God Fearing Atheist

And you summed up my position.

tronvillain

hedonologist:

I'm afraid that "Matters to who?" is the wrong question. The correct question is "Matters to what?", and the statement makes it clear that it is the survival of the self. Whether or not anyone considers that survival important is irrelevant.

While I know that "I" am information contained in the structure of my brain, I do not know the details of that information or which pieces are more important than others. It is not something I can determine by introspection, and as a result, I am incapable of speculating about what modifications to that information I might be willing to make.

What do you mean by "the experiencer" anyway? It seems that you have returned to the Cartesian Theatre in an effort to define yourself. To me, it looks like an unnecessary hypothesis.

tronvillain

Oh, and whether I'd undergo an "upgrade" depends on the nature of the upgrade.

hedonologist

I finally feel as though I'm receiving and communicating meaningful thoughts on the subject of materialism. I usually feel misunderstood and unable to find the words. I want to thank all of you for contributing and holding my interest also so I can think these things through. I get bored trying to do it by myself.

OK. If the "self" is defined as info, then if the info survives so does the "self". But would you not say that (there is a sense in which) a "whole self" (or person) dies when a near-copy dies? If I define the self as the experiencer, then it is true to say a "whole self" dies when a near-copy dies.
When you typed "'I' am information", you seemed to define "'I'" as something other than info, in that sentence. It seems to me that the pieces of info, which are going to be the more important pieces to us, are the ones necessary to sustain the experiencer. How else do you describe what it is we would be trying to preserve? Sure we would be trying to preserve some info (plus brain structure and everything else effecting this info through time), but what makes the survival of any particular info any more important to us, than any other info?
Calling myself an experiencer seems to denote that I value the "info" (ie physical phenomena) causing my experience, differently than the "info" causing other's experiences, even if that info is physically identical except for its position in space/time or other small differences such as those a copy would have.

excreationist

I'll just answer this...
I sometimes use the term "experiencer". (I think that's where hedonologist got the term from) It is the system that is aware. We do feel a sensation of "awareness" you know. In my old <a href="http://members.ozemail.com.au/~wenke/temp/brain.gif" target="_blank">brain diagram</a>, the short-term memory (STM) is what we're aware of, and the "experiencer" is the processor of the STM - it is "aware" of indirect sensory information, triggered memories from LTM, emotional responses, etc.

hedonologist:
No... but it's a long story about how I've tried to get what I want in life (a girl).

You also said:
"For all you know you just enjoyed nothing more than to clean their house, file their bunions, etc."
So I actually enjoyed myself a lot and didn't know of anything better. I actually don't mind rolling cigarettes (I can just daydream) and if I was brainwashed I wouldn't feel a need to daydream. I'd be happy just doing repetitive work. (You'd just need to eliminate my desire for "newness") And I could probably get used to eating banana peels right now. If I was brainwashed into thinking it was very enjoyable then it would be no problem at all. Just rewire the taste-buds. Bitter things would become pleasant, sweet, salty and fatty things would become unpleasant.

Ok, but we'd have to have Einstein and Galileo living in the present-day world then because their creativity mightn't be very useful. I guess it would be ok, but maybe not as good as mine. Their creativity would be good for logical type things, maybe not for far-out abstract things (especially Galileo).

Well that sounds good to me. That might be the only way you could convince me to let brain A have body B.

So do you mean if brain B was put in body C, it would forget all about personality B? It still contains the same information and the same molecules - there would just be a loss of consciousness (probably) - that's all.

Yeah you could do that, but that might involve tricking me into the complete brain transplant from brain A to body B. Or maybe I'd do it even if I knew what was happening since I could exit my life and you could live it for me. Hopefully I'd have a new body instead. (So brain B could get put in body C or body A).

