Magnus and Lila Squad
>
>It was a close call, but after including my own vote, the first
>topic for the cloned? Lila Squad will be instant cloning.
>
>Suppose there is a teleportation system that copies your DNA, kills
>you then instantaneously builds a perfect copy of you at a different
>location would you agree to travel by it?
>
No.
>Or suppose it doesn't kill you, would it create another you?
>
No - as the question is stated, merely a perfect corporeal replica.
>What does it take? Is it enough to copy your DNA? Are "you" defined
>by your DNA?
Absolutely not. Even identical twins reared together often exhibit
significantly different personalities.
Diana:
>On the other hand if you could include memory in the package, the social
>and intellectual patterns would be retained. Somehow that still doesn't
>satisfy though. The patterns might be there, but I'm not so sure about the
>consciousness. The DNA is only the information about the body, it is not in
>itself the actual experiencing body. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding DNA, but
>you might be able to write down all the information, but how would you make
>the new body actually alive?
Presumably a 'Star Trek' transporter somehow contrives to replicate
memories - a far harder feat than copying DNA I imagine from what I
remember of my school biology ! How are memories stored anyway ?
Some of mine are pretty hard to retrieve these days, and its hard to
imagine 'things' delicate enough to be destroyed by ECT surviving such a
transportation process.
Having recently become an 'elderly' father (not unlike Pirsig), it is
obvious even by the age of two how much life experiences mould social
patterns.
It seems from the postscript to ZAMM that Pirsig (at least at that time)
suggests that the intellectual pattern that is 'me' might survive
corporeal death. If so, the same pattern could presumably survive the
'transportation' *separate* from the merely biological pattern - or am I
too simplistic in my interpretation of the PS. ?
I often discuss the concept of 'reincarnation' (rather topical in the UK
lately thanks to some amazing remarks attributed to the England football
team manager !) with a colleague who is a Buddhist . My argument is
along the lines of well if 'I' don't remember my previous existence how
do I know whether I am on the way up (evolving to a pattern on a higher
intellectual plane) or down so to speak. In which case ignorance might
truly be bliss !
BTW the same colleague drew my attention to a recent article in 'New
Scientist' (30/1/99) - " I is the Law". More 'heresy' about reality
being created by observation : "Since Heisenberg's principle is so
basic, it occurred to me that perhaps every physical phenomenon occurs
in reaction to measurement - that measurement acts as a kind of catalyst
for the effect," says Frieden." (Roy Frieden)
Regards
Pete
--+-----------------------------------------------------------------+ | Pete Fisher at Home: Peter@psfisher.demon.co.uk | | "Do not adjust your mind - there is a fault in the reality" | +-----------------------------------------------------------------+ MOQ Online - http://www.moq.org
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Thu Jan 17 2002 - 13:08:35 GMT