From: SMcClenahan@ATTBI.com
Date: Tue Dec 24 2002 - 23:00:51 MST
When this thread started I immediately thought of Eliezer's reply, even though
I thought it was a bit long-winded -- What is it that you want?
We are of course assuming that that is the correct question to ask. And if it
is, the answer is very simple, even for trans/post-humans. We want more
pleasure, and less pain. Every single response so far can be reduced to this
answer.
But pleasure/pain can also be regarded as indicators for action/change for the
purpose of self-preservation. Pleasure means keep doing it because it's good
for you, pain means something is wrong and needs to be fixed. Altering a body's
senses through drugs and whatnot are self-defeatiing, eventually bringing the
ultimate pain of (brain) death. An intelligent person or body designer would
associate some sort of pain with taking euphoric drugs or having sex (or mutual
masturbation in this day and age) all the time.
Also realizing that it is Ben0 that "wants" to be cloned for the purpose of
increased pleasure, that pleasure must lie at a different level, at the "set of
all Bens", or his communities of relationships, or the whole human race, etc.
As an SL4er, we know that clones by definition, at any level, are discrete
entities unto themselves, even if all of the Bens decide together to have an
incestuous relationship and take over the world.
Maybe if we don't have the technology to clone one's corporeal body and mind to
upload into, maybe there is some room in the alleged unused 90% of our brain to
host another being, a virtual clone of one's mind. Like hosting another
operating system on the same machine a la VMware http://www.vmware.com/ . It
sounds like a schizophrenia disorder, but if it is controlled in a sandbox with
the flick of the mind's switch, then it is an issue of body resource
management. Maybe this is what dream states are for anyway.
cheers,
Simon
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