What do we mean when we say "me"? A thought experiment.

What does this have to do with the word ‘me’?

To give credit where it’s due, this thought experiment was proposed by Derek Parfit.

And why “me” rather than “I”? Because, of course, they do mean different hings.

Here is what I think about what “I” is, or to use a risky word, the soul.

I think the soul is an emergent property of the human brain. An emergent property is something that is “more than the sum of its parts.” For example, the stock market is emergent. It emerges from the collective activity of traders throughout the day. But it also feeds back on that activity—the traders react to the higher-level activity of the stock market.

Other emergent phenomena are termite mounds and flocking behavior. A city emerges from the behavior of the human society living in and around it.

So as it stands, I think your hypothetical question would be analogous to physically making copies of all the termites in a termite mound and transporting them somewhere else… without the termite mound. We’re talking about copying the “base” level of an emergent thing without the “top” level—termites but not the mound, or the brain without its consciousness. So I’m tempted to say that the soul, like the mound, stays in its original place. But only Willow in the highest heaven knows… or perhaps he does not.

@Blackberry: It has to do with what we mean when we are referring to ourselves. Would an exact replica of me really be me?

@Harp: Indeed it is, it totally mindfucked me so i was hoping it would entertain the fluther community aswell :)

@nisse Oh I see, after reading about Parfit and seeing where this whole conversation will lead, it’s not for me, sorry lol.

SO you’ve basically been cloned? Well which one is me? Earth or Mars? O.o
I’d rather be Earth please!!

I vaguely remember Parfit arguing that the erasure of either copy would be only a minor tragedy because much of our identlty lies in the representation of the person in the minds of others. In other words still according to Parfit, the fact that an identical “me” would be carrying on in “my” stead should make my demise almost inconsequential.

I’d sooner say that the whole scenario points more to the entirely provisional nature of self-hood.

There has to be another step in this game. If the disintegrater malfunctioned how did all of you get disintegrated enough to reform on earth? Can’t have it both ways, seems to me.

Here’s what I think in regards to the dual self concept.
The “I” would remain with one of them. Who knows which.

The Sutra of the Heart of the Great Practice of Zazen
[Interpretation from the Sanskrit by Michael Eido Luetchford]

Then the great bodhisattva Avalokitesvara said this to Sariputra:

“Sariputra, when a sincere man or woman from a good family starts
to practice Zazen, they will recognise that the five aspects used to
describe the psycho‐physical body have no separate existence of their
own.
Physical form is without its own separate existence. That which is
without its own separate existence is physical form.
There is no physical form other than the form which is without its
own separate existence, and there is no form that is without its own
separate existence other than physical form. Physical form and that
which is without its own separate existence are the same.
In the same way, the other four aspects are also without their own
separate existence.
In this way, Sariputra, all things in this world are without their own
separate existences; there are not things that arise into the world, and
then cease to exist, the classifications of pure or impure do not
describe them, and they are neither deficient nor replete; they are
“just as it is.”
At this very moment, Sariputra, it follows that in that which is
without separate existence there is neither form, nor feeling, nor
perception, nor human constructs, nor consciousness.

I would be tragically upset, because I would assume if they could screw up the transport they would CERTAINLY screw up the billing. And I don’t even know what the time zone is on Mars, let alone whether they have some “fourth world” billing support. This is going to take forever to straighten out.

@nisse Please source material that you are taking from someplace or someone else.

i would no longer be me the moment i’m first teleported. i would have died on earth as i was ripped apart at a molecular level.

the only way it would still be me, is if its the exact same atoms and molecules that get transported and then reassembled. using any molecules other than the original ones would simply result in a glorified clone.

@faye The scenario is that the state of every particle in your body is recorded, then your current body is utterly destroyed. Then the information about your partical states is communicated to Mars, where a new “you” is assembled having identical particle states. While the individual particles would not have been transferred, the end result would be the same since subatomic particles are presumed to be identical. So the destruction of the original is actually immaterial to the transfer.

@poisonedantidote Then that implies that there’s some “self-substance” that makes you “you”, since the particles in your body and their states are constantly changing from one millisecond to the next. But what would that self-substance be?

I say the original “me” would be dead, and there would be a copy of me on Mars who has my memories woud think he is me, but isn’t

@6rant6
Martian telephone support is a nightmare..
Don’t even get me started on Venusian telemarketers?

Doctor McCoy (from Star Trek) worried about this sort of thing all the time.

