I've seen the future, and it's not androids, it's heads in jars.

"Approves"


/hot

malaktaus: soup: So I won't live forever - a robot that looks and thinks like me and has my memories will live forever.

Not exactly the same thing, is it.

Like that whole teleporting = copying all your atoms, destroying the original, then building a copy somewhere else. I'll let someone else take the first ride.

I hate to have to tell you this, but the whole idea of the soul is a fairytale. It's the adult version of Santa or the Easter bunny. If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Do you not understand the difference between a 'soul' and human consciousness? I think the concept of a soul is as you put it, a fairytale, but I still understand that an exact replica of me with all of my memories wouldn't actually be me, but someone else.

Not this good yet, then.

NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

It wouldn't matter or be a problem to everyone else, maybe, but it would be a problem for me. I would die. Something that thinks it's me--and to everyone else is me--would still exist, but I would not.

"But I would notice the difference!" Arthur said. "No you wouldn't, you would be programmed not to."

/obscure?

NobleHam: malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

It wouldn't matter or be a problem to everyone else, maybe, but it would be a problem for me. I would die. Something that thinks it's me--and to everyone else is me--would still exist, but I would not.

It would be really, really different. Machinery doesn't have the plasticity of a human brain. It would start out like you, but it would be inflexible, it couldn't learn. It would be a snap-shot, not a personality.

Also...


theorellior: Paging QA to the thread, life-extention nutter QA, you are wanted in the thread.

He's busy. There's a NASA thread in the Geek tab that needed shiatting upon.

malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

Well, I do think that this sort of thing could be used as an argument for the soul, but it is in no way about the soul and it isn't superstition. Even if all of reality is just information, there's still at least one piece of information that's not transferred: location. A copy of me five meters away isn't me, even if you assume that all of reality is information, because the x,y,z coordinates of THAT me are different from THIS me.

how am i not myself?

WORST
REALDOLL
EVER!

PonceAlyosha: NobleHam: malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

It wouldn't matter or be a problem to everyone else, maybe, but it would be a problem for me. I would die. Something that thinks it's me--and to everyone else is me--would still exist, but I would not.

It would be really, really different. Machinery doesn't have the plasticity of a human brain. It would start out like you, but it would be inflexible, it couldn't learn. It would be a snap-shot, not a personality.

Well, at this point I'm talking less about the specific idea in this article and more about the idea of copying the mind in general.

washington-babylon: "But I would notice the difference!" Arthur said. "No you wouldn't, you would be programmed not to."

/obscure?

washington-babylon: "But I would notice the difference!" Arthur said. "No you wouldn't, you would be programmed not to."

/obscure?

I like to program a 481. Awareness of the manifold possibilities open to me in the future.

/You may also like an 888.

washington-babylon: "But I would notice the difference!" Arthur said. "No you wouldn't, you would be programmed not to."

/obscure?

It's Fark - not by a long shot!!!

PonceAlyosha: malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

Yes, logically there is a huge problem with that. That is not the same consciousness you had before, it is just a duplicate. Now to do a full nervous system PHYSICAL transfer into an immortal body would save you, but memory back-up doesn't. It just creates something that thinks it is you. It never was, it never will be.

Your kind of thinking is pure nonsense. We may not fully understand how consciousness works, but we do know that the human brain is made of perfectly normal matter. It isn't magic. There's nothing inherently unique about an individual's consciousness, you're just using it as a standin for the soul because the very word soul reeks of bullshiat.

Nrokreffefp: Unless the original you is terminated and the consciousness is transferred. Then, I think, you still die but leave behind a flawless replica that any observer would think is actually you, despite your consciousness having ended when your biological brain shut down. Has nothing to do with a soul.

I've always wondered about that in regard to Star Trek (and similar) transporters. It, what, disassembles your molecules and sends them? Or sends a data description? Either way, isn't it basically killing you and constructing a remote copy?

/I know, taking it way too seriously

malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

You're really incorrect. Imagine I am playing a copy of Crash Bandicoot. Imagine you play a seperate copy of Crash Bandicoot, at your house. You and I make saves. If I give you my save and you continue playing it, it's not the same file that I gave you. It doesn't matter that it was mine, it's not mine, it's your completion of me.

First off, if you have an immortal body and mind, a good...well...most of consciousness becomes irrelevant. Similarly, sensory awareness would be replaced and made irrelevant. It'd be a waste of computational capacity. If you remove the mind from the human body, it isn't a human mind any more, and thus can't be said to be the same as before. Why would a machine need a sex drive? Why would a machine need the sorts of primary sensory modalities we have?

