Dar al-Hikma

[Angakuk]

Actually, we have team from a Bible camp coming in to do the program and they provide the curriculum. The problem is that I am still in charge of the whole thing as the site director. Me being in charge is, generally speaking, not a good thing.

[Angakuk]

Originally Posted by wstewart

Your sci-fi is non-functional, hence magical, hence superfluous.

davidm's evil doctor, your Old Paul/New Paul and your Nikos/Thanos scenarios are all hypotheticals. Why are you allowed your hypotheticals and davidm is not allowed his? After all, these are all thought experiments, are they not?

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by Angakuk

davidm's evil doctor, your Old Paul/New Paul and your Nikos/Thanos scenarios are all hypotheticals. Why are you allowed your hypotheticals and davidm is not allowed his? After all, these are all thought experiments, are they not?

Are you totally unaware of Peacegirl's tactics? One standard for wstewart's claims and another more restrictive one for everyone elses. Wstewart's claims are to be accepted without question, everyone elses are in doubt. It is an echo of the Russian 'Cold War' stance, "What is our's is our's, what's your's is negotiable". In that vein what wstewart claims must be accepted without question, and what anyone else states is wrong till proven right beyond any question of doubt.

In my opinion, a very narrow minded view.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by Angakuk

Actually, we have team from a Bible camp coming in to do the program and they provide the curriculum. The problem is that I am still in charge of the whole thing as the site director. Me being in charge is, generally speaking, not a good thing.

Don't worry, as a figurehead, if they are smart, they won't call on you for much more than the occasionaly invocation, and I'm sure you can handle that. All that needs is a bit of flowery fluff. The only way you could screw it up, is if you actually try to contribute.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

...my chief concern with the argument for existential passage is that the only grounds present for Paul for maintaining personal identity (or consciousness identity) across the time-gap are clearly absent for Nicos. If we only judge Paul to have survived the stroke as the numerically same person (perhaps wrongly given the breakdown in psychological continuity) due to his bodily continuity, then this seems perfectly sufficient grounds for denying continued personal identity (or consciousness identity) between Nicos and Thanos where such continuity is absent.

The essay does not posit persistence of a unique personal identity throughout the scenario of Old/New Paul, or throughout the scenario of Nicos and Thanos, so this particular concern doesn't actually apply to essay reasoning.

re: precedence of unfelt time-gaps over personal identity

Revisiting your question about precedence, I can say that although precedence of one personal identity criterion over the others is dependent on the aspect of personal identity at issue, there is a sense in which unfelt time-gaps take precedence over all personal identity criteria:

The two concepts are related: unfelt time-gaps map to personal identity mainly through the concepts' mutual dependence on subjectivity. We've seen that the unfelt time-gap, as a concept, is plausible. It corresponds with subjective/objective transitions, which delimit personal identity. And we've seen in the Old/New Paul scenario that the unfelt time-gap can remain plausible even with permanent loss of episodic memory and a lengthy disruption of physical continuity of the thalamocortical loops sustaining subjectivity, in coma. Together these stipulations constitute loss of the subjectivity, memory and continuity that provide the criteria of personal identity. In this way the unfelt time-gap could be said to take precedence over personal identity: it remains plausible even when no aspect of a persisting personal identity is possible.

For this reason it seems unlikely that one could say, "Old Paul's unfelt time-gap is impossible, or else incomprehensible, because personal identity [x]," where [x] is some aspect of a persisting personal identity. The passive function of the unfelt time-gap just does not require active maintenance of a personal identity criterion.

This much seems true of Old and New Paul - but of course the same functional conditions are found in the scenario of Nicos and Thanos. That scenario presents no difference that would obviously invalidate the precedence of unfelt time-gaps over personal identity. And given that Darwin's nature can be expected to produce the same result whenever the same functional conditions appear, what result should we expect in the scenario of Nicos and Thanos? A result differing from existential passage would call for its own explanation, and judging from previous debates that explanation would quite possibly require more metaphysical entities than are required by existential passage reasoning.