@Harp this is going to be hard to explain hehe…

i dont think there is any kind of soul or essence that makes me the one true me. however, i am the one true me.

lets imagine we are playing with lego, and i build a house. i use red pieces for the wall, green for the base and white for the roof, i put the pieces together in an exact pattern. and i make instructions for anyone that wants to copy me.

i then take my lego house apart, i gather up the pieces and i move to the next room, i then proceed to put the pieces back together in the exact same order making sure there is not a single difference. it is still the exact same original lego house. however, if i then take my house apart and send the instructions to a friend, and he makes one just like it. he uses the exact same shape pieces in the exact same order and makes a house that when compared to my original one is absolutely identical. however, it is not the same lego house. it is a copy, an imitation.

so, do lego houses have a soul? or some kind of self-substance that makes them the one true lego house? no.

i believe the same applies for humans. we have no soul or special essence that makes us true. i am simply ’‘me’’ the one true original me because i came first and am the only one with this exact physical configuration made by these exact pieces.

even my thoughts and memories have a physical manifestation, brain mass, electrical impulses and pathways and what not.

so, i am not saying the teleported me would show any difference to me, or that its life would be worth any less than mine or that it would not serve the same purposes as me. none the less, it seems an inescapable conclusion to me, that the copy is still just a copy and not me.

i believe the earth is round… and my clone would also think the earth is round, but would he think the earth is round because he has the exact same original memory? or would he think the earth is round because he has a copy of my original memory. – do you think the earth is round? and if so, does that mean part of me is you? or is it that you have a copy of other version of my memory?

if i agree with you, if i believe everything you believe, if i share every idea you have ever had, and i have surgery to look just like you. am i you?

so in closing, there is no soul, no magic essence that makes me “me”, the only thing that determines i am me is the notion of originality.

EDIT:

i present to you triggers broom

Do you think you are you? If so, nothing said would change that.

Oh, and of course I’d be upset at having irreversible cancer, I’m going to die.

As I understand the question, this is about what shapes our sense of identity – as if that has some value beyond idle curiosity.

What we think we are isn’t much of a criterion for understanding anything. For example, some people who lose body parts think of themselves as useless bags of mostly water, while other people pick up (so to speak) and move on. Some people would say that coma patients should be turned off, but family members and BELIEVERS often want to keep them going. Does it mean anything that an individual has an opinion? Pfft.

So the fact that I evaluate myself in terms of the reflection in other people’s eyes really doesn’t carry much weight in the universe. And what about the 1 billion bacteria that occupy and ride on the object I call, “Me”? Why not ask them how they feel about being duplicated? I’m sure their actions would indicate an interest in staying alive.

i’d be rather miffed

@poisonedantidote Well, think of it this way: imagine that over the course of a few hours, every single subatomic particle in your body were to be systematically replaced, one by one. At what point would you cease to be you and become instead a reconstructed copy?

This reminds me of the movie The Prestige… if any of you saw it

I always seem to find myself wondering why I looked out of my own eyes… why am I me and not the person next to me? I’ll feel weird in my skin sometimes when I think to hard about it, because I don’t have an answer…
But when I was younger, I was sure that if I only thought hard enough, I’d be able to see out of someone else’s eyes, because back then I thought, “well, why couldn’t I?” I thought I was just in this body, but this body wasn’t me.
Now I’m not so sure… maybe because when I was younger I never succeeded at thinking hard enough, hehe ; ) I want to say that, if there’s a copy of me somewhere else, that it’s just a copy, much like everyone else here. But then, what I’m really saying is that I’m just a machine, in a way, right? If I can copy myself, and put the copy in my life and have no one know the difference… then I’m just a result of the DNA of this body and the memories this body has stored, as the DNA instructed it to. So then, my body is all I am, and I have no real control over what it does. And if that’s true, if my body is me, then I’m nothing but these exact molecules put together in this exact way…
Which brings me back to that question that haunts me. Why? Why am I here? Why do I feel… why do I have consciousness? The question you’re asking, @nisse. Why do these molecules make me me? Can it really just be those exact molecules, or could it be what they hold, how they’re put together?
Neither makes sense to me.
Because if it is the first one, if I needed all these exact molecules put in this exact way to make me, then I’ve won the lottery a thousand times over…
If it’s just the information they contain, then even though it would be easier for me to exist, if there was a copy of me, I’d have two consciouses. That makes my brain hurt worse to think about.
But now that I am thinking about it, I just realized: the copy wouldn’t be exactly me, would it? There’d be a difference between the ways we were created—a computer compiled her molecules together, compiled a bunch of random molecules from the air. And I was created from 2 cells that combined and then divided trillions of times…
Which means I’m not actually a bunch of molecules stuck together, I’m just the molecules those two cells built me with… I’m the result copies of two cells repeated and mutated into different forms, and working in synchrony with each other.
But does that make a difference? So then am I just those two cells? Or am I the random result of the creature they happened to create?
Hm… I’m just rambling, and I’m less and less clear of what I think the more I think about it…
[edit: But I’m not the same cells I was, even… they divide and use the food I eat to rebuild themselves… but I’m still me. So it has to be something they contain, not them themselves, right? Which makes me think, if they can make copies of themselves and preserve the me they create, maybe a copy is possible, although that’s a frightening thought…]

