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elementgermanium t1_iz3p8xh wrote

Reply to comment by Anschau in How Death Can Help Us Live: a philosophical approach to the problem of death by simsquatched

I mean, there are other forms of unconsciousness besides sleep, too. If someone’s brain completely shut down due to some severe injury, but then they miraculously recovered, no one would question whether they were still them.

In the end, our consciousness is an emergent phenomenon caused by the pattern of neurons that expresses our unique mind. As long as that pattern is preserved, I argue the persistent “self” is too.

Now, the natural follow-up is, what if you create the “clone” BEFORE destroying the original? In that case, it’s dying, because the “clone” has had time to “branch off”, so to speak. It’s become its own person, similar to, but separate from, you.

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Anschau t1_iz3q40f wrote

I think you die regardless in that last scenario. I get what you are saying but that second mind was always going to branch off. As long as the continuation is physically separate then it’s not really you. Let’s say that technology allows us to copy all the memories from one person perfectly and you could create an artificial biological brain that you could integrate into your own consciousness. Now let’s say after you add this new brain power you can install a copy of your memories from your old brain drive to your new additional brain drive, and moving forward all new memories are encoded simultaneously in both brains. Then as your original brain deteriorates the new brain picks up the slack. Lots of problems here, mainly making sure new brain is structured identically to old brain, syncing brains without changing power and personality, the syncing tech itself. But let’s say it all is solved and as your body and mind dies you eventually find yourself in your new brain and the new brain is then linked to a new clone of you or a synthetic body or whatever. I think that’s the only way to maintain self.

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elementgermanium t1_iz3qhxb wrote

I don’t see why there needs to be any sort of direct continuity. We have no real reason to say consciousness can’t stop and restart- although no one can experience it to this extent without the kind of tech we’re talking about, we can still extrapolate from things like sleep and anesthesia.

I think of it like a timeline. The new body is the same “you” if its “start” can connect to the end of the “line” of your old body, even if there’s a time gap. With a “branch,” however, the old “line” still ends entirely, with the “branch” continuing as a separate person.

I know this is a little hard to put into words, I might try and create a visual representation- though you’ll have to bear with my poor art skills if I do.

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Anschau t1_iz3r5x1 wrote

I think that’s a symbolic continuity and while it may not make much of a difference from an outside observer I think the original you is still gone. I think restarting the same mind from unconsciousness of whatever level is different then flash copying a new version as the old one dies. Though I admit I lack the knowledge to confirm the difference. I think if your priority is that a continuation of your experience keeps going then the flash copy is fine. But the inherent possibility that both could have existed simultaneously even if artificial constraints have made it functionally impossible is evidence to me that they are not the same though again I could not explain why in granular detail. At this point we enter into the philosophy of consciousness and discard the physical laws. When I think of the terror of death though I am not assuaged by the idea of another me out there experiencing the life I could have experienced.

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elementgermanium t1_iz3rgai wrote

I personally just don’t see a difference. It’s not like you’d necessarily perceive the transfer even if it were gradual- there’s a lot of factors there. I don’t believe in any sort of “soul” or anything- we are a pattern in the end, and as long as that pattern is preserved, so are we.

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