/sci/ - Science & Math

Do your own homework.

Climate would go apeshit - the end to seasons? Wave goodbye to half the world's ecosystems. It'd be an environmental disaster on par with an asteroid strike.

I find it highly likely that aliens exist, but given the absurd immensity of space and the distances involved, I don't find it particularly strange hat we haven't met any yet.

Life is crazy complicated yo, it's not gonna pop up on every second planet in the galaxy, and even then it's not gonna be necessarily intelligent, and even then, space-faring. So while it's out there, it's not gonna be common in the forms we're most interested to discover. We imagine meeting aliens far beyond our capabilities that then enlighten us with mad science shit, but what if we are the superiors? What if they're just space-Romans? We need to bear in mind that if we choose to search for life we must accept the potential responsibility of celestial educator and role-model.

Also, we should definitely check out Europa. It's the best chance for extraterrestrial life in our solar system, and if we find it that close to home, it pretty much guarantees that life is a common phenomena and the universe is going to be absolutely swarming with it.

>o Oh, you can also find the pattern of pi this way.

Wat


Though I'd fucking love it if next week it's all over the news that "Braydon B" has cracked fusion and is providing free energy for everyone, forever.

That's not philosophy, that's sociology/psychology.

>>3402282

I'd say the fact that other, non-civilised animals don't pursue an Ubermanesque sleep-cycle would suggest that it wasn't something that's been "lost" to us; it's reasonable to assume that had our primitive ancestors followed one, so would other species.

>>3402291

Animals are capable of adapting to the night - see nocturnal animals. The fact that they sleep during the day indicates that there is something vital about getting enough sleep, and not simply filling otherwise unused time that's not being used for REM or being awake.

>>3402210

Oh I know that (balls on the outside of the body), but it does seem to me that this isn't a situation like that - obviously if you're having to sleep for only a quarter as long as your genetic competitors you'll have superior access to resources, be able to cover greater distances, spread your seed more widely. I would personally be quite hesitant about using Uberman for an extended period of time before studies are conducted into it (that said, I may well try it for a month or two at some point, out of curiosity more than anything).

>>3402165

The Uberman Sleep Cycle definitely does work, it's well documented. It takes a lot of dedication though, for the first week or so you feel like you're going to die you're so tired, and you miss one nap and you'll be exhausted for days.

But be warned: there have been no scientific studies into long-term affects of any kind as yet. It could make you die 10 years earlier and we'd literally have no idea. I'm personally hesitant to try it - that sleep you're missing has got to be vital for something; from an evolutionary point of view, when sleeping you're vulnerable, and so those who sleep less will have the advantage. Sow why hasn't something like this come about through evolution? Seems to me we need that other sleep, even if it isn't so essential as REM in the short-term.

>>3402063

Is this bullshit pseudoscience? It sounds like bullshit pseudoscience.

GET YO PANSY ASSES IN HERE PEOPLE

>>3392744

Doctor Who touches on this in the most recent series- the Almost People two-parter.

There's also a great film which discusses this concept of perfect clong, but I'm not gonna post the name because it would basically ruin the entire plot. If you really want to know (and think you've got an idea what it is already), then I wrote it in the email field. Great film.


And yes, I am definitely going now.

>>3392728

It's something I've thought a lot about, and I was half-hoping someone could prove me wrong - I would like to be, and be able to wholeheartedly welcome such hypothetical advances, but I can't.

And I'm bowing out of this debate now, want a wank and I need to get up early tomorrow for work. One of the best discuessions I've had on 4chan for a while, thanks guys.

>>3392693

I would probably upload, because I know that to the new instance of consciousness created, he would be incredibly grateful for it, and from his perspective it would have worked perfectly, but there would be a bitterness to it - because I would still be dying, and my quest for immortality (the whole point of uploading) would have, from my point of view, failed.

>>3392663
>Bullshit. Even your own statements don't agree with that bit.

Howso? I don't see any inconsistencies in my argument, but please show me.

>>3392650
>Both experiences are equally legitimate and real.

Yes, they're both equally legitimate and real, that cannot be denied. But I don't care about the other experiences, despite their legitimacy - I only care about the preservation of my own current instance (I don't mean I'm an amoral cunt, just that my vested interest lies in this current instance of me rather than any other). For that reason I would see no reason to pursue uploading - it's not saving me, only a new instance of my consciousness, while I die.

>>3392633
>And as for murder - there would be a distinction in severity between killing a person who can be recreated from a 24hr backup, and killing a person and wiping all his backup brainscans. Only the last one looks like the current definition of "murder".

I don't see any distinction at all. That there happens to be a copy of the man still up and walking around (even if he was created at the exact instant of the original's death) doesn't matter one bit. The original man is dead, and the copy is simply a new, but separate instance of him.

