Cirripedia

In response to:Seeds of (Mormon) Faith

2007-04-19T01:21:12+02:00

You should not talk to them, it only encourages them. They are clearly incapable of logical thought, and so should be locked up before they can buy guns.

I keep a black pudding in the fridge at all times, in case the Jehova's Witlesses turn up at the door. Waving the black pud will make them run away...

In response to:Introductions

2007-04-19T01:13:23+02:00

Yes, I see why you won't accept the idea of humans being 'in flux'. I don't know myself.

But in terms of the mind being seperate to the brain - in fact, if we were able to keep the brain functioning and intact, the 'mind' part of us - our consciousness for one - would almost definitely also be preserved. Certainly our ability to descern what is moral, and what isn't, would remain. Our emotions would remain. Our ability to put ourselves in another person's shoes would also remain. You get the idea.

But what does it mean to be 'conscious' in the first place? There's a lot of interesting research into how the 'mind' functions and what it means to be 'conscious' at the moment. I look forward to advances in our understanding that will clarify this for both of us.

In response to:Introductions

2007-04-19T01:03:14+02:00

Ah, the always fascinating concept of a transhuman stage thanks to technological evolution of the human mind...

As I have a somewhat strong fear of death, it's something I've strongly considered in the past, although more along the lines of a gradual replacement of my existing nervous system with artificial neurones, and an eventual download of my 'primary' consious, rather than a copy.
Still, there is still the same fear in my mind that you mention: How will I know that at the end of the process, what will result is not merely something that merely *thinks* like me, rather than being me?
Frankly, when faced with death I would always think the risk is justifiable, but I would always wonder, even afterwards whether I am still me.

Although I see your argument with us as humans being in flux, I can't personally accept it. I have often wondered if I am a constant thing, rather than a newly-spawned and short-lived consious which remembers all that has been done by the previous incarnations of my mind. But nevertheless, I do not believe that to be true, though I accept it as possible.
Simply put, my mind refuses to believe I'm not who I think I am. To deny that I am, and always have been a constant identity would be for my mind to deny the truth to its existence, in a way.
For this same reason, although I find concepts and ideas such as simulation theory interesting, I cannot believe them to be true, because my mind and I will not accept that we're real.

To respond to your comment on humans as machines, I must say that I agree in part, but disagree in terms of the mind.
Whether it's philisophical, or perhaps poetic to be doing so, I believe that there's more to the human mind, and sentience itself than the phisiological 'machinary'.
The simplest way to justify this would be by returning to death: After a mind dies, the actual 'nuts and bolts' - the brain - remains whole and in most cases in good shape, and yet even if you were to supply the dead brain with all the 'fuel' it would normally run on in life, there would be no way to resuscitate the mind; no way to bring back the consiousness.
And that leads me to believe that there's more there than meets the eye.

-Jt

In response to:Mormons

2007-04-15T07:41:54+02:00

God invented the mormons so there'd be somebody dedicated enough to create the most useful genealogy database the world has ever known. Unfortunately some escaped while he was looking the other way.

In response to:Mormons

2007-04-15T03:32:09+02:00

They've been trying to nail me for years--ask them why they don't allow blacks to be deacons in the church--the answer I got was a bit ambiguous: something like, "Well, God has many uses for people of other races..." just not deacons, it that it? :))

Good luck to you--wish I could be there to witness it.