truly frightening to me...
 
Jabba said:
1. Your sense of self had no prior existence, or “representation,” of any kind prior to its current existence.
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This is a tautology. I'm not quite sure why you bothered to say it, but it's trivially true. Things that exist didn't exist before they existed. :)

2. “Prior representation” would be chemistry such that identical batches of it would produce your sense of self, and only your sense of self.
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Your "sense of self" is not something separate from your self. It's a thought. Just like any other thought. You could say the same sort of thing about your "sense of cheese". I can imagine cheese. I can remember cheese. I can visualize cheese. But those thoughts of cheese are illusory, just like my sense of self. It's just a thought. Generated by my brain, which is controlled by physics/chemistry. So, no, not "only your sense of self". Also your sense of cheese. Or any other thought.

3. Apparently, there is no such chemistry re your sense of self.
- Problems so far?
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Yes problems. This is where you went completely off the rails. This makes absolutely no sense. Of course your sense of self (or cheese) derives from the chemistry (and whatever else) that makes up your brain.

I have no idea what you're trying to say here. We just established that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain, which is a physical/chemical thing, and that the sense of self comes from consciousness, and all of a sudden, you want us to concede the exact opposite?
 
Jabba, did you bother to obtain and read Dr. Blackmore's works on the illusion of self that she directed you to after you corresponded with her--for example, Consciousness: A Very Short Introduction? If so, what are your objections to her theses, if any? If you didn't read them, why not, after going to the trouble of contacting her?
 
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PixyMisa said:
Yes. Everything you just said is complete nonsense. Self is brain function. If you have two brains, you have two selves.
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Perhaps this will help, Jabba. Keep in mind that "self" is a function of the brain. Now bear in mind that a heartbeat is a function of the heart. So, if you were to exactly duplicate a living heart - would you have 2 heartbeats or 1? Would those heartbeats be identical or the same?
 
Giordano said:
To me, the main promise of reincarnation is that there would be more time to learn and to do new things. The idea of endlessly repeating myself with no intellectual growth and no new insight is truly frightening to me...
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At least you would not know that you were making the same mistakes all over again.

(Kinds indistinguishable form not being "reincarnated" at all, innit?)
 
Giordano said:
My brother had a VW that had a personality and a "soul/self" as much as any car I have seen. In fact, I had a cat that had an acute sense of self and self-identity. It clearly recognized that it was a different creature (had a unique self identity) from my other cats and love to torment them and not be hurt itself. It clearly wanted the food for itself, and not have it eaten by the other cats. I think it had the illusion of a continuous self, in that it had a unique preference in food that didn't change from day to day. At the risk of a derail, Jabba, do you think cats have "selves' as you think people have "selves?" If not, why not? If so, when do creatures stop having selves? Bacteria, worms, bees, birds, etc. When?

I ask because I want to know how far your theory of reincarnation of selves goes back. If people evolved from apes, and apes from lemur-like creatures, and lemurs from other animals, is my unchanging self originally the self of an insectivore 100's of millions of years ago, or even the self of a still earlier creature, the first to have a self? If so, why don't I like to eat bugs? If so, where and when did the first self come from? Or do you believe in Adam and Eve and the first self was created only once by god?
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Obviously humans are devolved cats.
 
Slowvehicle said:
Wait, wait....

I know this...

"From the eminent transcendence of the all-void comes all-knowing."

How'd I do?
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When we tune our consciousness to the harmony of the universe the melody of meaning leads us onward to the song of understanding.

I'd say your tuning fork is vibrating at the right frequency.
 
tsig said:
When we tune our consciousness to the harmony of the universe the melody of meaning leads us onward to the song of understanding.

I'd say your tuning fork is vibrating at the right frequency.
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"...And when you clock the Human Race with the Stopwatch of History, it's a new record every time!

And who wins?

And who loses?

People like you, <Barney!> and you, <ah, Clem>!!"
 
Slowvehicle said:
"...And when you clock the Human Race with the Stopwatch of History, it's a new record every time!

And who wins?

And who loses?

People like you, <Barney!> and you, <ah, Clem>!!"
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See you on the fun way!!! You can tie one on!!!
 
godless dave said:
Just the problem I pointed out yesterday in a direct reply to you, and that several people have pointed out for pages and pages of discussion that you are rudely ignoring:
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Dave,
- I didn't really understand that. Please elaborate.
 
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