/sci/ - Science & Math

To some extent you're doing it right now.

>>3607450
My brain just leaked out a little.

>>3607455

Materialism much?

this is philosophical buttfuck territory.

it is obvious that the matter itself is not what's vital for consciousness (nothing conscious about proteins, ions, etc., and they're constantly being recycled anyway).

however once you concede this, you have to answer what would happen if you slowly transferred the consciousness of one person into two bodies. or what would happen if you don't destroy the original.

>>3607443

You can not transfer without moving the containing unit. what happens is you copy it to a new place then delete the original copy.

The point isn't to take a picture, then copy that over. That's not what the OP is asking and would not transfer the consciousness (as far as we can tell, at least).

The idea is to transfer more slowly, so that, say, you're copying a brain-state from one to the other, piecemeal, with them remaining in communication.

So, the magical nanotech you'd need for this procedure is observing and disabling one neuron at a time, and, at the same time, a copy of that neuron is created (whether digitally or on another brain) and a signal is sent back and forth between the nanobots in each brain. As this happens more and more, the one consciousness is half-running on one brain, half on the other, until, eventually, the last neuron is deactivated in one brain and is online in the other.

In doing so, the person involved would experience a gradual shift from one body to another. The question is, would it be the same consciousness?

>slowly transfer
Do you think you die whenever you fall asleep?

>>3607466
What do you mean what would happen?

The two nearly-identical people would immediately start to differentiate and live their own lives.c

>>3607852
>(as far as we can tell, at least)

It's not a question about fact. It's a question about interpretation. There isn't an objectively correct answer.

Well a exact copy of another person would obviously share his consciousness, memories and personality with the original (expect you believe in magic and fairy dust)

>>3607882

There is, though. The words bandied about for it (consciousness, soul, continuity, perspective, ghost, etc.) all mean the same thing; the thing that is quintessentially you. We have yet to narrow down what exactly it is, since it's hard to quantify, but we all know it's there (unless you wanna get into p-zombie territory) because we ARE it.

The correct answer lies with this; our ability to preserve and transfer it, if we can even narrow down what it is to begin with to begin with.

That is the objective answer. We just don't have the knowledge to be able to give it yet, and we might never.

>>3607876
missing the point.

what happens from YOUR perspective?

>2011
>not realizing you're the universe experiencing itself
>not realizing that we are a single entity
>not realizing you already have a consciousness in all the other bodies simultaneously but you just don't realize it because your knowledge is stuck inside your petty brain and you have been tricked into believing in individuality
I seriously hope you guys don't do this

Let's say you have a fire on one side of the room, and a pile of sticks on the other side of the room.

When the fire has almost become embers, you pour a flammable liquid between the two and the fire roars down the line and catches the pile of wood on fire.

Eventually, the original point of the fire is dead ash. But the new pile still burns. Is it the same fire? I say yes.

I believe that if you connect the brain to something that's sufficiently complex, and then the brain dies, consciousness is preserved. It doesn't matter what speed you do this with, or even what you connect it to (Necessarily).

>>3607969

>thinks we are only 2011 years old

go to bed, sweet young Timmy.

Consciousness is beyond computable logic because the cells and shit in your brain can travel backwards in time relative to each other, thus enabling infinite regression.
PROVE ME WRONG.

>>3607921
> the thing that is quintessentially you

That is what is a matter of interpretation, not fact.

>We have yet to narrow down what exactly it is, since it's hard to quantify, but we all know it's there (unless you wanna get into p-zombie territory) because we ARE it

Not really. We know that thought exists. Whether the thing that is doing the thinking today is the same as the thing that is doing the thinking yesterday - or even if it makes sense to say that the thinking is done by an individual "thing" - is a matter of interpretation.

>>3607994

Can't prove a negative. You made the assertion.

>>3608011

It's not really a matter of interpretation. I exist, you exist, we all exist. I'm not positing anything beyond the existence of this "thing" that is consciousness. I make no statements about its properties.

