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wolven7"The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens returned had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their place, insomuch that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question of things that grow; one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contending that it was not the same." - Plutarch (Vita Thesei, 22-23)
When we look toward the effects of the new (and old) technologies involved in the field of human/machine interface cybernetics, or the development of biomechanical replacements, many believe that we must ask ourselves: At what point do we stop being ourselves? The above quote fromm Plutarch shows that many have felt, and indeed many Still Feel that the replacing of the pieces of a thing, over time, constitutes the replacing of a thing. That, since what was originally there is there no longer, the thing is not there. But think about this: What constitutes a thing? What makes something what it is, and what we name it? Is it merely that the physical constituents of the thing take or are placed in a shape that we then associate with a certain name, or conceptual designation? Or is there something in the unique associations of individuality-- especially when the concept of ownership comes into play ("my hand")-- that lends a thing its identity?
Another example: You have a favourite watch the parts of which wear down, and must be replaced, over time. A cog, one year. A spring, two years after that. A fly wheel, in six months. This does not happen, all at once. Do you ever stop thinking of this as "Your Watch?" Most people wouldn't think twice about it. What about a car you'd had, since your dad gave it to you, or that you worked on, every day, with your grandmother, and, over time, the transmission, the catalytic converter, the seats, the upholstery, everything has been replaced. Is that still the same car? Most people wouldn't think about this, either. Because they're "fixing their watch" or "working on their car." What is it that keeps these things in our minds as "the same?"
We have, again over time, what acts as the persistence of memory, in the act of physical processes. Let me say that, again, a different way: As we perform actions of replacement or repair, over the course of days or weeks and especially years, we integrate the New pieces of the repaired thing in with the old, as being a part of that thing. Now, with car and watch parts, with computer components, and with the cells in our bodies, there is a continuance of type. These new things are of the same category as the old thing, with slight differnces, such as alloy composition, or the food that went into creating them. But as we place them, physically, within the area of "This Car," "This Watch," "This Planet," "This Body," then they become a part of those things, in our understanding. Piece by piece.
Now, if we were to all of a sudden replace, completely, a human body with a new one... Say we could clone you, and transfer your consciousness into the newer, cleaner, body, all at once, without taking the old parts and swapping them for new ones, over time. Say we could, instead, put your brain/mind into a robot body (and even have it be over five feet tall!), and have your old body just kind of... There. Which of them is you? As we replace the pieces of ourseslves, with ever more advanced mergers of organic and inorganic technologies, many will ask the question, "where do I stop being me?" And many more will ask the question "where do I stop being human?"
It is my belief that we do not stop being ourselves. We don't stop being us, just because none of the cells we have, today, are the ones with which we were born, do we? Nor do we stop being ourselves when we have an organ transplant, or a blood transfusion, despite what horror movies would like us to believe. We don't stop being who we are because as we move through time, as those things are replaced with new things, we are aware of the process of growth and of change. We know, as these things happen, that we are still the same persosn to whom these things are happening, that the majority of what we constitute "our bodies" is intact, and a new piece is merely being integrated under that heading. This, then, is the persistence of memory.
It isn't simply that we have physical parts and when those parts change those things are different. We have a certain set of conceptual patterns, in our minds, a set of components that can be altered, along a sliding scale, and still be recognisable as "Us." This is why amnesia is so scary, why severe brain damage cases like Phineas Gage freak us out, because there is no slow, knowing change in behaviour, there. There is no self-awareness, and not even the opportunity for it, regarding the actions being taken, or the changes being made in who and what we are. The Joker. Darth Vader. Any severe burn victim. No choice, no memory, no time to integrate a slow change into a cohesive sense of self.
But if I replace an eye, one year, an arm, two years after that... If I upgrade my lungs to a self-cleaning model, or implant my heart with an overclock-and-repair mechanism... If you don't see me, for 10 years, and we meet again... Am I still me?
You don't know me, at all, you don't recognise the changes, because you haven't been there to watch them, and to integrate them into your cohesive sense of "Damien." But there I am, in my mind, clear as day.
