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In reply to your first question, according to wikipedia, yes. ...each piece has the ability to regenerate into a fully formed individual.
by booleandilemma 9y ago
In reply to your first question, according to wikipedia, yes.
...each piece has the ability to regenerate into a fully formed individual.
- userbinator 9y agoThat's rather nightmarish. "Cut a worm in half. Now you have two worms." Reminds me of the famous https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lernaean_Hydra https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lernaean_Hydra
- inferiorhuman 9y agoWith the same memories that will then result in a pair of worms terrorizing you.
- alex_young 9y agoWhat if you cut the top off the bottom you cut off of the old top? Now we're in Ship of Theseus territory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
- takeda 9y agoI don't understand why this is considered a paradox. It is only a paradox due to flawed thinking of what is considered the same. The problem is when you think of same object as a binary (it is same or it isn't). If you think of same object as a spectrum it becomes trivial. In case of the mentioned ship, as individual pieces are replaced, what's same becomes smaller and smaller part of the entire ship. If you take these parts and build another ship, that will be the same ship that you originally had.
- ColanR 9y agoThing is, considering an object as a spectrum leads to other problems. If continuous spectrum, then _any_ adjustment gives you a new object: e.g., a wave eroded a few atoms from the hull, now it's a new ship. If discrete spectrum, then same problem as before.
- Doxin 9y agoYou're still thinking in binary there. If a wave eroded a few atoms from the hull it's now the tiniest bit a new ship. If you round it to the nearest binary result you'd end up with "It's not a new ship".