Well I'm saying that redesigning the structure of the brain would result in my personality being different so the copy wouldn't really be a copy of me, or it would be equivalent to a copy and it is easier just having a plain copy.

hedonologist

Actually, I have been using the term since before I discovered this forum, Mr More Creative Than Einstein. Not that I think it is impossible that you would be more creative.
I'm defining an experiencer as a subjective "phenomena" whose existence is inferred by an experiencing one, because they are having experiences. Whether the processor you mention, is all or part of the neurological correlate of consciousness (NCC) or a physical correlate of an experiencing being, is another issue. I know I exist as experiencer, without knowing what physical phenomena either causes me to exist or causes me to be aware that I exist, in this world/body. So I can't define myself (as experiencer) as a physical thing.
There is nothing more visually pretty, to me. I read something one such beautiful poet wrote, "beauty is the promise of pleasure". I wonder if having a girl really would bring me, as much pleasure as their beauty would have me believe. Imagining a "side by side" comparison of having such passion and being without it, leads me to think being free of Eros it is preferable in many ways. On the other hand I'm usually making this comparison when I am without. When I am within her trace, I think there is no where else I would rather be. Maybe I think I am better off abstaining from females to cope with being without. Not that I am intentionally abstaining, a part of me just reasons that it may be best, and my recent lifestyle has not yet led me to meet a girl who has mutual affections. I am serious enough about it to be looking into castration, though this wouldn't preclude a relationship with a woman, just make it more optional and take a lot of the stress out of it.
Is *believing* something is pleasurable, equal to knowing that it is? I don't think so. That was not the hypothetical I was making, which I tried to clarify in the second post. I was asking what if you didn't know how much you were actually suffering (and you were actually suffering very much), because you hadn't experienced the more pleasurable life, to compare it to.
Even if you enjoyed yourself you would die from lack of nutrients, and excess of toxins eventually, sooner than you would if you had a better diet. So the pleasure would be cut short and that would be less pleasure than you could have had, had you "brainwashed" yourself to enjoy that which lead to a longer life.
I don't know what you mean. Are you trying to say you are more conscious than me? :-|

I was saying basically that if your desire is to benefit "yourself", I could argue that you would not be benefiting "yourself" by doing something for "your future self". So it is like saying "your future self" is no more "yourself" than my "future self" is "your self", so why care which of these other people gets put in your head?

The "paradox" I'll feebly attempt to describe this way: Whether an experiencer is preserved through time, or whether changing experiences (time) actually change which being is the one experiencing these experiences.
The real trick would be convincing outsiders, such as the "surgeons"/"programmers" that you are the one speaking, if we were replacing parts one at a time, and before the surgeons started I told them to replaced a part I knew would cause you to change your mind. I think this part would be the memories which contained the info which would lead the combo brain to believe it were preserving itself by transplanting the rest of the brain A. It would be like "I" suddenly popped into your head and when they ask the brain who it was "I" lied and said "I am excreationist" and then made up some convincing pseudo-psychological explanation for how I could know I was you, while having my memories. The "surgeons"/"programmers" would have to back up and replace your old memories for "you" to object, and say, "That wasn't me, I have no memory of that happening."

Who would the brain really be at that time? That depends on how we define a self. For me, it would depend on what is the physical correlate of an experiencing being, though I admit this sort of hypothetical makes me wonder how to distinguish "being someone" from just thinking "I am someone", even just in a conceptual or hypothetical sense.

If we replaced each part of a brain piece by piece with identical pieces, and then rebuilt a brain out of the original pieces, I don't have a clue, after such an experience which brain "I" would be in. One strange thing is imagining "me" separated from the thoughts/experiences which convince me that I am me.
I'm not sure if when you say "personality" you are including the experiencer, or speaking about what could be determined different by objective behavior.

Say we made a program on a computer that could predict your behavior faster than you would do what it would predict. Then we used this program to build your clone and turned the speed down on the various thought processes so that it would imitate "you" but the way you would act in a different environment. Then we sync up its memory with yours and awake you both in different rooms that appear identical on the inside. You and your android "copy" are both doing exactly the same thing in both these rooms. We ask you both simultaneously via computer screen, to make up and type a story about whatever pops into your "heads". You both type exactly the same story. No matter how long we wait your actions are always identical. Is this being with a totally different brain structure, "you"?

