From: Matt Mahoney (matmahoney@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Oct 27 2008 - 06:33:57 MDT
--- On Sun, 10/26/08, Stathis Papaioannou <stathisp@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Let's say you believe in many worlds and you are
> offered the chance to run a simulation of your brain in a
> plausible, deterministic simulated world such that the
> simulation would predict your behavior in the real world in
> every case where the model agrees with reality. You know
> that the model is not entirely accurate because your
> simulation will be immortal, although the details of what
> that entails have not been specified. At the instant you
> flip the switch to start the simulation, you will be
> vaporized. Will you (not should you) flip the switch?
>
> Yes: it's the same as ordinary life, when your previous
> self disappears utterly from the universe as soon as the moment
> passes.
That's not the question. The question is what *will* a brain that has evolved to fear death do? I suppose that some brains could override instinct and be convinced that their consciousness transfers to the simulation, but they won't pass on their DNA.
-- Matt Mahoney, matmahoney@yahoo.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Jul 17 2013 - 04:01:03 MDT