I'm an atheist, and believe that my mind can be seen as simply "software" running on my brain. However that "software" also believes that "I" is not just the software, but the brain and perhaps even the rest of the body.
If someone cloned my body atom for atom, "I" feel like it wouldn't really be me, just an illusion fooling outside observers. Same for mind uploads.
Do any other atheists feel the same way?
As to cryonics, that's obviously not quite the same a mind upload, but it feels like a greyish area, if the original cells are destroyed.
Another thing: if my world is just a simulation (even the NYT wrote about this theory), which I have no way of knowing, then cloning myself and killing the original is still suicide, with a very negative utility.
What do others think? I know that Kurzweil can't wait to upload his mind, and Goertzel wants multiple copies of himself to hedge his bets.
I'm an atheist, and believe that my mind can be seen as simply "software" running on my brain. However that "software" also believes that "I" is not just the software, but the brain and perhaps even the rest of the body.
And also, among other things, software outside your brain (including in other brains). My brain might be the main part of my identity, but not its only part: other parts of it are in the rest of my body, in other people's brain, in my wardrobe, in my laptop's hard disk, in Facebook's server, in my university...
When I've brought up cryonics on LessWrong [1][2], most commenters have said I'm being too pessimistic. When I brought it up yesterday at the Cambridge MA meetup, most people thought I was too optimistic. (I think it could work, but there are enough things that could go wrong that it's ~1000:1 against.) What makes the groups so different on this?
[1] Brain Preservation
[2] How Likely is Cryonics to Work