The persistence of memory, the access to more information and context, within the system of changes. To know what, and why, and how... Is to know me, better. So if we take the slower process, we can ensure that we are and continue to be ourselves. As we are ourselves, human agents, making choices, performing actions on ourselves, we continue to be human. And so the Argo remains the Argo, not merely because of its static constituent parts, but because each of those is a pary of the dynamic process and the legacy that is the Life of The Argo.
Thoughts and comments welcome.
When we look toward the effects of the new (and old) technologies involved in the field of human/machine interface cybernetics, or the development of biomechanical replacements, many believe that we must ask ourselves: At what point do we stop being ourselves? The above quote fromm Plutarch shows that many have felt, and indeed many Still Feel that the replacing of the pieces of a thing, over time, constitutes the replacing of a thing. That, since what was originally there is there no longer, the thing is not there. But think about this: What constitutes a thing? What makes something what it is, and what we name it? Is it merely that the physical constituents of the thing take or are placed in a shape that we then associate with a certain name, or conceptual designation? Or is there something in the unique associations of individuality-- especially when the concept of ownership comes into play ("my hand")-- that lends a thing its identity?
Another example: You have a favourite watch the parts of which wear down, and must be replaced, over time. A cog, one year. A spring, two years after that. A fly wheel, in six months. This does not happen, all at once. Do you ever stop thinking of this as "Your Watch?" Most people wouldn't think twice about it. What about a car you'd had, since your dad gave it to you, or that you worked on, every day, with your grandmother, and, over time, the transmission, the catalytic converter, the seats, the upholstery, everything has been replaced. Is that still the same car? Most people wouldn't think about this, either. Because they're "fixing their watch" or "working on their car." What is it that keeps these things in our minds as "the same?"
We have, again over time, what acts as the persistence of memory, in the act of physical processes. Let me say that, again, a different way: As we perform actions of replacement or repair, over the course of days or weeks and especially years, we integrate the New pieces of the repaired thing in with the old, as being a part of that thing. Now, with car and watch parts, with computer components, and with the cells in our bodies, there is a continuance of type. These new things are of the same category as the old thing, with slight differnces, such as alloy composition, or the food that went into creating them. But as we place them, physically, within the area of "This Car," "This Watch," "This Planet," "This Body," then they become a part of those things, in our understanding. Piece by piece.
Now, if we were to all of a sudden replace, completely, a human body with a new one... Say we could clone you, and transfer your consciousness into the newer, cleaner, body, all at once, without taking the old parts and swapping them for new ones, over time. Say we could, instead, put your brain/mind into a robot body (and even have it be over five feet tall!), and have your old body just kind of... There. Which of them is you? As we replace the pieces of ourseslves, with ever more advanced mergers of organic and inorganic technologies, many will ask the question, "where do I stop being me?" And many more will ask the question "where do I stop being human?"
It is my belief that we do not stop being ourselves. We don't stop being us, just because none of the cells we have, today, are the ones with which we were born, do we? Nor do we stop being ourselves when we have an organ transplant, or a blood transfusion, despite what horror movies would like us to believe. We don't stop being who we are because as we move through time, as those things are replaced with new things, we are aware of the process of growth and of change. We know, as these things happen, that we are still the same persosn to whom these things are happening, that the majority of what we constitute "our bodies" is intact, and a new piece is merely being integrated under that heading. This, then, is the persistence of memory.
It isn't simply that we have physical parts and when those parts change those things are different. We have a certain set of conceptual patterns, in our minds, a set of components that can be altered, along a sliding scale, and still be recognisable as "Us." This is why amnesia is so scary, why severe brain damage cases like Phineas Gage freak us out, because there is no slow, knowing change in behaviour, there. There is no self-awareness, and not even the opportunity for it, regarding the actions being taken, or the changes being made in who and what we are. The Joker. Darth Vader. Any severe burn victim. No choice, no memory, no time to integrate a slow change into a cohesive sense of self.
But if I replace an eye, one year, an arm, two years after that... If I upgrade my lungs to a self-cleaning model, or implant my heart with an overclock-and-repair mechanism... If you don't see me, for 10 years, and we meet again... Am I still me?
