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[MorleyDev]

Your step-dad got red in the face over "Suppose that truth is a woman"? :S That seems an odd thing to get worked up about xD

As for the whole "brain thing", well life is a straight line of experiences. We experience and define ourselves by that experience, one could easily assert every second we *are* a different person than that who was before us in that previous second. Ever heard the old story about a man who lost his ability to store memories, and just kept writing "I am born!" in a journal over and over again? When you get down to the concept of self, is it not possible the only difference between us and that man is we have our memories? That we are born, but don't know it? ^^

[Sergius]

If you straight up replace your brain with another copy, made of different materials (silicon instead of carbon, machine instead of organic), even if it had the exact same data, it obviously wouldn't be you.

To who would it obviously not be you? If it were such an exact copy then people would only know if told, though, perhaps the scars would give it away?

If someone made an exact copy of you down to your memories, would your point of view shift to that of that copy? Will you start living his new experiences even as the both of you become separated? From his point of view, he either just woke up or he thinks he's been you the whole time and he just moved slightly away from where he was, but he would believe he was you. You, of course, would also believe that you are you. Still, you got two different people from that point forward, and from a continuity standpoint, only one of you has been existing and one has false memories (if only from a record keeping viewpoint).

However, if you ceased to exist at that same moment, could you say that it doesn't matter to you, because you still live in the form of a copy? I'm sure the copy is perfectly happy thinking that, but for you, the recording VCR that is life just suddenly hit STOP.

So there is merit to the OP. What if the change is gradual? First, parts of your brain could be replaced (maybe some of the empty memory space that hasn't been filled yet, although likely there is no such thing). Even if that caused you amnesia, would you still be you? Are people who suffer brain damage and are so changed still themselves? What if the amnesia parts were quickly replaced by something artificial so that, outwardly, no change occurred in your personality?

Once that synthetic part of your brain is implanted, and assuming it is as capable of the organic one to learn and experience more (could have increased Ability Scores or something, longer life without failure, etc), at some point you replace the remaining organic part with a synthetic part... what then? Is there something inherent to the organic part that "sparks" life? Since we're assuming we managed to duplicate it for discussion purposes... well, the answer in this hypothetical scenario would be no.

But anyway, this whole "losing half of your brain" is a bit extreme, and it could be argued that people that have that happen to them don't remain the same person. What if it was done in 5% increments, small enough not to notice? A bit of memory gone here, nicely backed up tho, then some motion control replaced, until it's fully synthetic, and as the OP asks, you're awake the whole time? Maybe super magic Star Trek nanites could do this without compromising the whole system.

I guess the point of this is, is this transition any different than just removing you and switching you with a duplicate?

[Earthquake Damage]

I guess the point of this is, is this transition any different than just removing you and switching you with a duplicate?

There's a difference in continuity.  The gradual change is like changing a boat one board at a time.  We generally say it's the same boat the whole time.  We generally don't consider an exact replica, built from scratch, to be the same boat, regardless of what happens to the original.  Well, you might say "same boat" to mean "same model of boat", but few people would agree that it's the same instance of the same model of boat.

But that's just perception.  Is there a qualitative difference?  Probably not.  The major unknown here is "the soul", which is either beyond the scope of science entirely (i.e. strictly untestable) or beyond the scope of current science (i.e. we lack the technology).  There's little point in idle speculation because we don't and, for now, can't know.

[Bauglir]

As near as I can tell, my consciousness is a pattern, not the meat in my skull or the electricity that fires along it. It's the system that arises from those things, sure, but it isn't them. That said, a perfect copy of a system isn't the same system, even if you create one. It'll quickly deviate, and even if it didn't, all it would mean is that neither copy could be certain which was the original (unless the method of copying made it clear and could be recalled by both).

[Glowcat]

As near as I can tell, my consciousness is a pattern, not the meat in my skull or the electricity that fires along it. It's the system that arises from those things, sure, but it isn't them. That said, a perfect copy of a system isn't the same system, even if you create one. It'll quickly deviate, and even if it didn't, all it would mean is that neither copy could be certain which was the original (unless the method of copying made it clear and could be recalled by both).

