Re: LS Program: Instant cloning

From: B. Skutvik (skutvik@online.no)
Date: Wed Feb 03 1999 - 21:33:24 GMT


FOR PETE, MAGNUS, AND HORSE (MAGGIE MENTIONED) AND SQUAD.

For Pete Fisher who wrote:
...snip....
> 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. ?
.....snip...

Welcome Pete. I didn't have the chance to say so at the MD. Yes,
the PS of ZAMM. If memory serves me Maggie Hettinger could not stand
that particular part of the book, and if the MOQ is to be the guide I
don't think our social or intellectual selves can be isolated or
"survive" the in the New Age sense). No upper level without its
base(s) IMHO. But wait...I feel that I am not in accordance with the
MOQ in speaking about MY social self or MY intellectual self. Let
this simmer for a while.

> 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 !)

Yes, it made it to the headlines here too

> 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 !

You have a point there.
....................................................
For Magnus who wrote:

> > What bothers me is this. If patterns of the four levels are
> > all there is, and if we can make an exact copy of a set of
> > patterns of those levels, then we really should have an exact
> > copy. But as you say, what we call consciousness might not be
> > copied after all, it would kind'a not *be* consciousness since
> > consciousness hardly can be at two places at the same time,
> > (supposing the original wasn't killed).

".....what we call consciousness"!? Isn't the first tenet of the MOQ
that there is no such thing? At least that it can be seen as
Q-Intellect, i.e; a sense of self as different from environment and
from other (society) and not the "sentience" of SOM. As said, the
various levels can be seen as an increase of abstraction - of
consciousness if we must - but nowhere does it attain the
"awareness of objective reality" ...of SOM.

If the teleportation is perfect - as things are in thought
experiments - every last bit, also the highly abstract patterns of
the social and intellectual patterns are copied, so the clone
will have a sense of identity as Magnus Berg included every memory
trace, still there is no shared biological pain or social emotion
(if that is what you call consciousness?) should your clone hurt
himself or fall in love....or later intellectual achievements.
..........................................................

For Horse who replied (to Magnus):
> Under ordinary circunstances I would agree but in this case we are
> talking about an exact copy of the original, including all the
> experiences of the original extracted from the memories. What is
> left out?

 Exactly

Magnus ctd:
> > I simply don't think it's enough to only copy the patterns of the
> > four levels. A person is more than that, but what? I guess the
> > easy way out is to call it DQ, but I'm not very satisfied with
> > that either.
 
The 'soul' perhaps. The feeling of identity. The human curse and
hallmark. Yet, I think this belongs to the intellect.

Horse replied:
> If the four levels and DQ are all there is, as Pirsig suggests, then
> at this point we would have to diverge from the MOQ. If it were the
> case that an exact duplicate, including the memories, could be
> constructed then this would imply that our 'self' is firmly grounded
> in our physical or material body.

Agreed!

> The above raises two further interesting problems:
> 1) If memory, the result of experience, could be extracted/copied
> from the original then this could be transferred to ANY other body,
> not necessarily the copied original.

Yes, if so, but I don't think that is feasible - principally - within
the MOQ framework. The levels are inextricable connected
and no upper level can be isolated or transferred.

> 2) If fake memories could be constructed, memories that are not
> necessarily the result of any one persons experience, would they be
> distinguishable from those memories that do result from experience.

It follows (from my reasoning) that neither can any artificial memory
be constructed or transported to another person. Here our old
disagreement over artificial intelligence surfaces again Horse :-]

Bodvar
..................................................

TO BE IS TO DO (Socrates)
TO DO IS TO BE (Sartre)
DO BE DO - BE DO (Sinatra)

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