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From: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: More Atheistic Wishful Thinking
Message-ID: <549@spar.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 29-Sep-85 12:04:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: spar.549
Posted: Sun Sep 29 12:04:58 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 2-Oct-85 21:04:44 EDT
References: <1522@umcp-cs.UUCP> <1668@pyuxd.UUCP>
Reply-To: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Organization: Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, CA
Lines: 163
Keywords: Satyagraha

>> >All of this indicates that the word "identity" is being used in at least
>> >two different ways here; one as a statement of likeness, and another as 
>> >a statement of "selfness".
>> 
>> No, what I am dealing with is the perception by the person of identity with
>> the earlier person, and the perception by those around them that this is
>> the same person.  What is this mystical concept of "selfness"?  Does it
>> maybe mean "having the same soul"? [Frank Adams]
>
>scenario presents problems for identity if duplicates are produced. I think
>it is garbage to try to say that the duplicates are indeed one and the same
>as the person that entered in the sense that they both have the same 
>"selfness" as the original person.
>
>The duplicates are "copies" of the original, but
>are not "the" original. [Padraig]

    What does it mean when we say two descriptors represent the "same" entity?
  
    As far as I can tell, any given descriptor implicitly carries with it
    a "universal set" in which it "exists", and the rules of that universe
    determine the equivalence relations used to decide identity.

    For example, are all instances of zero identical, or is each zero 
    different from the next? Usually, zero is a mathematical entity. In
    math numbers are entities that exist only as universals. So there
    is only one zero, mathematically, I suppose.

    Or is there? Is the notion of zero as the origin of the complex plane
    the "same" as the zero of integers? We CAN choose to call them the same
    IF WE PREFER, as an equivalence relation, by the natural mapping of the
    reals into the complex plane.

    Then there is computer science. Every zero in your computer's memory
    is in a different location. Are they the "same"? That depends on the
    context of the conversation. If, by the "same", we mean that, should
    a C program execute "if (a==b) they_are_the_same()", then yes. It is
    the context of the discourse that decides.

    Then there is the quasi-physical world. Is this zero -> 0 <- THAT ONE
    RIGHT THERE the "same" as the one I am looking at while I write this?
    And when your terminal scrolls it up one line, is it still the same?
    What if you reread this article? Do we decide that every time anyone
    reads this article on any DrivelNet site anywhere, that it is "same"?

    Also note that the each technical specialist will insist that their view
    is `deeper' than anybody else's. For example, who cares whether I wrote
    (i = 0; printf(i, "d")) or (printf ("0")), it's still the same zero on
    the screen to anybody who reads it. The guy who wrote "printf" might
    feel differently, though, and the hardware designers would likewise have
    their opinions, if any. Was it the "same" zero?  If each is different,
    was there a first ascii `0'? And are ascii `0's different from ebcdic or
    apl `0's?). It depends on your point of view.

    Songs and computer programs are much like that zero up there -- they
    only "exist" as copies -- unless we agree that there is something
    magical about their first instantiation. Do we? Was there a first
    instantiation of the Damned's "Feel Alright", from which all else were
    copies? Or are they all really copies of Iggy's "1970"? 

    Sameness here involves mental abstraction -- ie: what we mentally
    ignore, so that our focus cannot distinguish differences. So-called
    intelligence  tests are supposedly based on one's ability to ignore
    meaningless noise and thereby perceive deeper identity.
    
    What about electrons? They are (by theoretical dogma*) absolutely
    identical. If they weren't, the universe would break (*).  Does that
    mean they are the "same"? Still, we can trace individual electrons in
    physics laboratories. Most people would agree each electron is a
    different entity.  Or would they? When an electron meets with others
    about an atom's nucleus, it appears to lose its identity, merging back
    into communal electron-ness.  Subsequently we can pry an electron away
    from the atom. Is it the "same" one that earlier fused into the atom?

