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Death, probability and self


8th_wall

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There's a view floating around that death is a dead end.  The end of self.  The end of existence.  Without evoking Gods or even any specific after life this view hasn't made much sense to me.  For if there existed some probability to exist once then there exists some probability to exist again.  Once the self is dead it then enters into the realm of infinite time and infinite probability.  A nothingness.  One can only be conscious in states of existence that forms to support that consciousness.  So to my mind after I die I will simply instantly take up consciousness in the next reality formation that can support my consciousness.  Whatever matter formation needs to come about again.  I can't even begin to guess what that would be like or necessarily should be like.  But yeah, for me the potential for my existence is constantly present within the very matter of reality at all times.  It's simple a matter of time and probability for the matter to form in such a way that it can now say "me".

I worry about what precisely it means to be me.  For the self is a part of a continuous updating flow.  It seems possible that I could endlessly be reset to some baseline existence.  The other thing is that if the potential constantly exists for me to exist then I could exist twice in the same life span.  But I don't believe I would be aware of both sets of myself separated by space.  This sort of stuff makes me strongly suspicious that we are all the same being just experiencing different vertices of ourselves.  It doesn't seem that way in reality.  Anyway, any vertex, to my mind, exists independently at all times as potential.  I wonder how many configurations of any reality can exist to constitute the self.

So yeah, from this way of looking at things wouldn't consciousness be an indefinite constant thing from the perception of self?  Given parameters like infinite time and infinite probability?

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7 minutes ago, PsiSeeker said:

There's a view floating around that death is a dead end.  The end of self.  The end of existence.  Without evoking Gods or even any specific after life this view hasn't made much sense to me.  For if there existed some probability to exist once then there exists some probability to exist again.  Once the self is dead it then enters into the realm of infinite time and infinite probability.  A nothingness.  One can only be conscious in states of existence that forms to support that consciousness.  So to my mind after I die I will simply instantly take up consciousness in the next reality formation that can support my consciousness.  Whatever matter formation needs to come about again.  I can't even begin to guess what that would be like or necessarily should be like.  But yeah, for me the potential for my existence is constantly present within the very matter of reality at all times.  It's simple a matter of time and probability for the matter to form in such a way that it can now say "me".

I worry about what precisely it means to be me.  For the self is a part of a continuous updating flow.  It seems possible that I could endlessly be reset to some baseline existence.  The other thing is that if the potential constantly exists for me to exist then I could exist twice in the same life span.  But I don't believe I would be aware of both sets of myself separated by space.  This sort of stuff makes me strongly suspicious that we are all the same being just experiencing different vertices of ourselves.  It doesn't seem that way in reality.  Anyway, any vertex, to my mind, exists independently at all times as potential.  I wonder how many configurations of any reality can exist to constitute the self.

So yeah, from this way of looking at things wouldn't consciousness be an indefinite constant thing from the perception of self?  Given parameters like infinite time and infinite probability?

If God can change history he could:

1: Alter your history as a punishment causing all your memories of the super advanced civilization existing, causing the universe, and causing you to have to live a life in it.

2. God could also intervene to make changes to the universe by altering the past in such a way to make us think Noah's Ark is far out rubbish (he removed the water and added more animals)

If at death you have done your time maybe God will reinstate you.

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4 minutes ago, RabidMongoose said:

If God can change history he could:

1: Alter your history as a punishment causing all your memories of the super advanced civilization existing, causing the universe, and causing you to have to live a life in it.

2. God could also intervene to make changes to the universe by altering the past in such a way to make us think Noah's Ark is far out rubbish (he removed the water and added more animals)

If at death you have done your time maybe God will reinstate you.

Once you bring an omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent and omniscient variable into the fray you can do anything you are capable of setting your mind to.  To me that feels like a cheat code, so I try to avoid it for the sake of keeping the discussions interesting :P.