>>3392620

Because people seem to assume that your current instance of consciousness will simply continue into a clone in an example like OP's - it won't. It'll be a separate instance of the consciousness. I get the impression from this thread that people wouldn't care about doing insanely risky things, because "oh I'll just keep living through my clone". Eg. >In that case I'd become a super-pro street racer.

You, the current you, the only you that matters, would be dead. That a copy of you is still alive and thinking it got out of it all unscathed doesn't matter one bit - the "you" the you actually physically are would be dead.

>>3392567
>You wake up in a room on a couch. You look across the room, a person with your face looks back from another couch.

>Do you need to know whether you're the original?

If the original is intact, then it doesn't really matter. Either I am the original unhindered consciousness, or I am the new one - in which case it seems to me that I've always had a continuous consciousness.

I have an issue with the destructive cloning/teleporting, like what OP described. When you will happily allow yourself to be disassembled - and so killed - just so another, separate instance of you can be created.


Of course there are ethical issues and all that with non-destructive duplication, but that's something else entirely. I don't think you could give preferential treatment to either, even if they both knew which was the original. They are literally identical, that one is a copy means nothing if the original was not detrimentally affected in the creation of that copy.

>>3392465

I think there is a distinction between the two, and pattern-ists fail to recognise it. It's easiest to see if we consider cloning.

I make multiple clones of my self (true identical ones, each sharing the exact brain-state as my own at the moment of cloning). We would react in the same way to things, act the same, effectively be the same. We are after all identical. But if one of them is hurt, do I feel it? No. Can I make them move? No. Can I know what they are thinking, and think using their brains? No. Though they are identical, and have my consciousness, we do not share it. They are totally separate. People don't immediately recognise this because generally in examples the original me is discarded and not thought about, and from the perspective of clone-me, nothing is awry.

They are me in every single way except the most important - the continuation of this instance of consciousness generated by this instance of my physical brain. And that's the problem.

>>3392407

I disagree; a mind-upload could well be a vindication of the dualist argument - if this instance of consciousness does not die (and be replaced by an identical one) but rather continued unimpeded absolutely on a new medium, it could only be because there is more to the mind than simply an instance of a physical brain.

I define this current unhindered or impeded instance of consciousness, generated by this physical instance of my brain as "me". Something that goes against that, I would consider killing me (and replacing me with an identical copy). Sleep allows this, teleportation and "mind-uploads" in every formulation I have ever seen does not.

>>3392371

It still doesn't seem the same. I mean say you made this clone of me, and shot it, I wouldn't give a shit (any more than I would if you killed any human being), because it's not this instance of my consciousness, and this instance of the physical brain that generates the consciousness.

I think that's key - it's the same physical brain generating the instance of consciousness when sleeping, while it's not with teleporting/cloning. And yes I recognise that it is slowly replaced, but that allows for a continuation of consciousness - it's not like all of a sudden every single atom in it changes at once.

>>3392318

Imperial for measuring the human body. Height is in feet, weight is in pounds, dick-size is in inches. For all other distances, weights, volumes, etc., it's metric all the way baby.

The old you would be dead. That is, the you that's reading it right now. The one that wakes up in the hospital bed is an exact copy that current you have no control over. Because you're dead.

Look at it this way - if you were to be copied exactly while still alive, would you know exactly what the other "you" was thinking? Would you be able to control his body like you can your own, move freely? No, of course you wouldn't. It would be a separate consciousness and a separate body, despite being identical to your current one.

The example OP gives is for the purposes of the argument no different to this. The fact that the clone waking up is cannot recognise any moment of when he came to exist as the clone as opposed to when there was only one consciousness, the one you're currently using, doesn't change this.

The same goes for teleporters - that dissasembling of your body will kill you, quite likely very painfully. Even if you're rebuilt with the same atoms it's not your current consciousness but merely a copy, albeit one constructed out of the same atoms and that recognises no break in its consciousness. But you, the current you, will be dead.

It's a problem that transhumanism has to overcome if it ever wants to gain my support. I want to preserve me, not an exact copy of me. I don't give a shit if someone who is literally identical to me lives forever and transcends space and time, because it's not this instance of my consciousness. And really, that continued consciousness is all I am.

>>3379877

Bad habit I guess, but it is such a satisfying word to use.

Base-8 just... makes sense. 8/2=4, 4/2=2, 2/2=1. 10/2=5, 5/2=2.5, 2.5/2=1.25. It's just so much neater.

Whilst OP is being retarded, I do agree with him in a sense. I dislike the fact that we use base-10 - there's no logic behind it beyond the fact that we have 10 fingers. If it were up to me we'd all be using base-8 - it can be divided by itself multiple times without descending into fractions, and it's not too large that the number of symbols gets awkward (as would start to be the case and moved to the next logical one, base-16. Though I wouldn't mind that either).