There really might be an afterlife

Babbylonian said:
Is there any utility to this mental exercise, even if we assume its [potential] validity? I mean, I don't really care if a perfect duplicate of my consciousness randomly "comes together" billions of years in the future because my awareness of said duplicate would be exactly zero (given that my current consciousness would be fairly long dead). The only way it could matter to anyone is if we assume that there is something eternal about our current awareness/consciousness, which is very much wooerific.
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No, there is no utility.

There might indeed be something eternal about our current awareness/consciousness, though, and it has nothing to do with woo. Is there something eternal about, say, the fundamental patterns of mathematics, such as "isosceles triangles" or "spheres," etc?

The idea being that just as every instance of an isosceles triangle really is an isosceles triangle, every instance of the "you" process would indeed be "you," regardless of where or when that instance occurs.
 
rocketdodger said:
The idea being that just as every instance of an isosceles triangle really is an isosceles triangle, every instance of the "you" process would indeed be "you," regardless of where or when that instance occurs.
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Yeah, and if there was an infinite number of Universes - all running by the same script - each of these containing an exact copy of "you" -> which particular one is "you?".
 
wuschel said:
Yeah, and if there was an infinite number of Universes - all running by the same script - each of these containing an exact copy of "you" -> which particular one is "you?".
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The one that "you" are.

That is like asking: "which one of the copies would be himself?". It is a ridiculous question.
 
rocketdodger said:
There might indeed be something eternal about our current awareness/consciousness, though, and it has nothing to do with woo. Is there something eternal about, say, the fundamental patterns of mathematics, such as "isosceles triangles" or "spheres," etc?

The idea being that just as every instance of an isosceles triangle really is an isosceles triangle, every instance of the "you" process would indeed be "you," regardless of where or when that instance occurs.
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Sorry, but that is indeed woo. One isosceles triangle has no consciousness or an awareness of what it is and there's no scientific reason to suspect/assume that a second isosceles triangle has any connection to the first beyond its shape.

There's a continuity inherent in a human's sense of self. I'm conscious of the fact that I was conscious yesterday, the day before, etc. Even if we postulate infinite time and enough randomness to produce a second being with exactly the same combination of matter and experience as I possess, he can't be me. I can't be aware of his experience as I am of mine because I'm locked into my own mind and body, and once I "go the way of all flesh" I'm gone, never to return. My doppleganger can live exactly the same life, making all the same decisions, and having exactly the same life events, but my consciousness won't experience it. He is, to be succinct, a "coincidence." :)
 
Babbylonian said:
Sorry, but that is indeed woo. One isosceles triangle has no consciousness or an awareness of what it is and there's no scientific reason to suspect/assume that a second isosceles triangle has any connection to the first beyond its shape.
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Well, the computational model of consciousness states that there is no scientific reason to suspect/assume that your current consciousness has any connection to the one an instant prior beyond it's mathematical properties.
 
rocketdodger said:
Well, the computational model of consciousness states that there is no scientific reason to suspect/assume that your current consciousness has any connection to the one an instant prior beyond it's mathematical properties.
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In the OP, you assert it being a matter of information processing, however.

A single snap shot, thus, won't do it.
 
rocketdodger said:
Didn't I already say that?
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Yet you also wrote:
rocketdodger said:
Well, the computational model of consciousness states that there is no scientific reason to suspect/assume that your current consciousness has any connection to the one an instant prior beyond it's mathematical properties.
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...which, to me, is not the same.

May be I misread you and this is just another variation of the "what if the Universe started last Tuesday" theme. Most notably, I fail to see the connection with what could reasonably be referred to as an afterlife - versus the cloning problem where you are teleported but the original "you" is not destroyed - resulting in two individuals, each absolutely certain to be "you".

Isn't this whole confusion merely the result of our comprehension of "self" as being necessarily "unique" and so on... which maybe just so happened to be a trait to withstand selection pressure in a world full of individuals with no sense of self-importance, whatsoever?
 
wuschel said:
Most notably, I fail to see the connection with what could reasonably be referred to as an afterlife
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I guess I didn't make that clear -- the only connection is that it is possible an instance of you will pop up that is in some kind of "afterlife" from the perspective of the instance.

In other words, if the universe was created last tuesday, and by chance your universe happens to correspond to, say, something like the heaven in "What Dreams May Come," then you could say that that instance of you is experiencing an "afterlife."
 
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