I chose eternal mind but only after we understand the nature of consciousness enough prove that I would still be me
It can never be proven. That's the problem. Its not a limit of technology or knowledge its a limit of reality. There is no way to prove that you will maintain continuity of existence when transfered to a machine. It will be risky as hell no matter how advanced we are and no matter how many people do it "successfully" before you. This has been addressed by several modern philosophers.
If we study the brain enough, we may be able to figure out why it is conscious.Please, somebody whose into the "eternal mind" answer these questions for me:
Once a copy of your mind is successfully made on a computer what happens to your conciousness? Do you instantly become a dual conciousness? Say an electronic copy is made on a server in India and your biological body is here in the US. Do you all of a sudden perk up and perceive yourself in two places? If so why would that happen?
And then what would happen when your body is killed? Would you just magically transfer to this other mind? And if you claim your mind would be transfered (and biological body killed) while the copy is simultaneously created, this is really just the same situation happening in rapid succession so the answer should be the same.
And finally, since we're using the argument that the mind must not be necessary for conciousness since it's continually changing, what about the "Software" so to speak: the neural network. Its continually changing as well. With every new experience, every second of every day you are a different person. So if change disqualifies the physical body as a necessary component of conciousness then wouldn't it also disqualify the neural network? Could you even keep multiple copies of a mind on seperate servers? Because their varying experiences from being in different places would change their neural networks and make them different conciousnesses the instant after they were created.
No offense (seriously) but the idea that multiple copies of a mind are one and the same person seems a little like people who believe if they were to birth a clone of themselves it would be a weird, evil, mentally connected little child. Or those people who believe twins somehow have a mystical tie. A copy is not you. But I would love for someone to convince me that it is. Because that would be really comforting actually.
You seem to think that consciousness is fundamentally unique to an individual and consistant over time (a bit like a soul). Those of us who favor the 'eternal mind' scenario think that there is no difference between 'my consciousness' and 'your consciousness' except for the things we are conscious of. I'm me because I'm a concious being who has my memories, knowledge, and personality. Therefore, another mind with these properties would still be me. If there were two of them at the same time, they'd diverge into seperate people as soon as they started having separate experiances. There are no dual-consciousnesses or psychic powers involved. Just two people with a lot of shared memories who have equal claim to calling themselves 'Cyborgdreamer'.
Here is a thought exercise for you? (if you are interested)
How would you classify the entities, of which one is clone of the other, but the clone has started a new life with some minor differences. However they are still sharing
many new experiences say through some wireless link . Are they two different people or a merged person? I would say multiple bodied personality. Kinda like an avatar from Indian mythology.