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56 minutes ago, PsiSeeker said:

 So to my mind after I die I will simply instantly take up consciousness in the next reality formation that can support my consciousness.  Whatever matter formation needs to come about again.

Are you saying you believe in reincarnation, then?

48 minutes ago, RabidMongoose said:

I worry about what precisely it means to be me.  For the self is a part of a continuous updating flow.  It seems possible that I could endlessly be reset to some baseline existence.

It's part of the arrow of time, is it not? I am not the "me" I was before I read your post. Reading your post changed "me" in ways I might not be able to perceive, or that might not impact my current existence. But the change was nevertheless made. How do you define "baseline existence"? To me, you're talking about becoming a baby again, growing up, etc. Anyway, if you were reset, are you implying you'd make the same choices over again? Or not? Because if you didn't make the same choices, your "me" will not be the same as the "me" who wrote this post. All things being equal, if I was reset and chose not to read this post, I'd be a different "me" than the one I am now, having read your post.

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11 minutes ago, brlesq1 said:

Are you saying you believe in reincarnation, then?

This isn't the same as reincarnation.  Reincarnation implies something is actually reinserted into the system.  This has nothing to do with insertion.  It's just a result of the natural flow of things instead.

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It's part of the arrow of time, is it not? I am not the "me" I was before I read your post. Reading your post changed "me" in ways I might not be able to perceive, or that might not impact my current existence. But the change was nevertheless made. How do you define "baseline existence"? To me, you're talking about becoming a baby again, growing up, etc. Anyway, if you were reset, are you implying you'd make the same choices over again? Or not? Because if you didn't make the same choices, your "me" will not be the same as the "me" who wrote this post. All things being equal, if I was reset and chose not to read this post, I'd be a different "me" than the one I am now, having read your post.

That's what I mean.  I don't fully understand what the minimum requirement, or any requirement really, there is to constitute "me".  Baseline existence to mean the minimum requirement to constitute existence since it seems more likely that the minimum would come into being.  Not some continuation.

Not necessarily the same choices.  But the same choices you would have made from a baseline perspective.  I.e your base form doesn't evolve.  Or whatever form happens to come into existence.

That's being really specific over what constitutes "me".  I think it's simpler than that.  I think it can be complicated.  There are layers of you that stays the same regardless of reading the post or not.  However many of those layers can be completely removed and you'd still be left with yourself.

Anyway.  I think a reset doesn't necessarily imply you'd be reset into the same reality you were in before.  And to my mind the uncertainty principle is enough randomness in a system to say you wouldn't make the same decisions even if you were exactly the same person.

I honestly don't know what the boundaries are of "me".  At what point I can say that I begin and end.  Or should begin and end even.  I don't know what my minimum state is.

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2 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

 And to my mind the uncertainty principle is enough randomness in a system to say you wouldn't make the same decisions even if you were exactly the same person.

If there is enough randomness in a system, and you didn't make the same decisions, how can you say you'd be exactly the same person? Or am I taking you too literally?

2 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

I honestly don't know what the boundaries are of "me".  At what point I can say that I begin and end.  Or should begin and end even.  I don't know what my minimum state is.

I like to think the boundaries of my physical existence is akin the the boundary of the solar system, i.e., where the solar wind ceases to have influence on the particles and gases in space. Kind of like where the heat from my body ceases to affect the air around me. As for my mental existence, well, I have no idea.

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God is usually the lazy answer given to questions that have difficult answers, or seem unanswerable to our perceptions.

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2 hours ago, quiXilver said:

God is usually the lazy answer given to questions that have difficult answers, or seem unanswerable to our perceptions.

People too much imagine a conflict between faith and science, whereas great geniuses have proved else wise.

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11 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

Once you bring an omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent and omniscient variable into the fray you can do anything you are capable of setting your mind to.  To me that feels like a cheat code, so I try to avoid it for the sake of keeping the discussions interesting :P.

