From: Filipe Sobreira (warlordbcm1@yahoo.com.br)
Date: Fri Feb 06 2009 - 10:36:55 MST
De: John K Clark <johnkclark@fastmail.fm>
Para: sl4 sl4 <sl4@sl4.org>
Enviadas: Sexta-feira, 6 de Fevereiro de 2009 13:37:56
Assunto: Re: [sl4] Uploads coming first would be good, right?.
On Thu, 5 Feb 2009 "Mike Dougherty" <msd001@gmail.com> said:
> How many electrons are there? One? More than one?
I never denied there were 2 bodies in that symmetrical room, but the
point is they are completely interchangeable with no way to even be sure
that a change had even happened. There is no change
objectively and there is no change subjectively. In that regard they are
just like electrons.
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This kind of argument is interesting, but its actually invalid. If you measure their properties with enough accuracy, you could tell them apart. The only way you could not is if they're in quantum entanglement, what is believed to be precluded for complex macroscale objects like human beings. But lets say they, as observers, do not perceive the change: what that means for their identity? They are still two separate people, and that is easily verified. So observers are not interchangeable, neither objectively nor subjectively, as I've stated in my last email.
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<snip>
If you insist that identical things are not interchangeable then throw
all your physics and chemistry and biology books away, not to mention
logic.
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Observers are not interchangeable. There CAN NOT BE two identical observers. They are different or they are the one and same. In every example given I can prove by a simple mind experiment that they are not the same. We generally think that two similar things are interchangeable based on their value and utility. Not by their identity. If my mouse brakes, I could change it for an identical one and I would be happy. They'll be 'identical', but certainly not the same. If i change an atom for another identical one in a molecule, the molecule would still be the same based on its properties, value and utility, but I can easily observe that the atom in question is not the same as the one in the molecule, based on the fact that they share all quantum properties, except for their position (since i've trapped it) and momentum, They are equivalent and interchangeable, indeed, but they are not the same. When we talk about observers, the case is even more obvious,
since we can not exclude their own viewpoint of any mental experimment that involves them, otherwise the experimment is flawed. As I have said in my last email, if you want to believe that the two copies are the same person, THAT would be more a question of belief than logic. If someone pokes my copy, i'm sure i wouldnt feel nothing. If my copy kills himself for no reason, then I'm pretty sure "I" would keep living. If you believe otherwise, then we must agree to disagree.
>John K Clark
Filipe Sobreira
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