[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

[xtifr]

(You don't need to say anything if you don't agree -- I'm already assuming that you don't, and you probably can't really account for everyone listening.)

This is brilliant! If only the people who agreed with Jabba ever responded, this thread would be so much shorter! In most cases, Jabba would be the only one to post anything!

Of course, since there is usually only one reason for agreeing with an assertion, while there can be many reasons for disagreeing, such a discussion would be unlikely to be very useful or productive. But really, how is that so much different from what we're experiencing now?

 

[godless dave]

Jabba, do you now accept that the scientific model for human consciousness - A in your equation - does not include souls?

 

[Jabba]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

 

[jsfisher]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

Wasn't that the thing upon which you promised you would focus? Not going so well so far.

 

[godless dave]

- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

How are you going to do that when science doesn't think they exist?

 

[pakeha]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

Jabba, this is no definition, but rather a statement of faith.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

Before you do that, you'd have to show that they exist. Then you'd have to show that the standard scientific model would predict that they exist.

 

[Slowvehicle]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

Good Afternoon, Mr. Savage.

I am not sure to whom you think you are referring when you say "we" have a "working definition" of the thing you are trying not to call a "soul", at all.

If "what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes" is truly as close as you can get to defining, or explaining, or denoting whatever is is is the best you can do towards clarifying what it is, there is no wonder attached to why you are having such a difficult time dealing with whatever you think you are trying to say.

I fear you will not receive this well, but it is pointless to speculate about how many of something you can neither explain, define, or provide evidence for, "science would think" there are, or were, or should be. You keep claiming that "science" would agree with you, or should agree with you; but you have yet to indicate a single person who does, in fact, agree with you.

I cannot stress to strongly that, instead of trying to dictate to "science" what it "ought to believe", you truly ought to present objective, empirical, practical evidence for what is. Instead of trying to indicate what is more probable than observed reality, demonstrate the existence of what you are claiming.

You can't say what "it" is; you cannot describe "it"; you cannot identify "its" characteristics. You have, at this point, no place to stand from which to claim that "science" ought to believe that there is a "potentially infinite" number of "it".

Candyfloss from cloud-cuckooland; bamañulas del Bim Bàm Bùm; these are not the things upon which you can base assurances about what "most scientists", nor "any scientists", nor "a scientist" believe(s). Instead of assertions, consider providing support.

 

[Jabba]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

How are you going to do that when science doesn't think they exist?

Dave,
- Are you referring to "a pool of potential selves"?

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Dave,
- Are you referring to "a pool of potential selves"?

No, he's referring to what you're defining as a "self".

 

[Humots]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

Jabba: could be that we now have a Gostak.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Dave,
- Are you referring to "a pool of potential selves"?

Mr. Savage:

Do you remember this?

Good Evening, Mr. Savage!

I cannot speak for anyone else, but I find the idea of a "pool" of potential selves to be undescriptive of the process by which consciousness manifests itself as an emergent property of a specific neurosystem. It is not that a "soul" (or "self" or "consciousness") is assigned to a neurosystem once the neurosystem is complex enough to serve as a host; instead, under certain conditions, a neurosystem expresses a unique consciousness as an emergent property.

No pool.

Slowvehicle,
- Agreed.

Why are we back to the "pool"?

 

[Loss Leader]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes.

So your definition of "self" is something that may or may not exist depending on whether some person chooses to believe it exists.

- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

How in the world is science supposed to think anything about something that science doesn't allow to exist?

Dave, Are you referring to "a pool of potential selves"?

No. Nobody is referring to that. Dave was saying that the "self" you define doesn't exist. Since it doesn't exist, it's impossible to have an infinite number of it.

However, I'd love to hear your proof as to why you think the number of potential souls is infinite. Forget whether any scientist would agree with you. Just explain how you think it's possible.

 

[sackett]

For Jabba; and my apologies to Thomas Nashe his shade, for my looting

All strength fails
Unto the grave.
Worms
Have fed on Hector brave.
Dust
Hath closéd Helen's eye.
I am sick, I must die.
Kýrie, eléison!

 

[carlitos]

- Never have I suggested that there must be life after death because I fear oblivion -- or even have I suggested that there must be life after death because so many humans fear oblivion.

Let me remind you how you came to be misunderstood for the eleventy-hundredth time here:

- Does anyone agree that one aspect of the self stays the same during the lifetime of the self?

I think I do need to say that I don't agree.

You seem to be arguing that there is an aspect of the self that does not change, and that it's the aspect of the self that doesn't change.

jt512 & xtifr,
- I guess you guys agree with the rest that there is no aspect of the self that remains the same through the lifetime?
- Once again, I'm trying to refer to the part of us that we, who fear oblivion, want to continue after death.

OK, so the aspect or "part" of the self that you assert "stays the same" during your lifetime is the "part" that you oblivion-fearing folks want to continue after death. OK.

That's what most Christian people call a soul, as you damn well know.

- I was just referring to we who do fear death. I was not referring to you guys. I know that you guys do not fit into that category. There are plenty of us humans out her that do.

Most of us humans have the same parts. Believing differently doesn't add parts.

As I noted above, you're off the rails again here. We humans have the same parts, whether we fear oblivion or not. Buddhists, Jews, Christians, Atheists ---- All have the same parts. If you wish for this "part" to live forever, I still have whatever that part is in me, too, irregardless of my belief or lack of belief.

What part is it? It's not the frontal lobe; it's not the scapula; what is it?

1. Jabba said that part of our "self" stays the same throughout our lifetime.
2. This is the same "part" that he wishes to last beyond death.
3. What frigging part is it?

As slowvehicle keeps reminding you - you keep working backwards from your beliefs. Why not just follow the evidence? It's much cleaner that way; you don't have to keep Rredefining^TM English words that way.

 

[godless dave]

Dave,
- Are you referring to "a pool of potential selves"?

I'm talking about the self as you've defined it.

 

[Garrette]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

And you repeat, yet again, the same two tactics you have been repeating all along:

1. No one agrees with you about the self so you assume we agree with you about the self

2. You assume that we grant that the self is immortal so you can prove we have an immortal self

 

[carlitos]

1 - Finite Universe
2 - "Infinite Potential Selves" in that Universe.

 

[Agatha]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.

This is why people suspect that your fear of oblivion is the reason for your belief in immortality - that it's not a belief grounded in reality, but something driven by your desire to not be blotted out.

ETA: is this 'self' something that only exists in those who hope for immortality? How on earth (or anywhere else) does that work, and how do you propose we detect this particular 'self'?

But the rest of us, even those who fear death and leaving everything behind, prefer to start with reality and come to an acceptance of the way things are, instead of expecting reality to bend with our wishes. Not all sceptics or atheists are free of the fear of death/oblivion.

I expect that there will be people other than you, Jabba, posting in this thread who fear death and oblivion. But you are at the moment the only person making the wish for immortality the father of the idea that it could be real. Most people just rail against the unfairness that we live such short lives, and eventually accept the inevitable.

- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

I suspect people will post the same rebuttals as they did before, namely that matter is not infinite, neither is time, that DNA can only be arranged in finite ways, that sperm and ova are finite..... and I also suspect that you will ignore these rebuttals as you have done previously. However, I await your post showing what you contend that 'science' thinks.

 

[dafydd]

- Could be that we now have a working definition of the "self" to which I'm trying to refer -- maybe a working denotation. This self is what people who fear death see as continuous during their physical lifetimes, and hope to continue after their physical lifetimes. Whatever, I suspect that it's the best I can do towards identifying it.
- Now, I'll go back to trying to show why science would think that the number of potential selves is infinite.

Who's "we"?