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But GGP's question was specifically about being born. I really struggle to imagine how someone born somewhere else, somewhen else, could be "me" with anything l

But GGP's question was specifically about being born. I really struggle to imagine how someone born somewhere else, somewhen else, could be "me" with anything like the fidelity I think our intuition demands. And if you loosen your identity test to the point where it could, doesn't it then become useless as an individuation test, in that lots of people could be sufficiently like me all at the same time? Up front let me admit this is effectively a cheat. BUT in a multiverse or infinite universe not only are there multiple “you’s“ there are in fact infinite identical versions of you. I grant that this is not taking the spirit of the conversation into account, and is untestable to boot, it is genuinely possible.

mrec 8y ago
Yeah, when I said "somewhere else" I was kind of scoping it to this universe. I know, so small-minded. Note though that an infinite universe doesn't imply that everything imaginable occurs within it. There are an infinite number of even integers, but none of them is 3.
- skissane 8y ago
  > Note though that an infinite universe doesn't imply that everything imaginable occurs within it True, but in an infinite universe, everything with non-zero probability almost surely happens, an infinite number of times. Since our own lives have non-zero probability of existing, a spatially infinite universe implies that almost surely there are an infinite number of exact copies of ourselves existing right now, and an infinite future implies that almost surely our current lives will be exactly repeated an infinite number of times in the future.
skissane 8y ago
> there are in fact infinite identical versions of you But when I say (or think) "I", am I saying or thinking of any specific one of those versions? How could I be? It seems, if there are infinite number of identical copies of me, when I say "I", I must mean all of them equally.
brodie 8y ago
Based on my own personal experience of putting myself in a position of dying now probably more times than I can count (unfortunately), I've been seriously wondering if the universe does contain all of my deaths as well, but my consciousness stays on a path where it can continue, because that's all it can do. Though that still raises the question of why this particular set of living experiences and not others. Also, if this sort of thing is the case, I think it would make being a moral person significantly more complex. You would need to not only make moral decisions, but create as many moral possible universes as possible and shut out the immoral universes from existence by not creating paths to them. Though I guess that would make me a highly immoral person at this point (causing pain and suffering in all the universes where I've died), though I do try to be moral in this universe as much as I can.

mrec 8y ago

Yeah, when I said "somewhere else" I was kind of scoping it to this universe. I know, so small-minded. Note though that an infinite universe doesn't imply that everything imaginable occurs within it. There are an infinite number of even integers, but none of them is 3.

skissane 8y ago
> Note though that an infinite universe doesn't imply that everything imaginable occurs within it True, but in an infinite universe, everything with non-zero probability almost surely happens, an infinite number of times. Since our own lives have non-zero probability of existing, a spatially infinite universe implies that almost surely there are an infinite number of exact copies of ourselves existing right now, and an infinite future implies that almost surely our current lives will be exactly repeated an infinite number of times in the future.

skissane 8y ago

> there are in fact infinite identical versions of you But when I say (or think) "I", am I saying or thinking of any specific one of those versions? How could I be? It seems, if there are infinite number of identical copies of me, when I say "I", I must mean all of them equally.

brodie 8y ago

Based on my own personal experience of putting myself in a position of dying now probably more times than I can count (unfortunately), I've been seriously wondering if the universe does contain all of my deaths as well, but my consciousness stays on a path where it can continue, because that's all it can do. Though that still raises the question of why this particular set of living experiences and not others. Also, if this sort of thing is the case, I think it would make being a moral person significantly more complex. You would need to not only make moral decisions, but create as many moral possible universes as possible and shut out the immoral universes from existence by not creating paths to them. Though I guess that would make me a highly immoral person at this point (causing pain and suffering in all the universes where I've died), though I do try to be moral in this universe as much as I can.