The fact that you are even asking the question "[w]hether the thing that is doing the thinking today is the same as the thing that is doing the thinking yesterday" shows that there is something here that is causing the question to arise to begin with.

>>3608174
> can't prove a negative
> what the fuck is fermat's last theorem

>>3608181

Fine. Outside of mathematics.

>>3608174

>shows that there is something here that is causing the question to arise to begin with.

Yeah that is the brain. Whether that brain is actually YOU (the Self/Consciousness) is another matter.

I would see it as having to be done all at once but I'm no neurophysicist.

>>3607989

"Young Timmy's" thoughts are probably more accurate than everyone elses.

I think its quite reasonable to assume that the consciousness/Self/You are just an illusion of your brain's processes and memories. Who says that You are the same You that was earlier today?

>>3608238
> Fine. Outside of mathematics.

fail. instead of reanalysing your statement you just say, 'fine, not in that specific case but in all others'. no true scotsman amirite?

you can't go faster than light. you can't breathe in space. you can't fly using your body.

stay in school bro.

>>3608174
>I exist, you exist, we all exist.

But that's a big assertion. The existence of the self is itself an interpretation.

And even if it wasn't, the OPs question would be. Is the Ship of Theseus one ship or many? That's not a question about objective reality.

>>3608174
>Can't prove a negative.

Yes, you can.

P -> Q
~Q

Holy shit, ~P.

>>3608250

Again, the fact that there is a "YOU" to refer to here shows the problem.

>>3608278

The Ship of Theseus is not a person; it has no consciousness (and, again, I'll say "as far as we can tell"). The problem is thus made no longer subjective. Either the original consciousness is there, or it isn't. We just don't have a means to detect it.

>>3608325

you seem to be arguing from the dualist perspective. I myself am more of a materialist/monist. I don't think the consciousness is some sort of undetectable magical substance.

>>3607969
This

>>3608325
>The Ship of Theseus is not a person; it has no consciousness (and, again, I'll say "as far as we can tell"). The problem is thus made no longer subjective. Either the original consciousness is there, or it isn't. We just don't have a means to detect it.

The problem is not different. Is the Ship of Theseus the same ship that was around 20 years ago? Are you the same person that was around 20 years ago? In neither case are the objective facts in dispute.

>>3607969
>>3608358

are shrooms good?

>>3608352
nobody is saying it is a substance. most likely it is a product of systems. nobody can really explain though why there are percepts associated with these systems; the colour red and so on. it is easy for us to conceptualise an algorithm running that does what consciousness does but with no percepts attached.

>>3608362
I'm not saying people don't form their own individual identities, or that some sort of metaphysical or supracorporeal/supernatural entity exists that we are all a part of. We're the natural outcome of ~13 billion years of the universe naturally developing. We are not something apart from nature, we are not something apart from one another. We are the same.

>>3608364

Well I also say that this consciousness/feeling of Self is a product of brain and body processes such as perception and memories. But that could easily just give us the illusion of a continuous Self. I don't know how my Self experiences this though.

The problem comes with mind uploading. Upload the mind onto a computer and have the original living at the same time? Is the digital mind Me? Or is it now someone else?

>>3608393
I'LL TAKE that as a yeS

We're merely intelligent enough to appreciate such abstract concepts because our brains evolved in this way. I guess evolution fucked itself in a way, since we're all killing each other over metaphysical and asinine shit.

Try imagining a being that is as intelligent and conscious compared to us as we are compared to earthworms. That may be reality, who knows what exists in the expanding universe. Pretty fascinating.

>>3608393

hell yeah. one of the reasons im a naturalistic pantheist is because of that bill hicks quote. It's always made sense to me, and the more I delve into science and philosophy the more it makes sense.

And no, I don't believe the universe is God. I just believe in the oneness of nature, and that the universe has the traits to be called God.

>>3608415
>Try imagining a being that is as intelligent and conscious compared to us as we are compared to earthworms.

But from the POV of an earthworm we are the stupid ones.