Would You Still Exist?

[EA-1475]

I am a callaboration of half my father's DNA and half my mother's. If my mother had chosen to mate with another man, myself and my conciousness would not come to be, and an entirely different person would be born.
I would not be myself in another body 8)

More than collaboration between mom and dad's DNA, you are the result of a specific sperm cell fertilizing a specific egg.
Perhaps a more interesting question would be "what if your mom got pregant a month later when with a different egg?"
Or "What if a different one of your dad's sperm cells fertilized the same egg?"

 

[delta_9]

^That's a good point EA. I am indeed a product of that specific sprem cell fertilizing that specific egg at that specific moment. I honestly dont know what would've happened if that event had occurred later in time, or if one or both of the two cells in questions were swapped with different cells. My guess is pretty much the same though, that I would not be here, and that that DNA would've arranged itself into a different person. Perhaps that person would still have the same name as me, and perhaps he may have even found this place and registered as "delta_9", but my conciousness, and who I am would not exist.

 

[MCMG]

it depends what you define as "you," if you mean this body im in, probably not but if you mean my spirit of course.

for the record, my dad is my ma highschool "sweetheart" but they divorced so idc

 

[Pez]

Studies on identical twins keep indicating that genetics plays a larger role than we give credit for. Even thinks like a persons propensity towards religiosity can be attributed to genetics. There was an episode of the Australian show Insight on this very issue that was fascinating.

Damn, that's certainly news to me. We are talking about twins separated at birth, right?

 

[TheAppleCore]

"You" never actually exist as one "you", the way I see it. You're continually changing throughout time, as is all else in the universe. As a matter of fact, I think that after a certain amount of time passes, every single cell that was once alive in your body is dead, and replaced with a newly generated cell. You're not by any measure physically the same person you were as a child.

Within each infinitesimal slice of time is a totally unique universe...

 

[footscrazy]

As a matter of fact, I think that after a certain amount of time passes, every single cell that was once alive in your body is dead, and replaced with a newly generated cell.

Yeah, I find that really interesting when you consider that your brain is continously changing and yet you're always 'you', you have a continuous stream of consciousness.

Also, I wonder what would happen if it was possible to make an exact copy of someone's brain at a certain point in time - would it be 'them' as well, or a new consciousness?

 

[delta_9]

Also, I wonder what would happen if it was possible to make an exact copy of someone's brain at a certain point in time - would it be 'them' as well, or a new consciousness?

It's entirely possible to convert one's brain wave signals into digital data that can be saved onto a disk and copied any number of times, and perhaps uploaded into a blank robot.
What this means exactly, I'm not sure, but I do know it's currently being developed.

 

[New]

No, not in the form I interact with the world as now. Not in a million years.

 

[footscrazy]

It's entirely possible to convert one's brain wave signals into digital data that can be saved onto a disk and copied any number of times, and perhaps uploaded into a blank robot.

Could you explain more about that? Sounds interesting... But I would think there would be more to consciousness than just brain waves?

 

[delta_9]

Could you explain more about that? Sounds interesting... But I would think there would be more to consciousness than just brain waves?

Since the human brain is basically a biocomputer(hardware), the process scans and copies the entirety of one's thoughts and memories(software) and transfares it to another medium, like a disk for example. In theory, this disk could be copied an infinite number of times, or uploaded into another piece of hardware, such as a robot or even another human body capable of downloading it. In a sense, this allows that person to live indefinately. They could still choose to die if they wanted, but they are no longer subject to "natural death".

This is just how the process works, I'm not saying I agree with or believe in it, and we're still many years off from really developing this. I certainly hope to be dead by then.

 

[vegan]

I think that after a certain amount of time passes, every single cell that was once alive in your body is dead, and replaced with a newly generated cell.

7 or 8 years if i remember

 

[namelesss]

Imagine, for example, that your mother had remained with her high-school sweetheart instead of moving on and marrying your father. Would you still exist?

The only evidence is that nothing can ever be any other than as it is, Now!
The question is meaningless idle speculation on an impossibility.
What is, is!, Now! and Now! and Now!!

 

[lystra]

^what is has been and always will be.

IMO, the 'Now!' is but a microscopic fraction of our existence (if i could think of a smaller unit, i would phrase it that way). Not only have we always been (by 'we' i mean you, yes you.), we always will be, in which/what form i am unable to comprehend.

I am infinite, you are infinite. We can be no more than a tangent here.