@Harp well, it depends if its some natural thing or not. if its just like cell replacement then its always me because i was triggering the change. but if the change is because of an outside influence. i would say once you go past replacing 50% or more of the matter that makes up my thoughts and memories. maybe even less than 50%.

@poisonedantidote Suppose it happened without your knowledge, say while you’re sleeping (and yes, by some artificial process). Does this mean that at some precise point in the middle of the night, you would die? Or do you think that you would wake up in the morning and never know the difference?

I think of it like this. The observer I call “self” or “me” is the energy that causes my nervous system to move and perceive. For example, if someone has their hand amputated, they can still feel the energy of their hand, as in Phantom Limb pain. The same (I believe) would be with the entire body. (i.e.death). The same energy awareness is present, but with the possibility to move through different dimensions of space/time, since the fragile vessel of the body is not present to restrict it.

To answer the question directly, if the molecules were copied (into an identical body), then that would not be me, because I am the energy inside the vessel, not the vessel itself. Would I be upset if the malfunctioning teleporter gave me cancer? No, because before choosing to teleport, I would weigh the possible side effects of having my molecular structure be altered in any way, and one of those side effects could certainly be cancer. I knew the risks and decided to take action regardless, so I would not be upset.

I really enjoy contemplating quantum mechanics!! :-)

The interesting point in this thought experiment is, would it work at all. Are we in fact nothing more than the sum total of our atoms properly interconnected? On a previous discussion about overcoming the fear of death, we got into how both machines and living organisms with many more neural connection than human brains posses are still not self aware. Our self awareness is in fact, what lets us see ourselves as Me, I, Myself.

Why are humans, of all life forms and machines, uniquely able to step outside their own programming, realize they are simply executing a program, and then rewrite that program as they see fit? I do not know the answer to that question, but I suspect that it points to something that transcends a mere collection of properly arranged atoms, and that the supposed transporter might just spit out a chunk of living but not sentient meat.

As fascinated as I am with the prospect of such a mode of travel, I would decline to be transported until I was satisfied the the existential issues of what constitutes the uniqueness of the individual had been ironed out to my satisfaction.

The word “individual” seems to imply that subdividing a person into the smallest of all fundamental parts is contrary to maintaining the integrity of the person as them know themselves. With the added dimension attributed to the “soul” which presumes to transcend our short tern storage within the vessel of the body during a single lifetime, I feel even less ready to be dematerialised by a device designed by a group of humans who lack verifiable answers to the questions at hand.

The nature of ‘self’ is a topic that’s central in Buddhism, so it’s been studied quite intently for 2500 years in that context. @Qingu comes closest, with the notion that the self is an emergent property… something that depends on a collection of other aspects of what it means to be human.

The way to get at this question is to deconstruct all of the fixed concepts about it: if you disassemble the notion that there’s a fixed and immutable “me”... an essence or soul that transcends the body, that pushes one to the conclusion that there is no self at all—which is what many people believe the Buddha taught. But that isn’t correct: it’s not true that there is no self at all, because it is obviously a meaningful common-sense concept that is essential to everyday life. In addition, our beliefs about our self-definition are central to our psychology, which governs a lot about our lives.

So it’s not true that there’s no self, and it’s not true that there’s a fixed and immutable / transcendent self. While Buddhism emphasizes relating to the matter at a level beyond concepts, it’s still true that concepts are useful. So what’s a helpful concept to give the self some shape? I think the best idea of self is that it is a “set of possibilities for being”. There’s a certain range of possibilities for what you can be, you don’t have a fixed form or limitation. But that doesn’t mean you can be anything: you can’t be a ball-point pen! So if you are a range of possibilities, you’re mutable… there’s freedom. Not unlimited freedom, but still an awful lot of freedom.