Both systems constantly deviate from the original at the point when a copy is made. The only difference between the original and the copy is that one is a long-term messy project similar to evolution whereas the other appears wholesale. Neither of the instantiations are less "You" than the other and both will slowly transform on their own. Our consciousness is constantly dying and being reborn in ways that escape our notice, and difference between instances is superficial because the moment a copy is made two of "You" are being created while the original dies.

[Philosoraptor]

Why are you comparing replacing someone's brain with the rebuilding of a boat one board at a time? The concept is entirely different. The boat doesn't have sentience or the ability to make choices. On the other hand, our choices define who we are, so if our minds we to be replaced in small increments, would these replacements be able to make the same decisions the original could?

There is a certain amount of randomness involved in such a process, but the main issue is this: would the decisions of the past affect the new replacements? Would the new brain be capable of using experience gather from past choices and make new ones based on emotion instead of logic, as humans so often do? Or would we be, in essence, computerizing ourselves to make every decisions based on cold, hard logic?

[Earthquake Damage]

Why are you comparing replacing someone's brain with the rebuilding of a boat one board at a time?

I was thinking along the lines of gradually replacing the brain via magic fairy dust science nanomachines.  In a very real sense, you are your brain.  Scooping out your gray matter then replacing it with a new brain isn't much different than killing you and replacing your body (brain included) with a new one.

I also assume a strictly identical copy.

[SalmonGod]

Discussed this question at length in a Metaphysics class many years ago.

This is one of those questions with no conclusive answer due to lack of information and the subjective nature of the definition of identity, but here's my personal take on it.

I think the term "stream of consciousness" points to an intuitive understanding of our own nature.  We are constantly changing, but those changes happen in the midst of a continuity of experience.  A river may flow through many environments and undergo many changes, but it remains the same river throughout as long as it is unbroken.

I believe I could be alright with transferring whatever constitutes my consciousness into another container so long as the continuity of experience was unbroken in the process.  The crunchy details of how such a process could occur are completely unknown to me.

If there was a stop, jump, or hiccup somewhere along the way in this continuity, I would consider there to be some transformation of identity beyond that which normally occurs.  For example, if I was destroyed in one place and rebuild in another, no matter how instantaneous or perfect that process was made, I wouldn't consider the rebuilt version to be me.  Also, if at any point in a transfer process from one shell to another both shells contained enough of my consciousness to independently observe and identify one another as separate things, there would be a transformation of identity at that point which I couldn't accept. 

When I was first confronted with this question, I imagined two identical bodies laying next to each other, one uninhabited by a consciousness and the other fully inhabited.  A process began where consciousness was downloaded from one to the other.  I imagined somewhere around the halfway mark, one body would cry out "Stop!  You're killing me!"  while the other would respond "No! No! Don't stop!"  At this point, I just couldn't imagine the second body to be the same person as the first, even after the transfer was complete.

Of course, these are just my purely emotional reactions to the question.  Definition of identity being subjective, a neutral observer could witness a transfer of my consciousness from one shell to another and declare the new one to be the same person, and I'm not sure I could say they're wrong.

Also, yes, brain damage and psychiatric medicine are horrifying to me on a fundamental, existentialist level.  I cannot wrap my mind around them.  When my brother was on medications prescribed for his autism and related issues, he was quite plainly not the same person (barely human, even) and he felt just the same way about it... and eventually refused to be medicated.  On the other hand, I've known people with problems who felt more "like themselves" after being prescribed medication.  What's the fundamental difference?  I haven't a clue.

Also, I highly recommend the song Intrinsic by After Forever if you want a soundtrack to your navel gazing.  I would provide a link, but I'm at work.

[Bauglir]

As near as I can tell, my consciousness is a pattern, not the meat in my skull or the electricity that fires along it. It's the system that arises from those things, sure, but it isn't them. That said, a perfect copy of a system isn't the same system, even if you create one. It'll quickly deviate, and even if it didn't, all it would mean is that neither copy could be certain which was the original (unless the method of copying made it clear and could be recalled by both).

Both systems constantly deviate from the original at the point when a copy is made. The only difference between the original and the copy is that one is a long-term messy project similar to evolution whereas the other appears wholesale. Neither of the instantiations are less "You" than the other and both will slowly transform on their own. Our consciousness is constantly dying and being reborn in ways that escape our notice, and difference between instances is superficial because the moment a copy is made two of "You" are being created while the original dies.

