This discussion is one I cannot possibly debate with any amount of credence, nor can I support EITHER side adequately to myself.
This question hurts me like trying to conceptualize why "anything" exists. I mean removing religious ideology out of the mix. There is no reason for a universe. However this is given our limited ability of observation, 100 years ago we knew so much less than now, new discoveries about the functions of everything are discovered daily and at an increasing rate, but I digress... What I suggest is a hypothetical situation that's always left me confused and is related to this integrally . In star trek they have transporters. These supposedly disintegrate the molecules of the person / object transported, keep the order of the molecules for reintegration in a computer memory. The matter is converted to energy, sent to the receipt point, and is reintegrated.
Now this is where the relation to this thread comes in. Once the person is reintegrated, the transferred person would be self aware (since it is a perfect copy/reintegration of molecules) however, since at the point of inception the body is by all technicalities destroyed converted to energy and transferred, is the "mind" still me? It would be me by all outward observations, but what of my (what I like to refer to as focal point, what I consider me, myself, the fact that I am the same body who woke up yesterday, who snuck out of my crib as a toddler, who spends way to much time on the internet, simply it's the focal point of what I consider myself) focal point, would I "personally" cease to exist, recreated with a "new" mind, or would I be to myself, simply transferred across a spatial distance. While the latter seems sort of feasible, what destroys this possibility is that if the molecular make up of me was contained in a computer for reintegration from energy, then some energy could be used to create a second copy. If the primary transferrance does not effect my focal point of conciousness, then the problem arises of focal duality if a copy was made. The argument that arises from the hypothesis is that while the self/mind/awareness is perhaps biological, something else must exist that creates my local focal point. hope this made sense. It's something I'd love to see discussed.