    Crazed metaphysicists see understandinging as simply forcing the truth of
    Mach's principle (a radical version of Occam's razor asserting that
    "Nature does not twice express itself"), which drove Einstein to general
    relativity, starting with the assumption that gravitional and inertial
    mass REALLY ARE the same. In this case, all isomorphisms somehow entail
    identity.

    Less immaterially, nearly everyone will agree that pieces of hard and
    relatively unchanging matter are the "same", like your zero key. Of
    course, between now (0) and now (0) I have slightly modified my zero key
    by adding michael oil and wearing a bit of the plastic off. But we are
    all convinced that the majority of its molecules are still the same, and
    it still functions with identically respect to my terminal regardless of
    such waer. Is that zero key still the "same" object?
    
    If I smash my head through my terminal's screen, will my zero key still
    be the "same"? After all, it will become relatively useless at that
    point (unless I have a detachable keyboard). Will it not be both the
    "same" (seen as a collection of matter) and not the same (seen as a
    functional relationship), depending on the sense of speech? If essence
    consists of formal relationships, then do not even untouched things
    change as the external world goes its way?
    
    What do we assume when we perceive sameness of internal structure? The
    intuitive sense of causation tells us that when two `identical' things
    of sufficent complexity occur, that something lurks behind the scene --
    that an earlier pattern `caused' (ie: was propagated thru spacetime) a
    forked identity. If we encountered frogs on Mars, we would surely
    assume that somebody brought them there from earth.

    Plop! In hops Igorina, the neighborhood frog -- is she the "same" as she
    was last night? After all, she has replaced many of her molecules since
    then. What about the creek which nurtured her? It changes its matter as
    the water flows. Here, we speak of confluences of causal chains as
    entities carrying identity regardless of the composing matter.

    Do we consider ourselves to be the "same" as we were moments or years
    ago? Well that depends -- we have obviously changed. Much flamage in the
    free will debate has come from this point. Am I == what I was (modulo
    (a)causal intervening modifications)?

>Destruction of the original by death does not make
>the copies, or any one of them the same as the original, except of course
>one claims that the soul exists and survives to be resurrected.[Padraig]

    As to resurrection of individual persons, we can only speculate (or
    offer subjective (and unverifiable) testimony).

    Recall that most mystical sources deny the material aspect of self,
    which is in accord with the notion of self, not as a heap of matter,
    perhaps closer to the formal relationships among one's parts. I suppose
    then that the `soul' here would be a repository for such information
    while dead.
    
    To the extent that causality is the only conceivable ordering mechanism
    for information (even with `noncausal' interactions, information cannot
    be transmitted except causally), it is scientically impossible to cause
    a person's identity between instantiations without saving an offline 
    backup somewhere, like in a `soul'. Of course, that presupposes a 
    causal mechanism for writing it to offline storage in the first place.
    Death, no doubt, is nature's final core dump...

    Somehow, all these causal concerns fail to capture the non-physicality
    of mysticism -- which is admittedly as close to religion as Vi Subversa
    is to the Iron Bitch. Clearly, if one identifies oneself with one's
    matter, rebirth is kaka. Information is one level up, but is that
    removed enough? If it is not transitted causally (physically), then we
    clearly must accept scientific heresies (like formative causation,
    or an omnipotent omniscient deity) for soulless re-instantiation.

    What characterizes cosmic notions, such as Gandhi's Satyagraha or
    the categorical imperative anyway? Surely not that you will CAUSE
    actions elsewhere to occur. All one CAUSES is one's own actions -- and 
    if, in that act, one resonates with higher patterns elsewhere, that
    knowledge is only seen from a loftier perspective.
  
    Anyway, this is only a problem if you believe that there is any absolute
    principle according to which things "really exist" in the first place. I
    do not see how such an absolute principle can be made meaningful except
    by faith. Agnostically, there cannot be any such thing.

        The propositions are elucidatory in this way: one who understands
	them finally will recognize them as senseless, when one has climbed
	out through them, on them, over them. One must so to speak throw
	away the ladder, after one has climbed up on it. 

	- Wittgenstein, "Tractatus Logico Philosophicus"

-michael