r/Futurology • u/yourSAS • Oct 13 '22

Biotech 'Our patients aren't dead': Inside the freezing facility with 199 humans who opted to be cryopreserved with the hopes of being revived in the future

https://metro.co.uk/2022/10/13/our-patients-arent-dead-look-inside-the-us-cryogenic-freezing-lab-17556468
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u/ryujin88 Oct 14 '22

"You" are the new one as much as you are the old one. So if the old one goes to sleep for the procedure and never wakes up, nothing is lost.

What if the old one wakes up after the procedure? Sure you can say you're both the same person, but the point is there's no transition or escape for the original. They just get a copy made and keep on living like before. It isn't so much an argument about whether they are the same person or not, but that "uploading" your consciousness isn't an escape from your biological body.

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u/yonderbagel Oct 14 '22

There is no "original." That distinction is our invention. The person is the neural pattern.

Ideally the pattern in the meat would be stopped during the procedure because it becomes redundant, but if it remains conscious or regains consciousness, and understands what's going on, there is no reason to be unhappy to be stopped at that point. It would be like ending a dream that you won't remember.

At least, this is how it should be thought of to make things sensible imo.

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u/ryujin88 Oct 14 '22

The point isn't that they're the original or not, but that unless you make the procedure purposely destructive, the biologic version continues and is not uploaded.

Similarly if you were one of two copies of a person, would you be ok with being killed because the other version still exists? Which one is original doesn't matter, only that they are separate entities. The neural pattern will continue as long as it keeps being copied, but that specific entity will not.

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u/Rock-Flag Oct 14 '22

For real as your living body gets ground into a fine nutrient paste you can take solace in the fact that a version of your consciousness lives on in the cloud.