This is one way of stating the proponent view of existential passage as a parsimonious, default expectation. Hence the essay title, of course.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by Angakuk

davidm's evil doctor, your Old Paul/New Paul and your Nikos/Thanos scenarios are all hypotheticals. Why are you allowed your hypotheticals and davidm is not allowed his? After all, these are all thought experiments, are they not?

The more complete the descriptions in thought experiment, the more likely the derived inferences are to be correct. A magical element cannot be described because there's no true function to describe, and this spoils the thought experiment. Hence the need for natural scenarios, wherein every element of the scenario can be described with true function, as needed.

[Spacemonkey]

Are you under the impression that this addresses my objection? Because I can tell you right now that it doesn't.

I thought I'd made the objection pretty clear, but if you need me to go over it again I can do so.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by thedoc

Are you totally unaware of Peacegirl's tactics? One standard for wstewart's claims and another more restrictive one for everyone elses. Wstewart's claims are to be accepted without question, everyone elses are in doubt. It is an echo of the Russian 'Cold War' stance, "What is our's is our's, what's your's is negotiable". In that vein what wstewart claims must be accepted without question, and what anyone else states is wrong till proven right beyond any question of doubt.

In my opinion, a very narrow minded view.

It's a standard philosophical criticism of poorly conceived thought experiments, which plague personal identity philosophy.

Has anyone here studied personal identity philosophy, or cognitive science? I just want to gauge familiarity.

[mickthinks]

Originally Posted by davidm

Since there is no subjective or objective functional distinction between the two, EP must yield to the razor because it postulates a superfluous and wholly unverifiable or unfalsiable claim that adds nothing to our understanding of life and death.

EP is a postulate, David. It certainly seems unverifiable as yet, but I'm not sure that is the fatal scientific flaw you suggest. After all, the same "adds nothing to our understanding" objection might have been made in 1865 of Maxwell's electromagnetic wave postulate.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

Are you under the impression that this addresses my objection? Because I can tell you right now that it doesn't.

I thought I'd made the objection pretty clear, but if you need me to go over it again I can do so.

You stated your chief concern as the lack of grounds for "maintaining personal identity (or consciousness identity) across the time-gap". My post gave a reason for thinking that such maintenance across the time-gap (unfelt) is not required. If my post seems off the mark, just note the reason in your restatement.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by thedoc

the 'unfelt time-gap is an artificial construct, that only complicates a simple process of extinguishing a life.

Felt and unfelt time-gaps are just clinical observations and inferences from James' 'Principles of Psychology'. If you don't like the way I'm using his clinical terms, you're free to show us what's wrong with my usage. But "artificial construct"? Where do you get that notion?

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by Kael

I'll read through, but I'm already spotting some problems. First, none of the shortcomings of the few schools of ethics critiqued finds its simplest solution in existential passage - we can modify or replace reciprocism, for example, in ways that address the critique without positing this new (and still apparently superfluous) mechanism. Second, it seems to address potential problems of self-interest-oriented ethics by doing nothing more than expanding the 'self' part, an approach which always seems to leave a sour taste for me, but without any tangible incentive to do so, which strikes me as a poor approach with the self-interest crowd. At least with spiritualism you have some concrete connection, at least a claimed direct and experiential transfer bridging your current interests and those of your potential future self. Here, one is offered nothing more than is already present in ethical frameworks revolving around empathy, save the bald assertion that you will actually be one of the beings you might empathize with (but not in any way that might actually affect your consciousness), so it's actually self-interest, see?

So far, not much resonation, no.

OK. You asked.

re: "bald assertion". The essay inferences derive from reasoning and knowledge, so they shouldn't be characterized as bald assertions. You can challenge the reasoning, and I raise questions in essay myself, but "bald assertion"? No.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by mickthinks

EP is a postulate, David. It certainly seems unverifiable as yet, but I'm not sure that is the fatal scientific flaw you suggest. After all, the same "adds nothing to our understanding" objection might have been made in 1865 of Maxwell's electromagnetic wave postulate.