A human being is free to be within that range. One has choices. I envision this like an array of tunnels: I can be this way, or that way, or one of a thousand others. Once you start down a tunnel, the mind begins to focus and block out the other possibilities, and indeed the human condition is mostly characterized by forgetting that one is free… forgetting that there are other tunnels.

“Awakening” is rediscovering the entry to all the tunnels: coming to know yourself again as this range of possibilities, instead of being stuck with just one. To recover your true self is to recover the power of returning to the entrance of the tunnels so you can choose a different one. Or the same one. At will. That’s freedom, that’s being.

If I can be a shit-stick , a ball-point pen shouldn’t pose too much of a problem.

The lamp doesn’t turn on if only one hand claps.

@Harp no doubt ’‘it’’ would wake up and not tell the difference. and thus would continue to argue that he is the true original me, but would not be.

would i be dead, yes and no. from my point of view i would be, from your point of view i would not, and from ’‘its’’ point of view i would not.

@everyone Lots of great answers, thank you very much.
@ETpro That’s the discussion that reminded me of this thought experiment. :)
@poisonedantidote I think i agree with you.

The problem i can’t rationally solve is why i’d be upset. If there was an exact replica of me why would it matter that i was dying. If i don’t belive in dualism, an exact reassembling on the molecular level should be sufficient to be “me”. I still agree with you that the original “me” probably got destroyed in the first teleportation, and for him it probably hurt being desintegrated.

Maybe the problem is the quick replacement of all the molecules, as @DancingMind says, our cells are being replaced on a day to day basis, yet we still wake up every morning and consider ourselves to be ourselves. Maybe we are not the same person as when we went to bed, but we are destroyed and another me is recreated every second of our lives (like in the teleporter).

Being upset, or refusing to travel on the teleporter out of fear of being destroyed, rhymes poorly with not believing in dualism in my mind, after all, a perfect copy of me would from a non-dualist standpoint actually be me.

I hereby nominate “not believing in dualism in my mind” as the most ironic statement of this whole ironic thread.

@HasntBeen I think those “clap” lamps are just the worst idea ever. Clap with two hands and the light goes out. Clap with one hand and the damned thing disappears. What do you do with a lamp like that?

@HasntBeen
But that isn’t correct: it’s not true that there is no self at all, because it is obviously a meaningful common-sense concept that is essential to everyday life.
And apart from concept has no existence hence the words of Buddha
“The only foundation of the self is the self”
Show me this self apart from you.

@SeventhSense : the Buddha did not deny the existence or meaning of the word, he denied the existence of a “persistent and fixed essence”. This is a subtle point lost even on many advanced students of the Dharma. There’s no “ghost in the machine”, there’s no soul, there’s no transcendent essence or being or “thing” to which all the attributes of a human are attached. That was the Buddha’s critical insight.

But if you get carried away and start thinking that “self” is a meaningless word, you get into all sorts of tangled nonsense, like being unable to say “I went to the store” without calling yourself a liar. Really, beginners at Buddhism do indeed get into some very strange mental tangles trying to sort this out, trying to suppress all thoughts about themselves, etc. It’s silly: of course you exist in a conventional sense, what we’re talking about is seeing that there is no absolute basis, no foundation for personal existence. Your existence is conditional: it depends on all of those aggregates that make up a human being.

As the Heart Sutra points out, your existence is “empty” of separate essence. When you go digging for its basis, you don’t find it. But as an emergent property, no problem. The self exists in the same mode that New Jersey or Barney the Dinosaur exist.

@HasntBeen
Of course we use a self reference point to converse, but the foundation of the conversation has to do with not only a self but a self that can have self existing reference points on two planets. This is not a defining self necessary for the expediency of conversation.

The example implied by the question is a self that
does have a transcendent essence which of course is not possible. Can a thing which has no transcendent essence carry on a conversation with itself? The self is a concept of the discursive/discriminating mind and hinges upon the concept of other than self. The transposed would no longer would be self in this communication. Any conversation would be a discussion with other than self which could not possibly be ascribed as self, materialists notwithstanding. Each would probably view themselves as self to the other.

.

@poisonedantidote
Funny video.
Long time for that punch line. :)

I agree with your clarifying comment: the self is a concept which is defined by opposition to “everything not the self”, and there’s no transcendent essence. Don’t get me wrong, that’s an Earth-shattering realization for a human being when it strikes clearly—to see that they’ve spent their life trying to preserve and promote something which is a “mere concept”.

