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@ALittleLight: “.. One was the idea that the author could rule out the singularity ..” Your consciousness uploaded and then downloaded into a synthetic human l

@ALittleLight: “.. One was the idea that the author could rule out the singularity ..” Your consciousness uploaded and then downloaded into a synthetic human like body isn't ever going to be you. As the man said “transhumanism is a warmed-over Christian heresy”.

Nursie 6y ago
If we're firmly in the realm of sci-fi (which we are) I find the idea of a neuron-by-neuron replacement of the human brain by nano-sized computational units that function exactly the same way as those neurons, to be a more interesting proposition. Can it be done in a way that doesn't imply the death of the subject?
- Stierlitz 6y ago
  > .. Can it be done in a way that doesn't imply the death of the subject? The key word is replacement. Can this replacement vote or inherit property? What happens if there is a clerical error and they make two replacements. Which one is the real you?
  - Nursie 6y ago
    Oh absolutely, I think that is the key thing. Personally I'd never get into a transporter such as they are portrayed in Star Trek - what comes out the other end may well be a perfect reconstruction, and think it is me, and behave to the outside world as if it is me. But would there be a continuity of conscious experience? Or am I dead and a facsimile is now in my place? Incidentally, this is why I can't take Roko's Basilisk at all seriously - a future simulation of me is not me. Well, it;s one reason anyway.
    - antepodius 6y ago
      I mean, you're not alone. Nobody takes Roko's basilisk seriously.
IggleSniggle 6y ago
I find the notion of a coherent self / consciousness to be hogwash anyway. The "self aware" "conscious" brain is a wholistic entity, with what you ate yesterday causing moods that alter your train of thought etc etc, with multiple competing interests vying to control the larger organism to their own ends. The Ship of Theseus is the warmed-over Christian heresy. A brain is an organism with a symbiotic tight coupling to a meat bag, and the brain itself a similar cooperation by accident. An organism can develop that builds new tight "synthetic" couplings; it isn't sci-fi. It's partially released today. It's just that we are so normalized to the interfaces of smart phones, keyboards, monitors, steering wheels, and so on that we didn't notice it's arrival. More exotic, more tightly coupled interfaces also exist today (there exist direct-to-brain interfaces that provide a new sensory feedback loop that you brain can adapt to), they're just not as competitive currently with thousands of years of neural optimization of hands/eyes/nose/touch. Why would you want to do this? Who knows. Why do we want to do anything? Maybe a person wants to be part machine as a lizard-brain driven reaction to a low-oxygen office environment that sees no viable way out.
jhomedall 6y ago
Why would it not be you? If I replace a single one of your neurons with a mechanical replacement, are you still you? What if I replace half? All? If you walk across a room, are you still you? What if I break you down, and reassemble you at the other side of the room, using the same atoms? What if I only use half the original atoms? What if I freeze you, move you across the room, and then dethaw you?
- Izkata 6y ago
  It's the question of what is consciousness. As far as I (crudely) understand it, we don't know what exactly the cause is, other than it's tied extremely tightly to the brain and seems to be an accident of evolution/an illusion. My guess is that as long as the neurons keep firing continuously and the illusion is unbroken, the "you" that is you right now will remain you. So you may well be able to go full ship-of-theseus and piece-by-piece completely replace the physical layer without breaking the consciousness, but if you stop it completely with an upload/download* , continuity is broken and the new "you" will be an exact duplicate while the "you" right now will cease to be. Because it's an exact duplicate there would be no way to confirm this, though - the new "you" would think it had continuity due to how complete their memories are. * I'm thinking of switching to a robotic brain all at once here, instead of piece-by-piece. I'm not going to touch a transporter as suggested in your comment, as that probably depends on technical details of the transporter for what exactly is going on.
  - antepodius 6y ago
    What about piece-by-piece? What if we 'upload' you piece-by-piece, by replacing neurons in your head with remote connections to virtual neurons on a computer one-by-one? I think that conventional notions of identity are probably incoherent, and mean you die from second to second anyway.
- xsmasher 6y ago
  We're soaking in a stew of hormones and chemicals that change the functioning on the machine. I'm not likely to have the same reactions after lunch that I had before lunch, or consistency from yesterday to today.