You don't know me, at all, you don't recognise the changes, because you haven't been there to watch them, and to integrate them into your cohesive sense of "Damien." But there I am, in my mind, clear as day.
The persistence of memory, the access to more information and context, within the system of changes. To know what, and why, and how... Is to know me, better. So if we take the slower process, we can ensure that we are and continue to be ourselves. As we are ourselves, human agents, making choices, performing actions on ourselves, we continue to be human. And so the Argo remains the Argo, not merely because of its static constituent parts, but because each of those is a pary of the dynamic process and the legacy that is the Life of The Argo.
Thoughts and comments welcome.
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no subject
Date: 2009-01-05 04:59 pm (UTC)At the risk of lowering the tone, I have to say that this subject is one that always reminds me of a situation/quote from the LCD British sitcom "Only Fools And Horses", in which Trigger, the wise fool of the show, says: "I've had the same broom for twenty years... This old broom has had seventeen new heads, and fourteen new handles in it's time."
no subject
Date: 2009-01-05 05:14 pm (UTC)If you don't mind, do I know you, and if so, from where? Your name is familiar, but I can't place a face...
no subject
Date: 2009-01-06 09:28 am (UTC)I'm in the UK, am the chap from Nixsight.net, and the creator/curator at elephantwords.co.uk.
Does that help? I can't tell much about you from your profile!
no subject
Date: 2009-01-06 03:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-05 06:23 pm (UTC)"But if I replace an eye, one year, an arm, two years after that..."
You wouldn't even need to include BioMech to get this effect; no doubt there's been someone you've known and then not encountered for a decade or so, and they are mostly unrecognizable. Yet you do recognize them as the "same" "person" you knew some time ago, at least in the sense that you can identify...what?...that is still the same. Is it every seven years that it's said that the tissues of the body replace themselves with entirely new material?
...on a side note, the idea being discussed is what always bugged me about the transporter. But I digress.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-06 04:07 am (UTC)the idea being discussed is what always bugged me about the transporter.
I don't quite get what you mean...
no subject
Date: 2009-01-06 02:58 pm (UTC)Re: the transporter bit - the idea of identity being separate from the specific matter making "you" up. Either I "am" the pattern, in which case it wouldn't (theoretically) be too technically difficult to rig a transporter to make a hundred copies of me (and in that case, which me am I?) or I "am not" the pattern, in which case any time someone gets transported, they're disintegrated and an exact (as much as quantum uncertainty will allow) copy appears somewhere else, with all their memories, but as an effectively new and separate person.
I'm inclined toward the first interpretation, but even that has some odd implications. In a large enough universe, it's probable that there's another entity somewhere (or has been, or will be) that shares enough of my pattern that I might very well consider them "me" (with some small alterations, of course).
Sorry, rambling at this point.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-06 03:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-08 09:55 pm (UTC)(insert image of melting watches, for colour)
There's an interesting synchronicity here, in that my mum spent last semester studying similar ideas; one of the themes being inhuman consciousness.
What I'd have to say, in response to the original question, is that the essence of the subject is not defined by corporeality. If anything existed in a vacuum, perhaps, but part of the reality of a subject is its relation to others. The broom/car/Darth all have roles they fulfill despite their replacements. Some of the changes precipitate a change in their relationships (especially "He killed your father..."): a new paint job, the recognition that a hairstyle makes her look completely different. Flashing back to a memory of seeing my grandmother's corpse and recognizing that was not her lying in the coffin. (And I would probably have even said the same sans sand, embalming fluid, etc...)
Other interesting thoughts include reincarnation, but I'ma try to catch up on my LJ backlog.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-05 11:54 pm (UTC)The entire body is replaced throughout life, and changes in persona in line with those stages of life could be seen as a capitulation to a consensus of how those stages should present themselves and should think of themselves. The ego can have problems adjusting in the transition from a stage the individual sees as prime to one that's past that prime. Maybe that's why so many American males dress like Dennis the Menace all their lives now...
no subject
Date: 2009-01-06 04:09 am (UTC)