I feel that the problem with the omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent and omniscient view of God is that you begin to wonder why certain things happened. For example, why did God have to kill everyone in the story of the Ark instead of changing their minds. 

But in Death, I believe God does not have as much say as we believe. Sure he can probably kill any one of us instantly, but there must be more than that because if there wasn't, God wouldn't give different people different amount of time on this earth to prove themselves worthy of heaven.

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10 hours ago, brlesq1 said:

If there is enough randomness in a system, and you didn't make the same decisions, how can you say you'd be exactly the same person? Or am I taking you too literally?

I don't know what the minimum requirements are to be "you".  I don't understand really what effect decision making and the like has on who I am.  I think that there is a core you that doesn't change.  Whenever I think about this stuff nowadays I just end up with the view that everyone has the same core essence of what and who they are.

Quote

I like to think the boundaries of my physical existence is akin the the boundary of the solar system, i.e., where the solar wind ceases to have influence on the particles and gases in space. Kind of like where the heat from my body ceases to affect the air around me. As for my mental existence, well, I have no idea.

So you view who you are as being inclusive of the closed system you are contained within?  You are, in a bigger view, the universe?

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2 hours ago, Willstone said:

I feel that the problem with the omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent and omniscient view of God is that you begin to wonder why certain things happened. For example, why did God have to kill everyone in the story of the Ark instead of changing their minds. 

But in Death, I believe God does not have as much say as we believe. Sure he can probably kill any one of us instantly, but there must be more than that because if there wasn't, God wouldn't give different people different amount of time on this earth to prove themselves worthy of heaven.

I just think that bringing God into this sort of discussion at all is halting any great amount of thought.  As QuiXilver said, it's a lazy answer to something that could be discussed with a greater degree of insight and depth.

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14 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

For if there existed some probability to exist once then there exists some probability to exist again.  Once the self is dead it then enters into the realm of infinite time and infinite probability.  A nothingness.  One can only be conscious in states of existence that forms to support that consciousness.  So to my mind after I die I will simply instantly take up consciousness in the next reality formation that can support my consciousness.

 

14 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

 It's simple a matter of time and probability for the matter to form in such a way that it can now say "me".

Interesting, I hadn't thought about this idea before. I constantly wonder why "me" exists at all, and why now and not somewhere/sometime else. This feeling of self awareness is a strange thing indeed.

If the universe is infinite, or the multi-verse is infinite in space and time, I would agree the probabilities of another "me" (baseline consciousness) that will come into existence is probable. As you say, it's just a configuration of matter to form in such a way as to produce "me", given an infinite set of possible configurations.

There may be a very large or infinite set of "me's" already existing, each a separate "me". I would only be aware of this particular "me", because I have no way to access the others.

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3 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

 I think that there is a core you that doesn't change.  Whenever I think about this stuff nowadays I just end up with the view that everyone has the same core essence of what and who they are.

Layering, then. That spark of "you" that gets overlaid by your choices once you're booted into a different reality. So you're the same "person," yet not.

3 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

So you view who you are as being inclusive of the closed system you are contained within?  You are, in a bigger view, the universe?

Physically, anyway. As I said, I don't know where consciousness fits into this. Maybe consciousness is a physical construct, just on a different level than gross matter.

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11 hours ago, PsiSeeker said:

I just think that bringing God into this sort of discussion at all is halting any great amount of thought.  As QuiXilver said, it's a lazy answer to something that could be discussed with a greater degree of insight and depth.

But I'm stating that God does not have all the power in this, which is why we need to discuss it further

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I have to admit that once I try to think of non-existence it makes my brain spasm. Much like trying to conceptualize infinity in space; no matter how far and fast you go, no matter the direction, you never reach the end. After awhile you just stop thinking about it in such inclusive terms and just deal with what you have now.