The subjective distinction is continuance, albeit without persistence of individuation.

And who expects scientific verification of his ontologic view, anyway? It's no more possible for davidm's view than for the essay view.

Plus davidm's view of unfelt time-gaps remains inconsistent, unlike the essay view. How could an inconsistent view be true?

[Kael]

Originally Posted by wstewart

re: "bald assertion". The essay inferences derive from reasoning and knowledge, so they shouldn't be characterized as bald assertions. You can challenge the reasoning, and I raise questions in essay myself, but "bald assertion"? No.

Fair enough, a bit of hyperbole on my part, I've a penchant for it.

[mickthinks]

Originally Posted by Kael

Fair enough, a bit of hyperbole on my part, I've a penchant for it.

lol You and the mob.

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by wstewart

You stated your chief concern as the lack of grounds for "maintaining personal identity (or consciousness identity) across the time-gap". My post gave a reason for thinking that such maintenance across the time-gap (unfelt) is not required. If my post seems off the mark, just note the reason in your restatement.

No, my objection wasn't just about personal identity. I don't think you've paid sufficient attention to the above part in parentheses. My chief objection was that the only grounds for maintaining any kind of connection at all between pre- and post-stroke Paul is that which is not available for the Nicos/Thanos case - namely a single spatio-temporally continuous body.

I further observed that you seemed to agree that there is a failure of personal identity, yet still think that something other than the person is continuing. What is it? I asked if you meant that the same consciousness or locus of subjectivity that was Paul continues as the new different Paul. This is why I asked about identity conditions for a continued consciousness rather than a continued person. All of this was explained in my earlier post, yet you haven't addressed any of it.

You speak of existential passage as a continuation. A continuation requires something at the start to be numerically identical with that at the end. Otherwise nothing has continued and there is no passage. Take apart a Lego model and build something else and the same bricks continue on as a different model. With personal identity, the person's qualitative properties change, but you have the numerically same person at the end that you started with.

But with your existential passage you agree that personal identity fails. So it can't be Paul that continues, for Paul is a name for the person who has now ceased to exist given the failure of personal identity. So what is it that you think is continuing on as new Paul? If not the person, then what? One option is to say that old Paul's body is continuing on as new Paul, but obviously this doesn't work for Nicos. Another option is the one I asked about - you could say that the former consciousness/subjectivity of Paul is continuing on as a new person. If this is what you mean, then you need to explain your identity criteria for a consciousness as distinct from a person (and you also need to justify making this distinction in the first place).

But if neither, then you need to explain what it is after the passage which is numerically identical with that before the passage. If nothing at all, then existential passage is quite literally meaningless, and you are abusing language to speak of any continuation or passage at all.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by mickthinks

EP is a postulate, David. It certainly seems unverifiable as yet, but I'm not sure that is the fatal scientific flaw you suggest. After all, the same "adds nothing to our understanding" objection might have been made in 1865 of Maxwell's electromagnetic wave postulate.

Wayne's postulate is entirely metaphysical, unlike Maxwell's equations. It can't be tested, verified or refuted in any way. By itself, that is not a fatal objection; lots of philosophical ideas are like that, although this is also one reason many sciency types, like naturalist atheist, object to philosophy.

That said, I'm simply pointing out that if you compare how the world looks to everyone involved under existential passage and standard physicalism, there is simply no difference, nor could there be a difference even in principle. Given that standard physicalism makes one less postulate, it wins the razor contest.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by wstewart

The subjective distinction is continuance, albeit without persistence of individuation.

Wayne, that simply is NOT a subjective distinction.

No one individual feels or experiences "continuance" under EP, is that not correct? In order to feel continuance, there would have to be the very persistence of individuation you deny, OR a dying person would somehow have to experience the sensation of transitioning into a new person, and the new person would have to maintain some residual memory of having been the old person. Now of course EP posits neither state of affairs.