However, I part ways with Buddhism—or at least with the modern interpretations that are popular—because Buddhists tend to take it too far and position themselves in opposition to the concept of self. Concepts are useful, that’s why we keep them around. The idea is not to throw them out, but to clarify their nature and understand their limitations. As long as we’re talking on that level, the question “what does the word me represent?” is a meaningful question that deserves a coherent and understandable answer.

My answer to the question (once we’ve dispensed with ‘there is no absolute self’) is that the best functional concept of “myself” is “a range of possibilities; the freedom to choose from these possibilities as a way to be an agent in the world”.

@HasntBeen
But how can there be an answer if the premise, “the self” has not been established?
And Buddhism or enlightenment does not stand in opposition to the self. There is no self nor non self. They are both conceptual.

This is the same type of thinking that would deem the koan of one hand clapping as a riddle to be figured out. It is not a riddle but a tool to dispense of the illusions of the discriminating mind as @Harp points out.

So yes we can create many possibilities but it’s all just mental masturbation. It’s like trying to scale a wall as we simultaneously add bricks to the same edifice.

Hmm… I’m not sure what you’re saying. If you’re saying the idea of self is useless, I think that’s clearly a difficult position to defend (if you don’t exist, who is arguing with me? :)

Buddhism provides methods for disrupting the complacent belief in self as an absolute entity. That’s a good thing, I think we agree. But someday you have to look beyond that very important step and ask “ok, but we live and function in a sea of concepts, which are the tools for living as a practical matter. Given that fact, what should “me” refer to that doesn’t get us into trouble, but still gives the word some useful value?”

It almost sounds like you’re arguing that, just because there’s no absolute basis for something, we should dispense with the whole business of having definitions for words. Nothing has an absolute self-defined existence, it’s all a bunch of concepts. We’re agreed about that. So what? We still need concepts to function in life, and as long as we’re relating to them as useful rather than absolutely true, there’s no trap.

‹(•¿•)›

Winner “Best use of ASCII Art by a Non-Corporate Entity”.

OK, end of problem. I went to Mars and shot the fucker. Can we just have a beer now?

Damn, why’d you have to do that? Now they’re going to send more Dennis Rodman types and ray guns.

@Harp : long after the buzzer sounded, I got the lamp joke. While I reconstruct my wounded pride, I’m going to whistle a lilting medley of Air Supply hits as an homage to your deep and subtle wit. Just sit back and enjoy…

“I’m all out of love…”

I hereby proclaim permission to proceed with the consumation of alcoholic beverages. It’s friday after all.

Some of us don’t have that luxury.
there isn’t enough beer on Earth and Mars unfortunately

When Copernicus gave us heliocentrism, we kept right on saying “the sun rises” and “the sun sets” just like before, even though we know that this is an imperfect description of reality. These sayings endured because for most purposes, it simply doesn’t matter which way you look at it. They’re both just conceptualizations of a single reality. One conceptualization is more precise than the other, but it’s also more cumbersome and so not as suited to off-handed use. So we’ve ended up with an expedient model, and a technically precise model, but neither is the experience itself. Quite apart from either point of view—transcending them—is the blaze of the midday sun.

When Buddha gave us annata, “no-self”, we kept right on saying “I” and “me,” and taking names and owning property even though we know that in this emptiness there is no form, feeling, perception, volition, or consciousness, no sense gates, no objects of sensation or act of sensing, etc., etc. But both “self” and “no-self” are models of the same reality. “Self” doesn’t refer to one thing and “no-self” to another. One is practical and expedient, the other impractical and unwieldy, though more orthodox. But again, neither is the experience itself. Quite apart from either point of view—transcending them—is…well, I won’t say.

@Harp
Ok but until the time when we can say beam me up Scotty this question remains purely a philosophical one.

@SeventhSense Yep. BRB, I’m off to shoot Derek Parfit

As usual, Harp makes difficult things clear!

The initial question was posed as “would you be upset”. I thin the answer lies not in philiosophical discussion, but in the realization that we are in part, still animals. Any animal – well let’s say any primate – would be upset at any situation which threatened “death”. The animal part of OUR brains doesn’t get the story that we are the an assembalge of concepts.. yada, yada, yada.

We don’t wanna die!

@HasntBeen
You helped too. But it really doesn’t matter anyway. There’s only ONE of us

We mean that someone wishes to find out a particular thing, but is either too lazy or unable because there is not a solid enough basis to perform the experiment using conventional scientific method