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After that the copies will be deluded into thinking they survived death while in fact they died.


Hah, maybe. And maybe we die every night when we go to sleep and are only deluding ourselves into thinking we're the same person who went to sleep. But ultimately "dead" is a matter for us living beings to define, the universe itself has no notion of elan vital that discriminates between the living and the dead.


A useful thought experiment is to consider a machine that first duplicates a person and then drops the original into a meat grinder.

The duplicate that steps out would be identical to the original and have no memory of having been ground.

Would you step into such a machine, safe in the knowledge that from the point of view of the universe and all other living beings, you would emerge unharmed?


Well, there'd be two consciousnesses produced both of which I'd think of as me, pre-duplication. And one would die in horrible pain. I'd really rather not die in horrible pain even if there was still a me around afterward, though you could probably offer a large enough inducement that I'd take it. Of course, there exist inducements that would get me to consent to the meat grinder without duplication


I’m curious what kind of inducements would get you to consent to the meat grinder without duplication?


You must not be very creative if you can't think of any. Off the top of my head:

1. Credible threat of ceaseless torture as an alternative.

2. Credible threat death to your offspring.

3. Credible threat of death and injury to many other people.

All of these are reasons people are frequently documented to willfully cause their own demise.


I’m sorry you misunderstood ;-)

I wasn’t looking for a generic list - I was curious about Symmetry’s examples for themselves.


AnIdiotOnTheNet basically got the things I was thinking of so well I didn't feel the need to reply.


Is it really ‘consent’ if you are being threatened with those kinds of things?


4. A reward in the afterlife.


Hugh Jackman does, in the film "The Prestige" - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0482571/ - with the inducement being "to perform the greatest magic trick" and one-up Christian Bale.


Netflix: "Living with yourself"


Your brain doesn’t shut down when you sleep. You just stop forming memories.




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