Depends on what you mean by "you". Each will experience events independently; there wouldn't be some sort of metaconsciousness shared between them. They will both be "you"s, but they will be separate "you"s, is my point. Original vs copy is theoretically valid because you can trace the material that makes up the patterns, but it matters as much as the difference between the original manuscript for a novel and a printed copy does for the information it contains. At any rate, while I'm aware that the pattern that defines my mind is constantly changing, the part of it that it can observe remains consistently recognizable as itself. There's continuity there, even if it's not identical.

A method that would make it clear would be if somebody walked into a blue booth and a duplicate was created in a red booth (who would, naturally, be evil, if the laws of color coding in fiction are to be obeyed, but let us ignore that for now), although since that would necessitate a difference between the two systems, it's an inherent contradiction so I suppose it doesn't really matter. Anyway.

I guess all I was saying is that arguing that your brain changes all the time (and is made up of entirely different molecules eventually) misses the point, since the actual physical object isn't relevant so much as the pattern it forms.

[Glowcat]

Depends on what you mean by "you". Each will experience events independently; there wouldn't be some sort of metaconsciousness shared between them. They will both be "you"s, but they will be separate "you"s, is my point. Original vs copy is theoretically valid because you can trace the material that makes up the patterns, but it matters as much as the difference between the original manuscript for a novel and a printed copy does for the information it contains. At any rate, while I'm aware that the pattern that defines my mind is constantly changing, the part of it that it can observe remains consistently recognizable as itself. There's continuity there, even if it's not identical.

...

I guess all I was saying is that arguing that your brain changes all the time (and is made up of entirely different molecules eventually) misses the point, since the actual physical object isn't relevant so much as the pattern it forms.

As I said, continuity as is being presented is effectively an illusion as both new instances in this hypothetical are being created instantly. That one instance was created from a template where most of the components were already in place isn't what I would call a real difference from another instance created entirely in one moment if the information contained in each were identical. Personally I could never consider one version more real than the other, but rather would have to consider each a new sub-identity branch from the original. A single continuous identity would only be possible so long as the chain only fathered one result, and that identity would be dead once the entire chain could no longer grow.

When I referred to "You" I was referring to a point in the identity chain right before the proposed divergence, a point that would describe the entirety of a person at a particular moment. Obviously we never remain at one point for the duration of our lives, and in certain cases such as brain damage who we are can change drastically from who we were in another recent point of our identity chain. Yet our intuitive understanding of identity still tries to see such drastically different beings as the same, despite rationally recognizing that one is not the other due to dissimilar properties. The same can be said for any object that has slowly been modified, such as the object of The Ship of Theseus problem given in this thread, and rationally we know that a boat with pieces replaced due to repairs has new properties depending on the replacement, and even without being replaced we know that the boat's properties change with wear on its components. I am rather certain that the system that makes up our consciousness is the same, with property changes that are simply too small to notice in a short timescale or are irrelevant to our lives.

If Identity can exist, it is only as an abstract and, like a biological species, it will always have to be a nebulous idea which doesn't quite wrap itself around the reality of our universe but is used for convenience of comparison. The truth is that we consider ourselves to be who we are now, not the us that might exist in the future. What makes us who we consider ourselves to be is the accumulated history and the complete system that is created from our memories and other physical components. A perfect duplicate would acquire the entirety of that, and therefore be a real continuation of the self.

Here is a counter-hypothetical to the original question:

If it were possible to externally observe the process where a person is duplicated, and during the process the "original" suffered a case of complete and permanent amnesia, which of the two would be more similar to the template which created both? The one whose properties as a person better matched the original, or the one whose structure shared the original's components?

I would always say the so-called duplicate is more of the same person than the one suffering from complete memory loss. The amnesiac's only ties to the original is the state of its physical form created through the original's history, something shared by the duplicate albeit simulated instantly instead the usual method.

[Bauglir]

I don't buy this "new instances being created with every passing instant" thing. I know it's a common part of many philosophies, but I don't see any reason it necessarily follows from time being quantized (which I seem to recall it being). I see a lot of concepts dismissed as "illusions" because the intuitive definition or properties of the concept don't actually make logical sense or square with what we observe, but that doesn't really make sense to me. Why does the fact that time have a framerate mean that there can be no continuity? I honestly don't understand where you went with the rest of your first paragraph, and I apologize for that. The words make sense individually, but I don't see any logical connection. Any way you could clarify it with different terminology? Assume I've never taken a philosophy course (I haven't).