Sometimes I think that at the very core, our consciousness may be mo more complex than that of, say, an amoeba who operates mostly on the most base of instincts and that it powers the reactionary machine that is our body and brain without it ever knowing it is doing so. Glitches in the program regularly occur because of the difficulty in processing information and differentiating between our own experiences and the myriad of fantasies we consume.

When we die, all programs are terminated, so to speak.

I don't know..interesting to ponder.

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Is my consciousness biological and only happens once in the infinities of infinity that seem to exist as the entire Cosmos? I still can't get my head around my own conscious awareness. If humans have been around for a hundred thousand years, and all those baby's born who were not me, then all of a sudden here I am, this baby is born me, and in the future hundred thousand years all the baby's born who will not be me again...

Can we compute the probability of my self-awareness as me occurring at some moment in this perhaps infinity of time and space? Perhaps self-consciousness as me is a potential that is randomly generated in all this. The correct configuration of matter that results in my consciousness.

 

 

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On ‎3‎/‎12‎/‎2016 at 10:33 PM, PsiSeeker said:

There's a view floating around that death is a dead end.  The end of self.  The end of existence.  Without evoking Gods or even any specific after life this view hasn't made much sense to me.  For if there existed some probability to exist once then there exists some probability to exist again.  Once the self is dead it then enters into the realm of infinite time and infinite probability.  A nothingness.  One can only be conscious in states of existence that forms to support that consciousness.  So to my mind after I die I will simply instantly take up consciousness in the next reality formation that can support my consciousness.  Whatever matter formation needs to come about again.  I can't even begin to guess what that would be like or necessarily should be like.  But yeah, for me the potential for my existence is constantly present within the very matter of reality at all times.  It's simple a matter of time and probability for the matter to form in such a way that it can now say "me".

What makes you think millions of years of evolution will play out the same way? How will you retrieve all your memories in order to be "you"?

This seems to be a lot of wishful thinking on your part.

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10 hours ago, Ryu said:

I have to admit that once I try to think of non-existence it makes my brain spasm.

Ditto

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On 12/3/2016 at 11:03 PM, PsiSeeker said:

There's a view floating around that death is a dead end.  The end of self.  The end of existence.

This  view could be to do with the modern idea that we are individuals ... we are more focused on our individuality, as an independent unit,  than ever.  When thats gone ... YOU gone !    In other societies, if one doesnt become immortalised as an ancestor, one at least lives on in their descendants and community.   Of course, it is not the end of existence - existence continues ,   but your part in  it may change . 

On 12/3/2016 at 11:03 PM, PsiSeeker said:

 Without evoking Gods or even any specific after life this view hasn't made much sense to me.  For if there existed some probability to exist once then there exists some probability to exist again.

Fair enough ... as long as you dont think of  your 'pre-birth' as a state of non-existence ... as that would be a probability that you could return to .     So you have to , sort of think ,  you have always existed , or go through cycles of existence and non- existence . 

On 12/3/2016 at 11:03 PM, PsiSeeker said:

 

 Once the self is dead it then enters into the realm of infinite time and infinite probability.  A nothingness.  One can only be conscious in states of existence that forms to support that consciousness.

True ... and that could include consciousness needing 'the state of existence'  of the brain to generate it.    When a light bulb is giving out light, and the filament breaks, where did the light go ?  Somewhere else  ?   The  form is still there ( the current ,  the light globe, the room to be illuminated ) but an essential key ingredient is not. 

On 12/3/2016 at 11:03 PM, PsiSeeker said:

 So to my mind after I die I will simply instantly take up consciousness in the next reality formation that can support my consciousness.  Whatever matter formation needs to come about again.  I can't even begin to guess what that would be like or necessarily should be like.  But yeah, for me the potential for my existence is constantly present within the very matter of reality at all times.  It's simple a matter of time and probability for the matter to form in such a way that it can now say "me".