All we can do is explore (and hopefully, learn). And I wonder what I would be doing here if I weren't me.. .

 

[Edvard Munch]

Imagine, for example, that your mother had remained with her high-school sweetheart instead of moving on and marrying your father. Would you still exist?

"... That's heavy."

 

[namelesss]

^what is has been and always will be.

'Been' and 'will be' is a fantasy. There is only Now! and is!

IMO, the 'Now!' is but a microscopic fraction of our existence

Yup, there are one billion trillion trillion trillion Now!s (moments) per second (almost). Every Now! is a unique universe. All Now!s are synchronously arising and anihilating. Not 'eternal' and 'forever' according to the mundane sentimental notion, but 'timeless'. Actually too 'small' to have any temporal qualities.

(if i could think of a smaller unit, i would phrase it that way).

There is no smaller unit of existence than a 'Planck' moment.

Not only have we always been (by 'we' i mean you, yes you.), we always will be, in which/what form i am unable to comprehend.

Sentimental and all, but there is no evidence in support of the notion of 'eternal' or 'infinite'. Limited existence is all the evidence we have tells us; the rest is wishful thinking and 'beliefs' (in support of the notions/beliefs of an 'afterlife' or 'reincarnation' and 'karma'...).

I am infinite, you are infinite.

I am timeless, I am existence! But you are certainly entitled to define me as you perceive me.

 

[saveyour]

i most definitely would not exist on the purely biological basis that my dad didn't screw my mom and make me, their second born. being that i can't remember before i was born, i'd have to assume that before i was born i did not exist in a sentient form.

i would then most likely exist as disembodied half sperm/egg creature of some sort i suppose that got flushed down the toliet

a more interesting question to me is would you rather NOT exist? it may be better to never have been born (and certainly not reborn!)

 

[ebola?]

Okay...I will assume from the outset that you are not simply re-casting the problems of introducing time-travel to our corner of the universe...

I think that for analytical clarity, it will be necessary to first engage some as of yet unquestioned...issues that underpin your original question.

1. We need to disaggregate different notions of what it is to exist as something.

meaning a: something (x) exists as a reference to another thing (real or imaginary) (y) to the degree that x shares characteristics with y.

meaning b: (x) exists as (y) to the extent that x points to the same set of phenomena in the world as does y.*

2. What is a "self", and how does it relate to other entities?

My...overly speculative and...perhaps unnecessarily non-common sensical approach:
my self, empirically, as a discrete "thing", exists as an experience of "now" that is anchored in a moment to moment shift, where each moment births a self-anew. There is an illusion of continuity, born of experiencing memory, born of the physical history of the brain (and the rest of the body).

I will for now remain agnostic on how different selves link (horizontally (other minds simultaneous) and vertically (one mind through time)).

3. What is time, and how does it relate to the universe, in particular conditions of existing, and further in particular to questions of the existence of the self?

And I think these are finally the right questions to allow for speculative answers to the original question.

The experience of time appears to be an illusion built of a perceiving self, engaging the world AND ITSELF at any one moment. However, time also 'exists' 'objectively' (that is, las matter observed as an external entity) insofar as time proves operant in describing causal chains.

SO, to if you changed some of the relevant causes that led to you, as a current self that appears as a particular entity, I would imagine that you would not exist as 'you' do now (in terms of existence meaning a), but this would run along a gradient: to the extent that the stream of certain causes changes, 'you' become different to a certain degree in certain ways.

However, what about the existence of 'you' as referring to a particular 'nexus of consciousness' (meaning b)? This I'm really not sure about at all. . .If we assume the many universes interpretation of QM, and if we assume that each moment within each causal stream in the multiverse corresponds to a particular momentary 'self' that experiences this moment, then disruption of this causal chain would obliterate the particular 'you' of your moment, but that same you would exist elsewhere in the multiverse.**

However, if we wish for there to be some continuous self that maintains integrity through time, I think that 'you' would cease to be, as your particular place in a causal stream moving through time wouldn't exist anymore, as that causal stream would no longer exist.

er...does this make sense at all?

ebola

*I will assume that the divisions between phenomena are fuzzy and that phenomena are nested...hence this "self" is oversimplified when looked at as a unitary thing.
**I think that this works because, per some interpretations of the multiverse, anything that is possible is 'real, actual', but what possibilities will have been realized depend on where in the multiverse you happen to look.

 

[ebola?]

bump to reflect update.

 

[Jamshyd]

Bumping to avoid prune.