Nicos qua Nicos permanently ceases to exist under your EP, and does not feel himself transitioning into Thanos. Thanos qua Thanos gradually builds up an awareness of the world, a subjective point of view, and has no memory of some prior point of view of a different individual. Right? So, subjectively, how does the respective situations of Nicos and Thanos differ from their situations under standard physicalism, which is that Nicos dies and Thanos is born? There is no subjective or objective difference, Wayne, and to say continuance is the subjective difference cannot be right, as I've just shown.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

But if neither, then you need to explain what it is after the passage which is numerically identical with that before the passage. If nothing at all, then existential passage is quite literally meaningless, and you are abusing language to speak of any continuation or passage at all.

This is exactly to the point. One could imagine the Ship of Theseus, and say that although all its parts have changed, it's the same ship because the same pattern supervenes on different parts. Alternatively, one could imagine dismantling the ship and using the parts to build a house; in this case continuance is the substance of the ship with a different pattern. In both cases something continues; something passes: either pattern or substance.

Neither substance nor pattern pass or continue between Nicos and Thanos. So what continues? To say, as Wayne has said, that personal subjectivity continues can't be right, since under EP Nicos and Thanos are two different individuals and cannot share personal subjectivity. Tom Clark calls it generic subjective continuity, which might make sense if one posited a meta-mind in which individual subjective awarenesses are like successive thoughts in a brain. But both Clark and Stewart disavow this notion. So what is left to pass between Nicos and Thanos?

Literally, nothing.

[davidm]

To be precise, what Wayne wrote is: "The existential passage is purely subjective."

But, I submit, this is just an arrangement of words with no reference to what anyone actually experiences. Wayne, under your own reasoning, Nicos, qua Nicos, does NOT subjectively experience passage to Thanos. And Thanos qua Thanos does NOT subjectively experience passage FROM Nicos. Your own mortal amnesia wipes out the subjective experience of any passage. This means that there is no subjective distinction between your EP and standard physicalism which just holds that Nicos dies and Thanos is born.

Now, as I've indicated earlier, it might be possible to understand your idea under some forms of a "world mind," or perhaps of dualism, or metaphysical idealism or metaphysical panpsychism. But you (and Clark) say you are thoroughgoing naturalists. So there is no recourse to any of the above, all of which you either explicitly or implicitly rule out; and of course there is no recourse to metaphysical supernaturalism. You yourself take pains to point out that mind is nothing special, with your discussion in one of your chapters about how the mind is entirely a corporal process.

But then I submit that under thoroughgoing naturalism in which all of the above options are dismissed, there are exactly TWO things that can, in any meaningful sense of the word, "pass": Either a fixed pattern supervening on a changing substance passes, or else a fixed substance passes that manifests itself in different patterns. Nothing else can possibly pass under materialism.

Since Nicos and Thanos share neither substance nor pattern, your passage is impossible under metaphysical naturalism.

[wstewart]

Originally Posted by davidm

Wayne's postulate is entirely metaphysical, unlike Maxwell's equations. It can't be tested, verified or refuted in any way. By itself, that is not a fatal objection; lots of philosophical ideas are like that, although this is also one reason many sciency types, like naturalist atheist, object to philosophy.

That said, I'm simply pointing out that if you compare how the world looks to everyone involved under existential passage and standard physicalism, there is simply no difference, nor could there be a difference even in principle. Given that standard physicalism makes one less postulate, it wins the razor contest.

Davidm's repeated appeal to "standard physicalism" is a fallacious appeal to authority. It's not the facts of physicalism that are at issue, but our understanding of the facts. Interpretation is unavoidable, and davidm is smuggling a metaphysical interpretation under his fallacious appeal. Rip the tarp off and that interpretation is exposed. His interpretation of the fact of subjective/objective transition remains inconsistent, and therefore logically cannot be true.