[ January 23, 2002: Message edited by: hedonologist ]</p>

excreationist

Ok, but I'm saying that some materialists such as myself don't have a problem with the term. (unlike tronvillian)

Yeah, that is a more general definition and is therefore less likely to be mistaken. In the same way, saying that rain is droplets of water that fall out of the sky is more general than saying that rain involves the sun evapourating water, which condenses into clouds which rain. (I forget the jargon) Maybe when the sun dries up water it just disappears and then God just pulls clouds out of no-where (this would explain Noah's flood) and he empties them out, causing the rain. I'm looking for explanations that seem to make sense and have evidence rather than very generalized definitions that don't explain the cause-effect relationship between things.

Yes, you can't just assume (a priori) that the experiencer has a purely physical basis, but that's just the conclusion I have come to based on what I've learnt. (Or it seems to be the explanation which makes the most sense - though I guess dualism can't be refuted)

That's very interesting... I think that sounds right. Apparently young babies are attracted to beautiful faces - they probably see it as a possibility of pleasure (of nurturing). And people are also instinctively attracted to beautiful faces (this instinct can be changed though) and they probably intuitive believe that seeking them may lead to pleasure.

That's what I've been doing most of the time - I usually avoid girls or talk to them just a tiny bit if necessary. And three of my friends are like that - well they'd talk to girls a lot, but they seem to have no desire to get a girl-friend. Too much maintenance I guess.

I actually was very serious about it a few months ago. It would have gotten rid of my annoying body hair (which isn't black and thick but it is too noticeable IMO) and the lack of testosterone would have maybe made me less irritable. <a href="http://www.geocities.com/sherrylanina/CastrationResources.html" target="_blank">Some links</a>. <a href="http://www.bmeworld.com/smooth/01_01.htm" target="_blank">A FAQ</a>
I think I read somewhere that it makes your skin softer and you have "softer features" (maybe that means your muscle tone). Maybe my really low voice would change too. (And make me sound less bored) And I don't want to have kids anyway. I think it would just be a burden off of my shoulders. I'd be free! I don't know if I actually decided against it. I think I just forgot about it. (I can be easily distracted) The best method I've heard of so far is to cut off the blood supply to your testicles for a few days and they apparently shrivel up and drop off. You can also keep them in a jar. I think it is meant to be painful though, but it couldn't be that bad. (I've been through painful things before - though not deliberately - except for exercise type things)

Yeah... and a lot of girls probably aren't interested in sex much anyway, and if they are, they could just get it elsewhere. And I could also just please them and not worry about being pleased in return except for the visual and tactile pleasures. And I could always take hormones to give me back my testosterone. Also one of my testicles has always been quite a lot bigger than the other. I'd just feel better about myself. (except for the penis shrinkage ) Also I don't want to pass on my genes (I've got really bad genes physically, and a fairly severe mental illness that is apparently genetic) - I would much rather get adopted kids.
I think it is like being freed from our animal instincts and becoming more in control.
Update: After reading <a href="http://www.eunuch.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=8ff81374ffd09bf56a0c2d0c46a5a7a9& threadid=297" target="_blank">this</a> and <a href="http://www.eunuch.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=8ff81374ffd09bf56a0c2d0c46a5a7a9& threadid=108" target="_blank">this</a>, I've been having second thoughts. (BTW the picture can be seen by copying and pasting the link)

I think the most important thing is if people are more or less content or not. Not the extremes of pleasure they can reach (although this makes life more exciting).
I'm saying that I don't really see a problem with being blissfully unaware of the outside world. I might choose to have more knowledge and opportunities though (like in the Matrix) but I'm not that worried either way.

Well at least I'd have a clear purpose and direction in life. Many people die young in rich countries, just because they were born with a serious deformity. People can make the most of what they've got. Well if the alternative was longer life and more enjoyment and freedom then I might choose the alternative then.

Well I believe that I am brain B. And by putting brain B in a better body (e.g. body C or body A) then I would be improving brain B's life (my life). Brain B is like the pilot. Body B is just the vehicle. It doesn't matter what happens to it. It only matters what happens to brain B.

It doesn't matter what goes into body B as long as brain B is taken care of, since "I" am brain B.

