No, I understand that, I'm saying that, while Copy B is not the same person as Copy A, he IS the same person as Copy A was before being copied, at least as much as Copy A is.
What would you do if you discovered you were Copy B in such an experiment? Because presumably he would do the same thing.
I don't contest your first paragraph.
Regarding your question: I don't know. Probably update my understanding of this subject.
They may not be you(now), but if you count yourself as the same person as you(earlier), then they have to be the same person as you(earlier) as well. I think.
A newly created copy or electronic upload of me (call him 'Copy B') would have all my behavioral attributes and memories. He could be called $myName by anyone else observing either of us (we could be indistinguishable to a third observer).
However, to me (the guy writing this response, call me 'Copy A'), there would be an obvious observable difference between Copy A and Copy B. I see the world from Copy A's point of view, with his eyes and ears and I would observe Copy B from the outside as I would any other person, without knowing what is going on in his mind or experiencing the world from his point of view. Yes, Copy B might say the same about Copy A, but it's my fear that Copy A would never find himself genuinely waking up inside a copying chamber or as an upload. If that's true, uploading myself would be the death of my subjective point of view.
I get where you're coming from. I don't necessarily have an epiphenomenal view of the mind, but I also believe that the concept of qualia is not well understood by anyone. I do not understand why I'm me and not someone else, and neither does our current knowledge on the subject.
Based on this I'm agnostic on whether mind uploading in the style we're discussing would really preserve me and my stream of qualia, or kill me and create another person with a new stream of qualia. Without any evidence that it would preserve me, I would not accept going through such a process.
There are possible scenarios in which the copying process could preserve what I consider to be me: For example, if there is only one observer at all, who experiences all qualia streams throughout the world (that possibility scares me, honestly). Another possibility might be that copying me would simply double my measure in the world, and what I consider my qualia stream would have twice as many experiences after the copying process. These are just speculation, though.
This has definitely been an interesting discussion for me. Examining my thoughts on this subject has raised more possible interpretations than settled anything, though!
But surely the copy is as much the same person as the "you" of five minutes ago as the original?
To you and everyone else, but not to me.
If someone I knew had their physical body destroyed but they were uploaded with complete accuracy, I would consider them to be the same person (consistent with psychological view) [...] I don't accept that my upload would really be me (more like physical view).
This is consistent how?
I can observe myself in a way I that can't others.
From my vantage point, a copy or upload of someone else behaves the same as the 'original'. From that same vantage point, a newly created copy of myself is clearly 'outside' my mind and therefore observationally different.
OK, now I'm confused.
You said in this case you'd be inclined to accept that either you were a copy, or someone was playing a trick on me to make you think so. Which makes sense.
Would your duplicate be equally inclined to do the same thing in the same case?
If so... then why would your duplicate claim to be the original?
If not... what accounts for the difference?
Yes, my duplicate would think the same way as me.
In a world that has duplicators, my duplicate would not claim to be original without evidence one way or the other.
In our real world, if a copy of me were made using "magic", both versions would believe themselves to be the original (at least at first). I had this kind of very specific scenario in mind when I said both would claim to be original, but did not explain this in the earlier comment (inferential distance and all that).
That's not 'other', that's the psychological view (assuming you would still say they're the same person if one was duplicated minus a left pinky).
I don't know: If someone I knew had their physical body destroyed but they were uploaded with complete accuracy, I would consider them to be the same person (consistent with psychological view). I would not opt for that procedure for myself, though, because I don't accept that my upload would really be me (more like physical view).
I'm open to evidence and argument on this, though.
I'm not sure what you mean by "the original" here.
Suppose the atom-for-atom duplicate were constructed (for sound technical reasons) inside a duplication chamber, and it came to awareness inside that chamber. Would it claim that it had somehow had been swapped into the chamber and the duplicate swapped out, without it noticing? Or would it acknowledge that it had been constructed in the duplication chamber, but claim to be the original nonetheless?
Whether the duplicate claimed to be the original or not depends on the individual, I suppose.
If I lived in a world that contained such duplication chambers, and found myself waking up in one, I would not know whether I was "the copy" or not without some outside evidence. I'd be inclined to accept that either I was a copy, or someone was playing a trick on me to make me think so.
I understand that the duplicate would have the same memories and personality as me, but would not have my subjective sense of experience.
Other: For everyone else that I observe, an exact atom-for-atom duplicate is the same person as the original. If a copy of me were made, my 'mind' would reside in the original.
I accept that my duplicate would claim to be the original, of course.
Other: Agree that it's a false dichotomy.
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I find myself able to agree with this in the case of rocks, but not in the case of apples. An apple doesn't require the eye of the beholder. There's no danger that a different observer, at a different scale, would claim that there are really two apples if you look close enough.
Apples do require categorization by an observer to some extent.
Is a nearly decayed apple still an apple? At what point does it stop being an apple? At what point does a fertilized apple blossom get to be called an apple?