indefinite life, but not as we know it.

[Ken_J]

A topic I struggle with in discussions about indefinite lifespan, especially as described by Kurzweil is variety in the perception of living. in a Kurzweilian immortality as described in many of his pre 2018 predictions it's often suggested that an AI, hologram or machine with sufficient processing and memory power can 'recreate' a person so that we can be convinced they are really them.

I struggle with that idea, because it treats the living me as being defined by data collection and aproximation to the ideas others have of me. And it neglects the entire question of my feeling my own existence.

And it brings back the old question of what is consciousness, and by extension what does it mean to be alive.

because we kind of think we know that a record of my memories isn't me. because I existed first, and the memories are added to me as I live. And likewise we could imagine an immortality where all memory of this life is lost and you continue to live but start over as a new person, it's still you, you just don't remember your parents, first crush, or that embarassing thing we won't talk about.

To my mind you are still you. You are still living. but in some ways this is unsatisfying as a immortality. It's true that it's a chance to live again, but it's even less than mythical reincarnation, where you supposedly can access memories of past life.

But there are other concepts of what it means to be alive and consciousness. some that I can imagine as possible alternatives. I never much cared for the idea that only humans have consciousness and experience a sense of self as living. Nor does it really make a lot of sense to me to talk about a non-material soul, because in a lot of ways that just moves the question without answering it. making it one of what is a soul and where is it, how is it constructed and how does it exist independent from memory etc.

so if we are going to say that we will live forever starting in the 2030s-2040s as Kurzweil suggests, but it is just a recreation of us then do we actually live for ever?

And if we recalibrate the projections to be something more in tune with perpetuating the being that is experiencing things right now indefinitely, don't we have to start by admitting we haven't even begun to grasp what and where 'we' exist.

Are we emergent, are we the matter, the energy moving through the matter, the interaction between the two? are we the mathmatic seed of the quantum patterns in the thoughts we think? is the entire universe a field of consciouness with spots of greater density? can consciousnesses that have gone out be reassembled at a different time and place? is there a finite number of consciouneses that can be created and we do in fact exist more then once in the universe because our pattern is used more than once, we just don't know it because we don't have access to the data storage matter that is memory? Is there really just one pattern that lives in compartmentalized physical forms cut off from other physical forms like every cell in you body living seemingly distinct lives while being a part of you?

I just feel like we don't know enough about what we are, to even begin to speculate that we can preserve our unknown selves from death, whatever that is?

[Vakanai]

A topic I struggle with in discussions about indefinite lifespan, especially as described by Kurzweil is variety in the perception of living. in a Kurzweilian immortality as described in many of his pre 2018 predictions it's often suggested that an AI, hologram or machine with sufficient processing and memory power can 'recreate' a person so that we can be convinced they are really them.

I struggle with that idea, because it treats the living me as being defined by data collection and aproximation to the ideas others have of me. And it neglects the entire question of my feeling my own existence.

And it brings back the old question of what is consciousness, and by extension what does it mean to be alive.

because we kind of think we know that a record of my memories isn't me. because I existed first, and the memories are added to me as I live. And likewise we could imagine an immortality where all memory of this life is lost and you continue to live but start over as a new person, it's still you, you just don't remember your parents, first crush, or that embarassing thing we won't talk about.

To my mind you are still you. You are still living. but in some ways this is unsatisfying as a immortality. It's true that it's a chance to live again, but it's even less than mythical reincarnation, where you supposedly can access memories of past life.

But there are other concepts of what it means to be alive and consciousness. some that I can imagine as possible alternatives. I never much cared for the idea that only humans have consciousness and experience a sense of self as living. Nor does it really make a lot of sense to me to talk about a non-material soul, because in a lot of ways that just moves the question without answering it. making it one of what is a soul and where is it, how is it constructed and how does it exist independent from memory etc.

so if we are going to say that we will live forever starting in the 2030s-2040s as Kurzweil suggests, but it is just a recreation of us then do we actually live for ever?

And if we recalibrate the projections to be something more in tune with perpetuating the being that is experiencing things right now indefinitely, don't we have to start by admitting we haven't even begun to grasp what and where 'we' exist.

Are we emergent, are we the matter, the energy moving through the matter, the interaction between the two? are we the mathmatic seed of the quantum patterns in the thoughts we think? is the entire universe a field of consciouness with spots of greater density? can consciousnesses that have gone out be reassembled at a different time and place? is there a finite number of consciouneses that can be created and we do in fact exist more then once in the universe because our pattern is used more than once, we just don't know it because we don't have access to the data storage matter that is memory? Is there really just one pattern that lives in compartmentalized physical forms cut off from other physical forms like every cell in you body living seemingly distinct lives while being a part of you?

I just feel like we don't know enough about what we are, to even begin to speculate that we can preserve our unknown selves from death, whatever that is?

It's the copy problem - thinking that a copy of you is the same as you. But I and many other disagree - a copy of you isn't you.
If I die there's no bringing me back, no ever. You could make an exact duplicate that's such a perfect replica of me in every way that no one not even my own family could tell the difference - but I'd still be dead.
But there's a lot of people who believe this "copying" is their only way to live forever because...honestly I'm not sure why this is their chosen immortality above all others. Could never understand it.