I'm saying that when you put brain B into body C, the brain/experiencer is doubly mine because (a) it involves the original untouched molecules and (b) it contains the same personality/memories/motivational system

I think you could mix two personalities in there, except that it would be hard inserting one personality into another. I mean you'd have to work out the meaning of the neuron memories then connect them up in the right way. And also average out some neuron "weights". So I might think that pink elephants are good (+2) and you might think they're bad (-100). So the value of that neuron would be overwritten as -98, if you were doing a half and half style mix. Or it could be set to your setting completely. If many things are set all the way to your setting there would probably be a lot of contradictory reasoning and I'd have to straighten out my reasoning. e.g. I might love all pink things and everything to do with elephants, but hate pink elephants. And I might have a memory (my memory) that I got a pink elephant for my birthday and loved it.

Well the brain would be a mix of both of our personalities and memories - a hybrid.

Well if you were unconscious during the process you'd wake up as the recreated brain. Otherwise things get weird, like in the case of split brain patients that clearly have two minds at work.
And you can even anaethetize one hemisphere of the brain at a time - so that only one hemisphere is functioning - and you can even remove a whole hemisphere. I think we have a kind of dual consciousness that interacts with itself and one is more linguistic, the other more vaguely intuitive.

I usually mean behavioural patterns. They are just a kind of memory (though partly instinctual) but they aren't like memories of your red car, etc. They are memories about what behavioural patterns work and don't work and what situations are desirable and undesirable, etc.

Well you are seeing exactly what it sees but not directly. It is like a mirror image of yourself but not you, directly. BTW, our brains work on thresholds - like how a coin on its side will either land completely on heads or completely on tails. Sometimes only a tiny disturbance makes the difference. And in reality it would be impossible to simulate a human being without any inaccuracies. And over time any inaccuracies would greatly magnify (the "butterfly effect")

[ January 23, 2002: Message edited by: excreationist ]</p>

hedonologist

Well sure if you define it “physically”. Maybe tronv was somewhat comprehending what I meant by the term, or using it similarly.
I’m not sure what is meant by saying an experiencer has a physical basis. The physical is essentially experienced. Can what is experienced be also experiencer? If so, is it as accurate to say the experiencer *is* that aspect of the “physical” which is empirically sensed, when that is such a small experience compared to all that is subjectively experienced? I understand you are saying the subjective is also “physical”, but the aspect such as the feeling of pleasure, is totally indescribable in physical terms, either by talking about a physical correlate or if what is pleasing is programmed evolution or by. This doesn't describe why we like it in a subjective sense, only the subjective experience can "define" pleasure, in that way. The same is true of the experiencer.

My definition is not just “simpler”. The point I’m trying to make, is that we didn’t come up with the concept of an experiencer based on a certain physical organ or something. So we don’t define it that way, even when we are talking about a physical correlate. For example, how do you describe your intention in trying to preserve "you" (an “experiencer&#8221 , in a brain transplant, when you don’t know of a physical thing you are trying to preserve? It seems you are trying to preserve “yourself “ as I would define you, as subject not object. You are not sure what specific object in the brain corresponds with yourself as subject.

Maybe I am arguing for property dualism as opposed to substance dualism. Off hand, I’m not sure that property dualism is incompatible with “materialism” or some other “monism”, and further this is not much different than substance dualism where one arbitrarily draws a line between substance which is “matter” and that which is “mind”, except in the way words like “matter” would be defined. It is like asking is reality one or many? Is the solar system many planets and a sun, or is it a whole solar system? It is just a linguistic distinction… unless it affects behavior (thoughts) differently.

excreationist

I mean that as a materialist, I believe that awareness involves only the physical universe.

Yes, you can experience other people.

Or...
What is experienced can only be part of the experiencer, not the experiencer in its totality. The reasoning behind this involves STM (short-term memory) where the contents of the STM are what the experiencer is aware of.
Maybe in the future we will be able to detect the contents (including the associated LTM's) of our STM. For the experiencer to view these results, their STM would change - and it changes anyway about 20-40 times a second. But let's say the experiencer could look at the contents of STM and look at the neurons, etc, using imaging equipment. The size of the information found using the brain scanning equipment would be at least the size of the STM. And to be aware of other things, the experiencer would also need extra space to analyse this information. Perhaps this could be done though - the brain scanning information could be compressed during its transmission into the STM. But the contents of STM would be changed and the brain-scanning information would have to be changed.
Or look at it this way - to be "conscious" of the contents of STM, in an analytical detached way would require the contents of STM and the analysis to be in the STM. And that copy of the STM that is being analysed is no longer accurate - because the STM now contains its former contents AND the analysis.

