Skipjack wrote:I couldnt care less about some emulated computer version of my brain (not my personality). I (me) will be dead then and I wont know one way or the other. So why bother?
*Jams electrodes into your brain to keep your simulated brain synchronized during your death*
There, dying now is just a very uncomfortable sensation while 50% of your brain stops working.
But seriously, I think there is something we're overlooking here.
Something we simply cannot comprehend like some kind of Agnosia.
I submit the following thoughts:
Is the difference between the person of age 5 and the same person of age 50 greater or smaller then two different persons of the same age but brought up in the same neighbourhood?
Imagine we found a way to freeze tissue without causing tissue data.
All chemistry is locked in place.
So we stop a brain, and it stops being a personality, it is a monolithic block with a lot of different chemicals.
During this frozen period, where is the person?
In this frozen state, we rebuild the person in two copies.
One is rebuild with actual atoms, recreating tissues in their different states (build up in a frozen state).
And another is rebuild inside a powerful simulation system (also simulated to be frozen).
We keep the original frozen and defrost the two copies.
Which one is real according to his own perspective?
Which one is real according to your perspective?
After a while, we de-freeze the original, can we consider a personality that completely stopped for a while, and started again still the same personality?
What if we used that period to simply take that person perfectly apart in cubes of 1cm^3 and reassemble without losing a single atom?
Is it still the same person?
Would you ever find out if we switched the original with the flesh clone?
Would it matter?
Your clone would always consider itself to be you. You would be your clone.
There will be an instance of your person who would be proven wrong about it's view about being dead even if an copy existed.
The thing is, I think we are not some magical entity which cannot be copied and even if copied, would be something lesser.
It's just we are incapable to consider this a valid thought since it is one about the way we look at ourselves in a very primary way.
But I do think we NEED to have a transfer period, something that offers us the sensation of continuity to be able to accept the concept of still being yourself if this technology would be possible.