Nursie 6y ago

If we're firmly in the realm of sci-fi (which we are) I find the idea of a neuron-by-neuron replacement of the human brain by nano-sized computational units that function exactly the same way as those neurons, to be a more interesting proposition. Can it be done in a way that doesn't imply the death of the subject?

Stierlitz 6y ago
> .. Can it be done in a way that doesn't imply the death of the subject? The key word is replacement. Can this replacement vote or inherit property? What happens if there is a clerical error and they make two replacements. Which one is the real you?
- Nursie 6y ago
  Oh absolutely, I think that is the key thing. Personally I'd never get into a transporter such as they are portrayed in Star Trek - what comes out the other end may well be a perfect reconstruction, and think it is me, and behave to the outside world as if it is me. But would there be a continuity of conscious experience? Or am I dead and a facsimile is now in my place? Incidentally, this is why I can't take Roko's Basilisk at all seriously - a future simulation of me is not me. Well, it;s one reason anyway.
  - antepodius 6y ago
    I mean, you're not alone. Nobody takes Roko's basilisk seriously.

IggleSniggle 6y ago

I find the notion of a coherent self / consciousness to be hogwash anyway. The "self aware" "conscious" brain is a wholistic entity, with what you ate yesterday causing moods that alter your train of thought etc etc, with multiple competing interests vying to control the larger organism to their own ends. The Ship of Theseus is the warmed-over Christian heresy. A brain is an organism with a symbiotic tight coupling to a meat bag, and the brain itself a similar cooperation by accident. An organism can develop that builds new tight "synthetic" couplings; it isn't sci-fi. It's partially released today. It's just that we are so normalized to the interfaces of smart phones, keyboards, monitors, steering wheels, and so on that we didn't notice it's arrival. More exotic, more tightly coupled interfaces also exist today (there exist direct-to-brain interfaces that provide a new sensory feedback loop that you brain can adapt to), they're just not as competitive currently with thousands of years of neural optimization of hands/eyes/nose/touch. Why would you want to do this? Who knows. Why do we want to do anything? Maybe a person wants to be part machine as a lizard-brain driven reaction to a low-oxygen office environment that sees no viable way out.

jhomedall 6y ago

Why would it not be you? If I replace a single one of your neurons with a mechanical replacement, are you still you? What if I replace half? All? If you walk across a room, are you still you? What if I break you down, and reassemble you at the other side of the room, using the same atoms? What if I only use half the original atoms? What if I freeze you, move you across the room, and then dethaw you?

Izkata 6y ago
It's the question of what is consciousness. As far as I (crudely) understand it, we don't know what exactly the cause is, other than it's tied extremely tightly to the brain and seems to be an accident of evolution/an illusion. My guess is that as long as the neurons keep firing continuously and the illusion is unbroken, the "you" that is you right now will remain you. So you may well be able to go full ship-of-theseus and piece-by-piece completely replace the physical layer without breaking the consciousness, but if you stop it completely with an upload/download* , continuity is broken and the new "you" will be an exact duplicate while the "you" right now will cease to be. Because it's an exact duplicate there would be no way to confirm this, though - the new "you" would think it had continuity due to how complete their memories are. * I'm thinking of switching to a robotic brain all at once here, instead of piece-by-piece. I'm not going to touch a transporter as suggested in your comment, as that probably depends on technical details of the transporter for what exactly is going on.
- antepodius 6y ago
  What about piece-by-piece? What if we 'upload' you piece-by-piece, by replacing neurons in your head with remote connections to virtual neurons on a computer one-by-one? I think that conventional notions of identity are probably incoherent, and mean you die from second to second anyway.
xsmasher 6y ago
We're soaking in a stew of hormones and chemicals that change the functioning on the machine. I'm not likely to have the same reactions after lunch that I had before lunch, or consistency from yesterday to today.