It's like this....

This shows contents of the STM, where the brain then becomes aware of this information and analyses it (so that it can have human-level symbolic awareness of it).

STM [initial thoughts]
analysis(STM)
analysis((STM))
analysis(((STM)))
analysis((((STM))))
analysis(((((STM))))

This is like a person being aware that they are thinking [whatever it is that they are thinking].
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking.
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking.
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking.
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking.
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking.
Then, if they have the mental capacity (STM plus LTM based compression schemes), being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking.
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking.
Then being aware that they are thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking about themselves thinking..... etc.

You see each time, they aren't fully aware of what is going on inside their head, from an analytical kind of consciousness. So they have to analyse their current thoughts. Then analyse themselves analysing their current thoughts, etc.

So to summarize:
What is experienced can only be part of the experiencer, not the experiencer in its totality.

Well brains have a motivation system that makes them seek things which trigger a pleasure signal (determined by the limbic system(?)) and avoid things which trigger a pain signal (also determined by the limbic system(?)).
Apparently sometimes people who have a damaged limbic system can still feel a signal (such as the physical injury pain signal) but don't feel compelled to avoid this signal.
In a properly working brain, the processor of STM sets goals and acts in order to maximize expected pleasure and/or minimize expected pain. So "you", the processor of STM, is compelled or limited to doing what it determines to lead to the expected maximum pleasures or minimum pains.
This is like a computer where a computer has no choice but to obey its binary "instructions".

Well to an onlooker who is looking at a mysterious computer operate (e.g. a Commodore 64), it obeys instructions faithfully - and spits out error messages or crashes when there are errors. But to the computer, it is doing the "correct" thing. And because of the way our brains work, we seek pleasure and avoid pain (depending on its intensity). So since our brain forces us to seek pleasure, we could say that we "like" it. And since our brain forces us to avoid pain (depending on its intensity) we could say that we "hate" it.

Well the experiencer is only aware of its STM, as I explained earlier. Since we can't access other people's STM directly then their awareness is very personal.

Well I think that awareness requires at least a motivational system (to make the system learn, respond, etc), memory (to store what it has learnt), senses (to sense the environment) and a means of influencing the world (muscles, etc). It may be conceivable that a totally paralysed foetus, who is unable to move a muscle could "know" what those sensations it is seeing is all about, but I think proper learning (and therefore awareness) requires the system to experiment with the world, to test their beliefs and to create new experiences that have never happened before.
So I'm saying that you'd need some kind of brain and senses (and muscles, at least at some stage in your life) to be considered aware. I don't think there is a little organ of the brain that holds the consciousness that you can just pull out and hook it up to a life-support system. I think for me to be "me" it requires my memories - which make up most of my brain - and my senses and emotional system, etc, which make up the rest of my brain.

Well I was under the impression that with property dualism, it isn't very mysterious - it's just a case of hardware and software in a material world (I might be wrong though). But substance dualism is different - where the phenomena of awareness is mysterious and where it is conceiveable for things like "zombies" that act like humans, but without awareness, exist.
I'm just a plain materialist I think, although I think that there are different systems at different scales or from different perspectives. e.g. nations, life, morality, art, etc.

hedonologist

My apologies if I am asking anything you have already answered. I may get to reading the rest of each of your posts later, but for the last two I have only read basically up to what I responded to.
What "part of" the experiencer known as yourself would you be interested in preserving, in your brain transplant?

Why that part?
Isn't it sort of a moral or value judgment to call that "proper working"? It seems to reveal *your* intention, in trying to influence what brains will do.
You are speaking of a computer as if it were the subject of an experience.
How do you know we are not "forcing" our brain (or other processes within our brain) to seek pleasure, instead of our brain "forcing" us? I could see how the brain may determine what is pleasurable or not, but wouldn't we be the part of the brain making the decision?