I have often half-jokingly talked about “when the singularity arrives and i upload my mind into a new body…”. Of course, this is nirvana for many of the Singularitarian‘s. A way to cheat death and live forever.
Time for some thought experiments. Do i really think this is possible? If it is (or becomes so in the future), would it be a good thing? Would i personally want to do it? The biggest question: Would it really still be you? It seems like even if your mind was perfectly replicated it would only be a copy. I suppose as things go, if you did a weekly backup and died, at most, the “real” you who had died couldn’t complain. Because you’re dead. And the “copy” you would feel as if they were you (minus the memories of whatever had happened in the intervening week since the backup).
I can certainly see the allure of something like this. But then if you take some religious and philosophical viewpoints, things get a little fuzzy. “You can’t copy the soul” someone might say. So all you have is a soulless robot that thinks, remembers, acts, and might (or might not) look like you. But isn’t really you. What is the soul? Is it the sum of all your memories and likes/dislikes? What if all that is copied exactly? Is it something more elusive that can’t be copied? “Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter“.
What about this. I back up my brain. I then go and kill someone, and then kill myself. My previous backup kicks in and downloads to a new body. Is that new “me” responsible for the murder? “I” didn’t do it. The “other” me did, right? What if you run two backups at the same time? Which one is “you”? Who has to pay the taxes? Which ones goes to work? Which one gets to be with your wife and children?
Of course, a thought that occurs to me is the tower of babel. This seems like a modern equivalent – man trying to reach out and touch heaven through artificial means. “let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven … and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do” (Gen 11: 4, 6). What do you think?
7 Responses to “Can we, should we embrace artificial immortality?”
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I think we are made more, even as we are reduced by, this crude body. We have a symbiotic relationship with the circumstances of our existence, whether it’s a body with a physical deformity or a life situation that conforms our choices. I am a different me when I’m interacting with those different things. I’ve often discussed my “tin punch lantern” philosophy of life. I think we are luminous beings in a lantern that only lets a portion of us show. Everyone’s pattern of punches letting light through is different, and we only see the patterns, not the luminousity in others. I don’t think we would really recognize each other’s souls, in their purity, because we’re so used to looking at their patterns. And I don’t think I know who I am outside of my embodied experience. Any upload of “me” would not be a recognizable me, even to me. That’s why I think resurrection is a lengthy process. I’d have an identity crisis if it happened all at once.
So this is a common theme in scifi. I have seen it played out many times. And, yes, it seems that the general concensus is that it depends on how a person is replicated. If the original is copied, and you can tell which one is the original, then the duplicate is just that — a duplicate. But what if there is a transporter accident, like with Riker on TNG, and the person is rematerialized in two different places? And there is no way to tell who is the original? Aren’t they both? And what about when the scientist (name?) tranfers his mind at the time of his death into Data? He thinks he is the same person, but his assistant (who he is secretly in love with) doesn’t. And what about the Trill who Beverly had an affair with? When the host body dies and it’s put into Riker she seems to be able to accept that it’s the same person but not when it’s transfered into a woman.
Okay, I have not come to any conclusions. But I am ready to watch some more TNG. Done with the first season yet?
Bonnie – I know what u mean. I don’t recognize myself sometimes. I’m all “WHY did i just do that, that’s not me or who i am, is it?” Especially after i’ve just done something incredibly stupid or bad (or both). Makes me wonder what sort of pattern i’m creating. And does the pattern you create externally influence the glow inside in a self-reinforcing loop?
Robin – I know what u mean. Very common sci-fi theme. And TNG … gah – i wish i had more time to get through them faster. !!! You should come over and watch with us. I just need an excuse to actually sit down for a few hours and go through a disc now and then.
I love this little murder scenario you whipped up! You should write a book about this!
I think if it’s self aware and it can make choices, it’s a real intelligence. But what good can it actually do? Most people in the world do not contribute through their intelligence. And therefore how do we decide who is WORTHY of such a thing?
Uggghhh. I just remembered a movie I really enjoyed until the end … The Prestige. I HATED it then, because it made the ethical questions of self-duplication so heinously in-your-face. It’s a strange thing that when WE create the life, we feel a measure of control, and therefore disassociation with it, and how incredibly creepy is that. I much prefer to play with the ideas of self-duplication (which is preservation) than to consider their actual application. **SHUDDER**
I am completely with God on this one — self-duplicate by having children and leave it at that. ICK ICK ICK.
I like Bonnie’s last comment. We duplicate through our kids. Everything else is just yucky.
That reminds me of the Doctor Who library episode, with the weird devices that… you know what I mean. Anyway, is that really them? Does it really seem like them? That’s what I think of when I think of the Singularity. And I don’t think it would be possible to perfectly or even near perfectly, recreate all of our individual emotions, thoughts, and reactions, us humans are just too random.