You wouldn't be you. You would be something else, because you COULD NOT exist in the same state you did before, even assuming that consciousness was transferred, rather then copied. The hardware of the "soul" is the soul.

"The goal is to have a hologram-like avatar that could contain an artificial brain that would house a real person's thoughts, memories and personality."

I don't know what I've been told
Big legged woman ain't got no soul

malaktaus: Your kind of thinking is pure nonsense. We may not fully understand how consciousness works, but we do know that the human brain is made of perfectly normal matter. It isn't magic. There's nothing inherently unique about an individual's consciousness, you're just using it as a standin for the soul because the very word soul reeks of bullshiat.

No one said there was any magic or abnormal matter, only that replicating that brain out of different matter is not creating the same brain, it's creating another identical brain. You seem to be the one not thinking very clearly.

NobleHam: malaktaus: Your kind of thinking is pure nonsense. We may not fully understand how consciousness works, but we do know that the human brain is made of perfectly normal matter. It isn't magic. There's nothing inherently unique about an individual's consciousness, you're just using it as a standin for the soul because the very word soul reeks of bullshiat.

No one said there was any magic or abnormal matter, only that replicating that brain out of different matter is not creating the same brain, it's creating another identical brain. You seem to be the one not thinking very clearly.

It wouldn't even be identical. You'd need to copy the entire nervous system otherwise you'd be a body wide phantom limb. Seriously Russian dudes, crack open a farking book.

NobleHam: No one said there was any magic or abnormal matter, only that replicating that brain out of different matter is not creating the same brain, it's creating another identical brain. You seem to be the one not thinking very clearly.

The matter in your brain changes a bit every instant. You don't have the same brain you had yesterday or last year.

So what?

NobleHam: malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

Well, I do think that this sort of thing could be used as an argument for the soul, but it is in no way about the soul and it isn't superstition. Even if all of reality is just information, there's still at least one piece of information that's not transferred: location. A copy of me five meters away isn't me, even if you assume that all of reality is information, because the x,y,z coordinates of THAT me are different from THIS me.

That's so meaningless a distinction as to be totally absurd.

And by 2075 they hope to be able to put eyeballs in straight?

malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

Well, I do think that this sort of thing could be used as an argument for the soul, but it is in no way about the soul and it isn't superstition. Even if all of reality is just information, there's still at least one piece of information that's not transferred: location. A copy of me five meters away isn't me, even if you assume that all of reality is information, because the x,y,z coordinates of THAT me are different from THIS me.

That's so meaningless a distinction as to be totally absurd.

Okay, so if I copy you and kill you, you're not dead? I didn't commit murder? That dead body and dead brain say otherwise. Just because something is a copy doesn't mean it is the same thing. Think of identical twins. They have the same biological presets, yet are seperate people. Even if you put a copy of you UP UNTIL THAT POINT in a perfect, exactly cloned body, it still isn't you. Your mind exists in your physical body. It doesn't stop being a person because another one is around. You don't stop being you just because you've been copy-cloned.

I don't need that, I'm as healthy as a Rigelian ox.

malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

Well, I do think that this sort of thing could be used as an argument for the soul, but it is in no way about the soul and it isn't superstition. Even if all of reality is just information, there's still at least one piece of information that's not transferred: location. A copy of me five meters away isn't me, even if you assume that all of reality is information, because the x,y,z coordinates of THAT me are different from THIS me.

That's so meaningless a distinction as to be totally absurd.

It's a minute distinction. For all your talk of logic and the nature of universe being information, you ought to know that minute is not meaningless. In any case it was merely to point out a flaw in your idea that reality is just information.

The more important distinction is simply that they are different chunks of matter, even if all of that matter is arranged identically. Let's say you create an identical human body (not a robot body) with all of same neural links, every particle in its proper place, but you do not destroy the old one immediately. The new body creates new memories right away, but these memories are not simultaneously transferred to the old one. The old one is still a separate entity. When you destroy the old one, that entity is destroyed, and a new one which shares its memories up to the point of the new one's creation continues. Now you can call it the soul if you want, but the facts of it are undeniable.

If you can copy a human brain, why not store that information until your death? Create the body and continual update the back up of your brain. When you die, the replacement is activated. And you have the best of both worlds. A perfect copy of you goes on living, and you go on to whatever afterlife actually exists.