In that second paragraph, though, I think I see the issue. Since my concept of the self has to include allowance for the fact that I am not an unchanging object in complete violation of entropy, obviously I can't define it as a particular state of the system at any given time. It's the system itself, not the exhaustive list of all properties of the system at any given point in time. It's the bus schedule, not the position and velocity of all buses at any given point in time. Defining it the way you seem to necessarily leads to your conclusion, true, but it seems a case almost of circular reasoning, "My self is the pattern of neural connections at any given time in my brain, therefore at each given moment my self is a different self."

Obviously identity IS an abstract concept. Systems are abstract. There's no reason to insist that a table is any different from the air surrounding it except that it varies in a few properties that we've decided allow it to constitute a system conceptually separate from the system of air, but that hardly means the abstraction is as pointless as is the implication from what you're saying (if only because I see the same language you're using in arguments that do conclude that, and I apologize if that's not the direction you're going). Saying that it's "only" an abstract is kind of silly when you realize how much of everything we conceive of is. A surprisingly large number of abstractions have objective reality.

When I say that a truly identical duplicate would not be "you", I mean only that your own consciousness would not perceive the duplicate as itself, but as another being. It would inherit all the properties that make you "you", but it would not be the same system. It would be a system whose starting state was in all ways identical to your system's state at the point in time it was created. If nothing else, you can be differentiated by having different spatial coordinates. That's all the difference it takes.

[Realmfighter]

Bauglir, If you woke up one Morning and found another you in the room, Which one of you is the original? You both Woke up at the Same time and you cannot remember where you went to sleep. There is no question that He is not you in the sense that you are separate from each other, but which one is the one that Isn't the first?

And another related question, if you came into begin this last second, everything you believing leading up to this Second being created with you, how would it matter?

[Earthquake Damage]

time being quantized

AFAIK time is not quantized.  I think a Planck time is the minimum theoretically measurable time period, but I don't think the theory implies time flows in discrete units.  To my knowledge, we have not confirmed that energy is universally quantized (in some contexts it is, e.g. bound electrons) and space is also questionable (Planck length is analogous to Planck time).  I'm pretty sure any two of those being strictly/universally quantized implies the other, but AFAIK none have been proven so.

I wonder how quantized space, time, and energy would affect relativity.

[Bauglir]

Bauglir, If you woke up one Morning and found another you in the room, Which one of you is the original? You both Woke up at the Same time and you cannot remember where you went to sleep. There is no question that He is not you in the sense that you are separate from each other, but which one is the one that Isn't the first?

And another related question, if you came into begin this last second, everything you believing leading up to this Second being created with you, how would it matter?

Given that information, I have no way of telling because, by definition, there's no discernible difference. That's why, in my original post, I made a specific disclaimer for a duplication that left an obvious way to tell. I mean, actually, I think that that's basically what I was trying to say. The correct answer is to say, "Ah, fuck it, let's get on with the shenanigans this event is clearly meant to enable."

Also, it wouldn't. I see no reason to believe that that's the case, though, and I have reason to believe it isn't (which is that I perceive it to be so), so that's the assumption I go with.

NINJA EDIT: Ah, okay, I'd actually heard that it had been but I'm no physicist. And it was a loooooong time ago; I may well have misheard a description of the Planck time. At any rate, that's the only justification I can imagine for "the universe is recreated at each instant", and I don't think it's even a particularly convincing one at that. Discarding it, I can think of no reason except "Wouldn't it be cool if..."

[Earthquake Damage]

NINJA EDIT: Ah, okay, I'd actually heard that it had been but I'm no physicist. And it was a loooooong time ago; I may well have misheard a description of the Planck time. At any rate, that's the only justification I can imagine for "the universe is recreated at each instant", and I don't think it's even a particularly convincing one at that. Discarding it, I can think of no reason except "Wouldn't it be cool if..."

Do be aware that I know just enough to be dangerous (read:  took Intro to Modern Physics + Quantum Mechanics, the latter of which I dropped after 4 weeks), but not enough to speak with authority.