How do we know that places like Narnia do not exist?

I just want to know how Ian is going to explain all this on his website, if he can't get people to understand it now.
 
Paul C. Anagnostopoulos said:
I don't think so. He's assuming we can make a Star Trek transporter-like copy of a person and store it. So far, so good ...

~~ Paul
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I don't mind the physical possibility of doing that. What I don't agree with is that, for some reason, YOU'D be the same person. No. That person would be a copy, but he wouldn't share your consciousness.
 
Interesting Ian said:
I'm assuming it's physical. Not sure what you mean by "metaphysical", but it is evident that you do not understand what the word means.
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What IS evident is that you can't post two straight posts without resorting to insults.

If consciousness is non-physical then it is not information and hence you would only be able to duplicate the body, not the consciousness. In other words the duplicate in the year 3000 would simply be a corpse.

You need to read my post here where I explain all.
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Not sure where you're getting at. What's so absurd ? The duplicate has a mind, you have a mind, the two sets of thoughts are identical, but they are not the same person. I don't see what's wrong with it.

You are recreated at the very instant that you are scanned. Obviously the you in the year 3000 would not remember your life after the scan. In your ongoing experiences as you get scanned there will be half a chance that you will remain in the scanning room ,and continue on with your life, and half a chance that you will suddenly find yourself being transported 1000 years into the future.
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Sorry, I thought you meant memories prior to the scan. My bad.
 
Belz... said:
I don't mind the physical possibility of doing that. What I don't agree with is that, for some reason, YOU'D be the same person. No. That person would be a copy, but he wouldn't share your consciousness.
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I disagree. I believe the copy would share the consciousness of the original for the moment of scanning (and lots of things would be similar afterwards), but it wouldn't keep the same consciousness. If consciousness is an emergent property of the brain, then a perfect copy of the brain would contain a perfect copy of the consciousness.
 
Belz... said:
I don't mind the physical possibility of doing that. What I don't agree with is that, for some reason, YOU'D be the same person. No. That person would be a copy, but he wouldn't share your consciousness.
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But Ian hasn't said that yet. Not yet, anyway.

Ian, we're ready for the next step.

~~ Paul
 
Tricky said:
I disagree. I believe the copy would share the consciousness of the original for the moment of scanning (and lots of things would be similar afterwards), but it wouldn't keep the same consciousness. If consciousness is an emergent property of the brain, then a perfect copy of the brain would contain a perfect copy of the consciousness.
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Having a copy of the consciousness for a moment is not the same as sharing the consciousness.

I can hardly wait for the next step. Ian?

~~ Paul
 
Paul C. Anagnostopoulos said:
Having a copy of the consciousness for a moment is not the same as sharing the consciousness.
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Okay, you're right. I said as much earlier when I said the copy is not the original. But if it were a perfect copy, it would be indistinguishable from the original. If you had the original and the copy side by side in the instant after scanning/printout, the two consciousnesses would be indistinguishable, so you might say they were sharing the same thoughts, in this case, "What the hell??!!"

Ian may have retired for the evening. Or he may be at the pub. I understand they have recently eliminated "closing time" there in England.
 
Interesting Ian said:
PixyMisa This message is hidden because PixyMisa is on your ignore list.</SPAN>


:)
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Ah, the famous argument by "I can't hear yoooooou."

peentjeoor.jpg
 
Interesting Ian said:
If not are there any half decent arguments against the existence of worlds/Universes like Narnia?
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???:confused:

Give us a break. As boring as it may be, you should know, and probably do, that the answer is that there is no such argument and never can be and doesn't need to be any more than there should be one against the Easter Bunny.

Give us arguments for.
 
Interesting Ian said:
I'll complete my website. I would be pleased if you went to the trouble of reading it because I am attempting to explain myself as clearly as I possibly can on it. If after reading it you still think I'm stupid, then so be it.
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Ian - I understand more about philosophy than you ever will. So do many of the people on this board. Not only do I understand philosophy more than you, but I'm able to incorporate it into my life, I'm able to make contibutions to it, I'm rational, I'm sane, and I'm not an ***hole.

There is no question that you have read some philosophy. What a pity that you don't seem to understand it, let alone practice it.

I wish that you would learn from your mistakes and straighten yourself out, but I'm not holding my breath. I don't think that you're capable any longer of self examination and constructive change.

I will never visit your website. I will never read what you have to say on any subject. Your opinions do not matter. I have nothing to learn from you except how not to behave.

Please go work on your website and leave us alone.
 
PixyMisa said:
Berkeley's Demon

A symptom of the inability of immaterialist philosophers - that is, idealists and dualists - to understand the consequences of materialism. The demon manifests itself when the philosopher makes an attempt to disprove materialism using the argumentum ad absurdum, or proof by contradiction. Inevitably, and usually quite early in the "proof", the philosopher will import a concept that is not valid under materialism, immediately invalidating the argument.

An interesting property of Berkeley's Demon is that its perceptibility to the audience is inversely proportional to its perceptibility to the arguer. Thus, a very subtle flaw might pass by the audience, but will be immediately obvious to the philosopher, who will then retire for for several years to make increasingly elaborate attempts to improve his argument. On the other hand, a blindingly obvious contradiction will merely provoke cries of rage from the philosopher, who will insist that his argument is valid no matter how often the flaw is pointed out.

