Infinite Lock-In, part 5

Wouldn’t mind-uploading be cool? What’s wrong with it? Can the human mind be modeled? Let’s do thought experiments!

Personhood and Digital Finitude

At the end of part 4, “Digital Heaven,” I posed some questions:

Supposing mind-uploading is possible, what are we talking about uploading? What is “a good approximation of your memories and mind state”? Just how good can such an approximation be?

And I posed other questions, but for now let’s restrict ourselves to this line of inquiry. To pursue it, let’s revisit Ray Kurzweil’s blithe assumption that “information defines your personality, your memories, your skills.” Remember, he predicted “we ultimately will be able to capture that and actually recreate it.”

Capture what? Recreate what?

You are not a finite set of data points.

Giving that interview, Kurzweil didn’t bother to unpack personality, memory, or skill. It’s telling that he didn’t. For him, these words are just catch-all generalizations. He doesn’t probe them deeply enough to realize, as generalizations, they mean almost nothing. Only in a particular case — this person, her personality, her memories, her skills — do they acquire real meaning.

What do they mean? Let’s play out a few thought experiments, thinking in terms of particular cases.

Only in a particular case do we realize someone’s personality emerges not solely from the mind but also from the body and its special attributes, for instance a facial tic, the timbre of a voice, or even how someone wears their hair. Also, personality changes in response to other people, including their physical attributes. You’re the same person, but your personality subtly alters as you interact with different people.

Think about it. Do you talk exactly the same way to your mother, your cousin, your significant other, your best friend, a casual acquaintance, and complete strangers? Do you even talk the same way to the same people every time you meet them?

Your personality is not a finite set of data points, immutable characteristics. It’s much more accurate to describe personality as a morphing spectrum, containing a variety of evolving characteristics, thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.

You change. Wouldn’t life be very dull if you never changed? If the people around you never changed?

Only in a particular case do we realize memories aren’t immutable, either. Memory morphs over time, too. It doesn’t just fade as events recede into the past. The memory of a significant event changes in your mind each time you remember it, even if only in the significance you give it — though, in fact, it likely changes in more profound ways than just that.