Quote:
Originally Posted by whswhs
But your use of "each mind" already begs the question: It equivocates between the qualitative identity of mind and the numerical identity of mind. Two minds can be qualitatively identical if they contain the same information at some point. But that's not sufficient for numerical identity. It is not clear that the mind in an organic body is or can be numerically identical to the digital ghost based on that mind residing in a cybershell or bioshell, given the specific technological assumptions of THS about the uploading process.
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That's what I meant with my post. Right now, none of these dilemmas are technologically possible since we cannot copy minds, or all the information of a particular mind, and so on. Confusion about identity exists mainly in philosophical theory, and not in practice. As a result, few people even
need a solid definition of "identity".
But once you get to TS-era technology, such definitions are suddenly urgently needed for legal as well as social reasons. And then it gets complicated - you specify "qualitative identity" and "numerical identity" and seem to have your own definitions for them, but no doubt other people will come up with their own terms and their own definitions for different types of identities.
In Transhuman Space, it has gone so far that different
societies have come up with their own terms and definitions - and laws.