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gjm comments on Open thread, Oct. 19 - Oct. 25, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Well, that's just sad. But I suppose you should believe that you witnessed a relatively normal course of decline. In more unlikely threads there possibly were quick and painless deaths, continuing declining, and also miraculous recoveries.
I guess the interesting question your example raises, in this context, is this: is there a way to draw a line from your grandfather in a mentally declined state to a state of having miraculously recovered, or is there a fuzzy border somewhere that can only be crossed once?
It seems to me that a disease that inflicts gross damage to substantial volumes of brain pretty much destroys the relevant information, in which case there probably isn't much more line from "mentally declined grandfather" to "miraculously restored grandfather" than from "mentally declined grandfather" to "grandfather miraculously restored to someone else's state of normal mental functioning" (complete with wrong memories, different personality, etc.).