faustuz

I realize I didn’t address this question in my original post. I had better do so because you completely misunderstand me. I never said anything to imply that the two would be seeing through the same eyes. I am only saying that they are a continuation of the same conscious entity. They are merged as one in a continuation from the path, but they will diverge completely from here onward. Bob’ and Bob” (the new Bobs) sense that they are Bob (the original Bob) in exactly the same way. This is exactly what you would have to expect would happen in reincarnation. The reincarnated being would be the same as the being it is reincarnated from in the sense that it received some form of the essence of the original being.

For conscious beings, unless you are a mystic the only thing that can be considered essential to identity are things like memories, personality, beliefs, etc. To be reincarnated one would need to pass these things on, and would need to pass on only these things. One might call these things memes, from the term coined by Richard Dawkins, and from here out I will do so. Bob’ and Bob” received all of Bob’s memes, and so at the point of awakening they are both exactly Bob. If they had only received a portion of Bob’s memes they would be only part Bob. People all around you are receiving your memes all the time. They are therefore in part a conscious extension of you. When you die those memes will live on in others. Since you are your memes you will live on too.

faustuz

Croc,

I think we are almost on the same wavelength here, although I take issue with some of your statements. Indeed when the Bobs (I’m going to hereon call them Bob for the original and Bob’ and Bob” for the post copy Bobs) awaken they are both in a different state, perhaps in a different bed, to be concrete. They are conscious of being separate entities from each other. They might even point to each other and say “I’m not him”. However they are both the continuation of Bob and it is in this manner, and only in this manner, that they share identity. Since, as I’ve said before, for conscious beings identity is comprehended as a continuity of consciousness both Bob’ and Bob” are Bob in the sense of continuity, although they are separate entities free to diverge at this point. One might call them separate paths of Bob since they will become less like each other from here on out. However, you said:

<strong> I’m not sure how this follows. It seems to me that there is no point at which Bob’ or Bob” (or Bob #11 for that matter) become a new entity. Rather their divergence from Bob is a continuity, not a step function but a curve if you will. Yet despite this divergence there is in fact no point at which Bob’ and Bob” stop being the continuation of Bob (unless one of them gets amnesia). 20 years from now you will be the continuation of the person you are today, and I will be the continuation of the person I am today. We will both feel and believe this to be true and it is unreasonable to say otherwise. Consciousness is continuation. This is as true for Bob’ and Bob” as it is for me and you.

I’m not sure what you mean by this, and it sounds suspiciously mystical to me. What does the universe need to reorient around? The sense of identity of Bob, Bob’ and Bob” are completely internal and can be observed, and can only be thought of existing, it terms of introspection, i.e. the subjective viewpoint. The universe has nothing to do with it.

crocodile deathroll

"Conscious observation" is the only means to which the universe can observe itself, unless you reinvent some other concept of a God or pantheism that I do not know about.

If consciousness never emerged in the universe then the universe in all its complexity will be asleep all the time and there will be no one around to observe in awe all of its own planets, stars and galaxies and other structures and as a consequence they as may as well of never existed.

faustuz

Am I to presume that you believe in some form of the Participatory Anthropic Principle?

crocodile deathroll

I believe in the <a href="http://www.physics.sfsu.edu/~lwilliam/sota/anth/coincidence.htm" target="_blank"> Weak Anthropic Principle </a> where all the numerous unobserved actualities like the Putonian landscape collapse into one observed actuality like an Earth landscape at the moment of observation, the only actuality that matters from your point of view. So it is really in the universe's interest for it to be observed. It is far more plausible than God.

However I do not believe the universe was made for the benefit of intelligence. It is just that it takes consciousness and only consciousness to observe some emergent aspects of it.

Participatory Anthropic Principle states the Universe is made for the benefit of intelligence, and the Universe in fact needs intelligent observers to exist. Nonsense, I just think the universe needs intelligence and consciousness to observe and analyze it. Intelligence has gone through a lot of trouble launching the Hubble Space Telescope and building particle accellerators to find answers. Otherwise the universe would be just ignorant of itself.
I am of the view there would be other universes out there, other actualities, but there would be no one there to observe them because they are just made of nothing but a cloud of boreing gas.
And they do not need intelligence to exist any more than Pluto needs intelligence to exist.

I may be entering into wild speculation here but consciousness may well be necessary for particle positions to be actualized otherwize the universe would be just a multitude of possibilities that will never be observed. But this is by all means not a cast iron certainty.

I find it highly plausible that when you die you just default back to where it all started. You started in the universe as merely a multitude of possibilities until one is realized like a ball on the roulette landing on one certain number. But if the croupier spins the wheel the next time around then #11 will not be excluded just by virtue of the fact it has all ready came up on a previous spin. If it did then that will over complicate things no end, and that violates Occams Razor

[ December 23, 2002: Message edited by: crocodile deathroll ]</p>