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Article 3300 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: fcostllo@swift.cs.tcd.ie
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: red light / blue light scenario
Message-ID: <1992Jan30.151218.8216@swift.cs.tcd.ie>
Date: 30 Jan 92 15:12:18 GMT
References: <1992Jan23.194357.8713@smsc.sony.com> <1992Jan24.022109.23048@convex.com> <1992Jan26.004726.24463@smsc.sony.com> <1992Jan26.223233.28580@convex.com>
Organization: Computer Science Department, Trinity College Dublin
Lines: 87

In article <1992Jan26.223233.28580@convex.com>, cash@convex.com 
(Peter Cash) writes:

> In article <1992Jan26.004726.24463@smsc.sony.com> markc@smsc.sony.com 
>(Mark Corscadden) writes:
>>In article <1992Jan24.022109.23048@convex.com> cash@convex.com (Peter Cash) 
>>writes:
> 
>>  belief system A
>>  You feel that your personal experience is tied to your current
>>  physical self.  Thus, choice 1 offers you no hope to feel for
>>  yourself, tomorrow, what it's like to win that medal; although it
>>  would allow your to-be-created duplicate to have that experience.
>>  A player who believes this way and is playing within the spirit
>>  of the game will make choice 2, to maximize their own chance of
>>  winning the medal tomorrow, at the expense of their duplicate.
> First of all, I don't have any notion of what my "personal experience is
> 
>>  belief system B
>>  You feel that it's possible for your personal linear sequence of life
>>  experiences, what you feel within you, to start in the original and end
>>  in the duplicate.  It's a toss-up whether you will *be* the duplicate
>>  or the original in the end, in every sense that's relevant to what
>>  you will feel internally.  Thus, you make choice 1 in order to have
>>  a 50/50 chance, tomorrow, of feeling what it's like to win the medal.
> 
> I find this very puzzling. Why do you think it might be the case that I
>might "start in the original and end in the duplicate"? What are you
> thinking here? 
>

I think the problem here is that we have (at least) two naive mental models of 
'I-ness'.

In the first, 'I' am the one who was born as, and still is, a certain
specific body. I am myself because this is, and has always been, my body.

In the second, 'I' am the one who experiences my body's perceptions
(whatever they are). I am myself because this is what I'm experiencing.

These two models cooperate and unite to explain 'I-ness'. The first
model refers to continuation of existence, while the second refers
only to instantaneous experience. Thus memory is seen as part of the 
body - i.e. an identical body would have identical memories.

We have other naive models, which cooperate to explain other aspects of life.
One group of models unite to create our concept of 'motherhood' (Lakoff,
Women,Fire and Dangerous Things).

One model says the mother is the woman who contributes genes to the child.

One model says the mother is the woman who gives birth to the child.

Another says the mother is the woman who nurtures the child.

Usually, these models combine. The person who bears a child is the one who
cares for it. Sometimes however, they fail to connect. A surrogate
mother, gives birth to a child but does not supply genes. An adoptive 
mother cares for a child she did not give birth to. In these cases, our
Idea of motherhood is weakened. Is an adoptive mother 'really' a
mother? Is a surrogate mother?

I think a similar thing happens in 'duplicate body' scenarios. The two
models of I-ness fail to cooperate. Believing the 'body' one, the duplicate
body could also be 'I'. Believing the 'experiences' model, the duplicate
cannot be 'I' since it has different experiences, beginning with seeing
a different coloured light.

When a naive models fail, it shows that what we thought of as a whole is
actually made up of parts. Only through considering these parts can
we understand the whole. The failure of the naive model of 'I-ness'
shows that we should not think of identity as an indivisible whold, but
as p product of parts. The apparent dilemmas of the Duplicate Body scenario
stem from an incorrect view of what identity is.

And here the sermon endeth.

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|                        |                                                 |
|   Fintan Costello.     |    If I'd known it was harmless,                |
|   AI lab, Computer     |    I would have killed it myself.               |
|   science Dept.        |                                                 |
|   TCD Dublin Ireland.  |                         - Philip K Dick,        |
|   Fcostllo@cs.tcd.ie.  |                           'A scanner darkly'.   |
|                        |                                                 |
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