Or.... for the sexually deviant amongst you, have a copy of your brain downloaded into the physical body of your choice for your sexual gratification. I don't see any reason that our memories have to be completely gender dependent.

/all this has been thought of by scifi writers.

ph0rk: The matter in your brain changes a bit every instant. You don't have the same brain you had yesterday or last year.

So what?

The standing wave of consciousness is part and parcel of these changes and, in fact, directs some of them.

what an android may look like:

malaktaus
Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

You volunteering to go first, then?

As I type this, the bit of me that thinks of me as "me" is sitting in a sac of salty lips inside my skull, looking out my eyes. In order for there to be continuity of existence, that bit must be extracted from the sac and placed into new hardware. Simply duplicating brainwave patterns doesn't do that. If I make a copy of a file on my hard drive and give it to you, I haven't given you the original. I could clone my brain into a hundred different robot bodies, and none of them would be me. They might be complex enough to achieve self-awareness and think they're me, but they're not me. I'm still stuck in my meatsack.

malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

... except "you" wouldn't be continuing anything, "you" would be dead, and another "you" would be living. Do you think your consciousness just skips to the nearest duplicate of yourself after death?

Should have made him black, then he would be perfect.

PonceAlyosha: malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: NobleHam: malaktaus: If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Except for the one way that matters to people who want to live forever. It may be identical down to the subatomic particles, but two identical rocks are not the same rock and two identical people do not have the same consciousness.

Bullshiat superstition. You're using the word consciousness the way religionists use the word soul. All of reality is just information, and if all of the information about a thing is recorded the thing itself is recorded. As someone who would like to live forever, this sort of thing would be entirely acceptable to me. And no, just for the record, I don't think 30 years will be anywhere near enough time to see this happen. Even a century probably won't be enough, but there's no reason in the world why it would never happen, assuming we don't destroy ourselves or lapse into a dark age.

Well, I do think that this sort of thing could be used as an argument for the soul, but it is in no way about the soul and it isn't superstition. Even if all of reality is just information, there's still at least one piece of information that's not transferred: location. A copy of me five meters away isn't me, even if you assume that all of reality is information, because the x,y,z coordinates of THAT me are different from THIS me.

That's so meaningless a distinction as to be totally absurd.

Okay, so if I copy you and kill you, you're not dead? I didn't commit murder? That dead body and dead brain say otherwise. Just because something is a copy doesn't mean it is the same thing. Think of identical twins. They have the same biological presets, yet are seperate people. Even if you put a copy of you UP UNTIL THAT POINT in a perfect, exactly cloned body, it still isn't you. Your mind exists in your physical body. It doesn't stop being a person because another one is around. You don't stop being you just because you've been copy-clo ...

Identical twins have unique individual experiences, starting even before birth. That's such a terrible example I almost feel bad arguing against it. If you copied me and then killed me, I think the exact circumstances would make a difference as to the classification of the act. If you just shot me in the head or something that would be needlessly cruel, but if I was rendered unconscious, and then copied, and my original body was then destroyed without having regained consciousness, I would be fine with that. Your problem is you still think people are special, when we're really just very complex organic machines. Your thinking is primitive.

PonceAlyosha, NobleHam

Yes! Both of you have have made the point I was trying to make, only better.

Treize26: Do you think your consciousness just skips to the nearest duplicate of yourself after death?

Treize26: malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

... except "you" wouldn't be continuing anything, "you" would be dead, and another "you" would be living. Do you think your consciousness just skips to the nearest duplicate of yourself after death?

Yeah, that's what Car Wars taught me.

PonceAlyosha
It would be really, really different. Machinery doesn't have the plasticity of a human brain. It would start out like you, but it would be inflexible, it couldn't learn. It would be a snap-shot, not a personality.

They're working on it.

5 year old article, but I didn't feel like googling for long...
Cognitive computing... making machines with plasticity like the human brain... someday it will probably happen.

PonceAlyosha: Yes, logically there is a huge problem with that. That is not the same consciousness you had before, it is just a duplicate. Now to do a full nervous system PHYSICAL transfer into an immortal body would save you, but memory back-up doesn't. It just creates something that thinks it is you. It never was, it never will be.

Why doesn't memory back up? I'm not saying I have a box in my closest full of old profplump data tapes, but I don't understand fundamentally how you'd tell the difference between a "copy" and "original" of perfectly duplicated data.

malaktaus: Identical twins have unique individual experiences, starting even before birth

EXACTLY! As do the two copies of you!

Allen. The end.: washington-babylon: "But I would notice the difference!" Arthur said. "No you wouldn't, you would be programmed not to."