You'd think he'd do something about that, if he could. Maybe he can't. That would explain the easy exposure of this inconsistency.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by wstewart

The more complete the descriptions in thought experiment, the more likely the derived inferences are to be correct.
.

This is nonsense, A detailed description is just as likely to be wrong as a vague description is likely to be correct. I once worked with an engineer who thought that because he was paid more his ideas were more likely to be correct, most people in the office were laughing at his ineptness. You can have a detailed description of fiction as well as an incomplete description of the truth.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by wstewart

Davidm's repeated appeal to "standard physicalism" is a fallacious appeal to authority. It's not the facts of physicalism that are at issue, but our understanding of the facts. Interpretation is unavoidable, and davidm is smuggling a metaphysical interpretation under his fallacious appeal. Rip the tarp off and that interpretation is exposed. His interpretation of the fact of subjective/objective transition remains inconsistent, and therefore logically cannot be true.

You'd think he'd do something about that, if he could. Maybe he can't. That would explain why he's talked himself into this inconsistency, eight years on.

Wayne, you have not explained or identified anything I've said that is inconsistent. Please do so, if you expect a response.

I have not been talking about this subject for eight years, Wayne. Where do you get this stuff? I raised the subject some years ago in a thread at the Galilean Library, a thread that lasted for a week or two, and then discussed it with you at the Dawkins board, and that's it.

What inconsistency, Wayne? Please state it again, in thread, rather than with links.

You still are not answering either Spacemonkey or me. Wayne, what looks different, subjectively or objectively, to either Nicos or Thanos, under your EP, than under SP? Nothing, right? So why do we need to invoke EP when it means aboslutely nothing to the subjective experiences of either Nicos or Thanos? Nicos, qua Nicos, is well and truly gone forever, right, Wayne? So how could Nicos possibly know or care that he has somehow "passed" to Thanos? He can't, can he? So we are left with good old SP: Nicos died and later someone called Thanos was born, and there is no connection of pattern or substance betweeen them, full stop. Right, Wayne?

What is inconsistent or wrong in what I just said?

I look forward to your reply to Spacemonkey's lastest post.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by davidm

To be precise, what Wayne wrote is: "The existential passage is purely subjective."

Now, as I've indicated earlier, it might be possible to understand your idea under some forms of a "world mind," or perhaps of dualism, or metaphysical idealism or metaphysical panpsychism. But you (and Clark) say you are thoroughgoing naturalists. So there is no recourse to any of the above, all of which you either explicitly or implicitly rule out; and of course there is no recourse to metaphysical supernaturalism. You yourself take pains to point out that mind is nothing special, with your discussion in one of your chapters about how the mind is entirely a corporal process.

But then I submit that under thoroughgoing naturalism in which all of the above options are dismissed, there are exactly TWO things that can, in any meaningful sense of the word, "pass": Either a fixed pattern supervening on a changing substance passes, or else a fixed substance passes that manifests itself in different patterns. Nothing else can possibly pass under materialism.

Since Nicos and Thanos share neither substance nor pattern, your passage is impossible under metaphysical naturalism.

Not quite true, since they do share same DNA.

However this is not true of other passages that Stewart claims in exestential passage, and in the many other claimed cases there is nothing physical that passes and that only leaves a spiritual passage as a possibility. Eliminating the possibility of spiritual passage eliminates the possibility of any kind of passage at all. EP is a fictional construct that only complicates a simple cessation of life and adds nothing of value.

[mickthinks]

Originally Posted by wstewart

Interpretation is unavoidable, and davidm is smuggling a metaphysical interpretation under his fallacious appeal.

I agree.

His interpretation of the fact of subjective/objective transition remains inconsistent, and therefore logically cannot be true.

I disagree. I don't see any inconsistency, explicit or implied, in davidm's interpretation, but perhaps I am missing something. Where do you see inconsistency?