(From A Skeptical Pixie's Guide to Philosophy)
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I'd go further than Tricky - this is brilliant. Does anyone else remember the poster Juggler/Undercover Elephant? He did exactly this in his "disproof of materialism" by having as one of his assumptions that mental stuff was immaterial. He, too, just didn't get it when this was pointed out and tended to get angry. Do all idealists suffer from Berkeley's Demon?

Edit for spelling
 
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Dragon said:
I'd go further than Tricky - this is brilliant. Does anyone else remember the poster Juggler/Undercover Elephant? He did exactly this in his "disproof of materialism" by having as one of his assumptions that mental stuff was immaterial. He, too, just didn't get it when this was pointed out and tended to get angry. Do all idealists suffer from Berkely's Demon?
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Not only that, he failed to realize that had the proof been correct, it would also have disproven his own idealism. (Because the "proof" assumed dualism).
 
Tricky said:
Okay, you're right. I said as much earlier when I said the copy is not the original. But if it were a perfect copy, it would be indistinguishable from the original. If you had the original and the copy side by side in the instant after scanning/printout, the two consciousnesses would be indistinguishable, so you might say they were sharing the same thoughts, in this case, "What the hell??!!"
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I'm not so sure I agree with this. A perfect copy of x (we shall call it "x2") would have a perfect copy of x's consciousness (lets call it "y" and "y2" respectively), of this I agree. However, I'm not so sure you could equate y and y2 as the same thing ("yy2"). For example, I do not think y would share the experiences of y2. If one punched x2 in the head, would y feel the same pain? From an external perspective, there is no telling apart x and x2, and thus y and y2 are essentially yy2. But internally (from x and x2's perspective, i.e. y and y2) would it be the same? Similarly, if you made your scan of x, and after x died (lets say the very next day), you created x2. To y, would it be like she saw the bus running her over, then woke up in the clone creation lab? To outside observers, it would seem so, but I'm not so sure internally.

I feel that for y and y2 to truely be the same, you need both spacial and temporal continuity. So y2 would indeed be a perfect copy of y, and to any other observer would be as if they were yy2. But I tend to consider it thus: While y2 is a perfect copy of y, it is not the same y. Similarly, a perfect copy of a rock is not the same rock, it's simply a perfect copy of the rock.
 
Taffer said:
I'm not so sure I agree with this. A perfect copy of x (we shall call it "x2") would have a perfect copy of x's consciousness (lets call it "y" and "y2" respectively), of this I agree. However, I'm not so sure you could equate y and y2 as the same thing ("yy2"). For example, I do not think y would share the experiences of y2. If one punched x2 in the head, would y feel the same pain? From an external perspective, there is no telling apart x and x2, and thus y and y2 are essentially yy2. But internally (from x and x2's perspective, i.e. y and y2) would it be the same? Similarly, if you made your scan of x, and after x died (lets say the very next day), you created x2. To y, would it be like she saw the bus running her over, then woke up in the clone creation lab? To outside observers, it would seem so, but I'm not so sure internally.

I feel that for y and y2 to truely be the same, you need both spacial and temporal continuity. So y2 would indeed be a perfect copy of y, and to any other observer would be as if they were yy2. But I tend to consider it thus: While y2 is a perfect copy of y, it is not the same y. Similarly, a perfect copy of a rock is not the same rock, it's simply a perfect copy of the rock.
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I did elaborate on this a bit, pointing out that they are only identical at the exact instant of scanning/recreation. But I also acknowledge that two things cannot be "the same". They must, for example, use different atoms. Neither is it possible in the real world to have a "perfect" scan (or really a "perfect" anything.) However, as this is just a thought excercise, we can assume that for one instant, they are as close to identical as is possible.

The point is that some kind of "reincarnation" could be compatible with materialism. Sure it's an outlandish concept, but it doesn't violate any materialist principles.
 
Tricky said:
I did elaborate on this a bit, pointing out that they are only identical at the exact instant of scanning/recreation. But I also acknowledge that two things cannot be "the same". They must, for example, use different atoms. Neither is it possible in the real world to have a "perfect" scan (or really a "perfect" anything.) However, as this is just a thought excercise, we can assume that for one instant, they are as close to identical as is possible.

The point is that some kind of "reincarnation" could be compatible with materialism. Sure it's an outlandish concept, but it doesn't violate any materialist principles.
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I see your point. To me it wouldn't be "reincarnation", as the copy wouldn't be 'me' in any way other then design. This could simply be a misunderstanding, on my part, of the usage of the word "reincarnation", though. I think of reincarnation as the rebirth of another me, which still encapulates something that is definately "me". A soul is the obvious choice here. If the soul was, in fact, found to be marerial in nature, then reincarnation (as I think of it) is quite possible. If it is simply the cloning of a body, I (again, personally) would consider this less reincarnation and more cloning.

Not that it really matters, as all this obviously isn't going to be Ian's point anyway.
 
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