/obscure?

It's Fark - not by a long shot!!!

Funny thing is, I am reading the entire Hitchhikers compendium for the umpteenth time and that was the chapter I just finished. Kind of fresh in my mind.

malaktaus: If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

So pretend you are going through your scenario here. You are put under anesthesia and a copy of your mind is created. They didn't use enough anesthesia though and so you wake up before they destroy you. The law states that if you wake up before destruction, you cannot be destroyed without your permission. Do you allow yourself to be destroyed? And if so, does your consciousness somehow magically snap into and combine with your copy? Because if not, there certainly IS a big farking problem here.

profplump: PonceAlyosha: Yes, logically there is a huge problem with that. That is not the same consciousness you had before, it is just a duplicate. Now to do a full nervous system PHYSICAL transfer into an immortal body would save you, but memory back-up doesn't. It just creates something that thinks it is you. It never was, it never will be.

Why doesn't memory back up? I'm not saying I have a box in my closest full of old profplump data tapes, but I don't understand fundamentally how you'd tell the difference between a "copy" and "original" of perfectly duplicated data.

Imagine if you send me partially finished document. You keep your copy and finish it. I finish it in my own way. They're not the same document, even though they started from the same point.

Can you @#$% it?


/oblig

Kaiku: malaktaus: If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

So pretend you are going through your scenario here. You are put under anesthesia and a copy of your mind is created. They didn't use enough anesthesia though and so you wake up before they destroy you. The law states that if you wake up before destruction, you cannot be destroyed without your permission. Do you allow yourself to be destroyed? And if so, does your consciousness somehow magically snap into and combine with your copy? Because if not, there certainly IS a big farking problem here.

Of course it doesn't. There is no "non-local" consciousness (sorry wizards). It's stupidity to consider another instance of you to be YOURSELF.

malaktaus
If you just shot me in the head or something that would be needlessly cruel, but if I was rendered unconscious, and then copied, and my original body was then destroyed without having regained consciousness, I would be fine with that.

So you agree that once your original body woke up, it would still be you. You even used the same word you were criticising us for using and calling it superstition. In your scenario, what would happen if the original did wake up? Would the robot copy still be "you", or would it be a clone?

Robert J. Sawyer's Mindscan

It's a good read.

malaktaus: I hate to have to tell you this, but the whole idea of the soul is a fairytale. It's the adult version of Santa or the Easter bunny. If the robot has all of your memories it is you in every way that matters.

Who said anything about a soul? Transfering memories and knowledge is not the same thing as having a consciousness or sentience (which you'd have to be a complete idiot to argue doens't exist). Even if you were able to duplicate a consciousness in an artificial consruct, it would be a clone, separate from the source consciousness, just as a genetic clone is separate from the source organism. THAT clone would have "immortality" (such as it is), it may even think it was you, but YOU would would still die and undergo whatever processes people undergo when they die (soul not withstanding).

This whole robotic avatar idea is nothing more than a moving, sophisticated memorial to a once living person. LIke an electric, robotic tombstone.

I swear why is it the people who think they are superior in their cognitive reasoning abilities, come up with the most idiotic ideas?

The Russians hope to do this? Bwhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha ha!

Ambivalence: I swear why is it the people who think they are superior in their cognitive reasoning abilities, come up with the most idiotic ideas?

Because they think they're superior so they don't examine them. The Dumpy-Krugydigger effect.

malaktaus: PonceAlyosha: malaktaus: NobleHam: It won't be you. It may be identical to you and have your memories, but your consciousness won't be transferred. You will still die.

If it's handled properly that wouldn't matter. First you get put under general anesthesia, then the mind is recorded; once it can be ascertained that the transfer was successful the physical body is destroyed and you start your new life. Logically there should be no problem with this.

Yes, logically there is a huge problem with that. That is not the same consciousness you had before, it is just a duplicate. Now to do a full nervous system PHYSICAL transfer into an immortal body would save you, but memory back-up doesn't. It just creates something that thinks it is you. It never was, it never will be.

Your kind of thinking is pure nonsense. We may not fully understand how consciousness works, but we do know that the human brain is made of perfectly normal matter. It isn't magic. There's nothing inherently unique about an individual's consciousness, you're just using it as a standin for the soul because the very word soul reeks of bullshiat.

I am not going to get into the soul argument, but if the duplicate knows that it is a copy then just from that knowledge it is something different. Don't assume it would act the same way as the original, it might not be happy with the whole situation.