I worry about what precisely it means to be me.  For the self is a part of a continuous updating flow.  It seems possible that I could endlessly be reset to some baseline existence.  The other thing is that if the potential constantly exists for me to exist then I could exist twice in the same life span.  But I don't believe I would be aware of both sets of myself separated by space.  This sort of stuff makes me strongly suspicious that we are all the same being just experiencing different vertices of ourselves.

Yep .... the human being   :)  .  Its an old concept  ... sort of like an archetype ;

 

 

On 12/3/2016 at 11:03 PM, PsiSeeker said:

 It doesn't seem that way in reality.  Anyway, any vertex, to my mind, exists independently at all times as potential.  I wonder how many configurations of any reality can exist to constitute the self.

So yeah, from this way of looking at things wouldn't consciousness be an indefinite constant thing from the perception of self?  Given parameters like infinite time and infinite probability?

Well, under those parameters   eventually    anything could happen . 

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On 05/12/2016 at 0:01 AM, Willstone said:

But I'm stating that God does not have all the power in this, which is why we need to discuss it further

Would it still be God then?  Any being that has will capable of cosmic changes causes any theorising to go haywire.

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On 05/12/2016 at 3:37 AM, StarMountainKid said:

Is my consciousness biological and only happens once in the infinities of infinity that seem to exist as the entire Cosmos? I still can't get my head around my own conscious awareness. If humans have been around for a hundred thousand years, and all those baby's born who were not me, then all of a sudden here I am, this baby is born me, and in the future hundred thousand years all the baby's born who will not be me again...

Can we compute the probability of my self-awareness as me occurring at some moment in this perhaps infinity of time and space? Perhaps self-consciousness as me is a potential that is randomly generated in all this. The correct configuration of matter that results in my consciousness.

 

 

I get caught up on this stuff just as much as you.  I get confused as to what precisely it is that separates me from someone else.  What is it about me that's so unique that I can say "me".  Why am I not someone else as well?  I don't understand what process could be governing the decision that I am me and not someone else.

It would seem that there is a range of matter configurations that could constitute you for you are the same you now as you were when you were born were you not?  Even though all the particles in your body has been replaced.  Somehow the continuity means you are still the same you.  I sometimes think that the simple act of self-consciousness is enough to generate everything but it doesn't seem that way observing everything.  I wonder how many possible matter configurations can exist to still be "you" or "me".

I wonder if you slowly changed one person's particles into another person's particles at what point they stop being them and someone else.  Confusing stuff.

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On 05/12/2016 at 1:53 PM, Rlyeh said:

What makes you think millions of years of evolution will play out the same way? How will you retrieve all your memories in order to be "you"?

This seems to be a lot of wishful thinking on your part.

When all you have is an infinite span of time and probability...  As far as memory goes I don't think you necessarily need memory to be you.  I don't know what the "minimum state" would be so to speak.  For it seems more likely that a minimum state would be re-represented than some more complicated state.  I think whatever "you" is it spans across a range of potential states of reality.

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On 06/12/2016 at 6:41 AM, back to earth said:

This  view could be to do with the modern idea that we are individuals ... we are more focused on our individuality, as an independent unit,  than ever.  When thats gone ... YOU gone !    In other societies, if one doesnt become immortalised as an ancestor, one at least lives on in their descendants and community.   Of course, it is not the end of existence - existence continues ,   but your part in  it may change . 

Fair enough ... as long as you dont think of  your 'pre-birth' as a state of non-existence ... as that would be a probability that you could return to .     So you have to , sort of think ,  you have always existed , or go through cycles of existence and non- existence . 

True ... and that could include consciousness needing 'the state of existence'  of the brain to generate it.    When a light bulb is giving out light, and the filament breaks, where did the light go ?  Somewhere else  ?   The  form is still there ( the current ,  the light globe, the room to be illuminated ) but an essential key ingredient is not. 

Yep .... the human being   :)  .  Its an old concept  ... sort of like an archetype ;

Well, under those parameters   eventually    anything could happen . 

Eventually everything possible should :P.

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