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Beyond the Soul
James J. Hughes Ph.D.Public Policy, Trinity College
Executive Director, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies
Ensoulment Views
“The Soul of Trans-Humanism” By Ted Peters (2005)
Immortal souls not an orthodox Christian, creedal belief
Varieties of Christian Soul Views:Substance DualismTrichotomyEmergent DualismNon-reductive PhysicalismTheological MaterialismAtheistic Materialism
Spirit Dualisms
Substance Dualism Hindu atman and most lay theism Pre-existing and after death essence
Trichotomy Body, soul (mind/brain), spirit (supra-
physical) Baptism replaces human spirit with
divine spirit
Emergent Dualism Soul emergent from the brain, but
supraphysical Before the body, no soul
Materialist Ideas of the Soul Non-reductive Physicalism
Soul/Mind cannot be reduced to the brain
No body, no soul
Resurrection of the body necessary
Theological Materialism
Soul is a conscious, physical brain’s attunement to God
(Uploads and robots could have this kind of soul)
Atheistic Materialism
“Soul” is meaningless: there is only consciousness and self-identity
Enlightenment and Self
Liberal individualism: rational, autonomous, continuous citizens, consumers, contractors
Individual is fundamental unit of analysis
Hobbes: individuals sacrifice freedom for rational goal of security
Rights of Man, Bill of Rights
Mill: individuals given freedom to pursue own ends will maximize social happiness
Locke
Bridge to atheist materialism God made thinking matter Theological materialist, but
resurrected body will be of different matter
Memory is bridge from life to resurrected body
Subjective identity necessary for Judgment, accountability
Self is Thinking, Memory, Identity
…to find wherein personal Identity consists, we must consider what Person stands for; which, I think, is a thinking intelligent Being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing in different times and places… (Locke, 1689)
Splitting Identity
Locke: if identity is memory in matter, it could be split
Hume’s Empiricist Skepticism
All cause-effects are perceptual illusions
The continuity of the self is a perceptual illusion
"…a bundle or collection of different perceptions which succeed one another with an inconceivable rapidity and are in perpetual flux and movement" (Hume, 1739)
Threat to Liberal Individualism If personal identity is an illusion, what of
the Enlightenment project of building a new society of rational individuals pursuing self interests through democracy and market exchange?
If we are so confused about the very nature of our selves how is it possible for us to create a society based on the equality of citizens, morally accountable persons and individual rights?
Selfless and irrational individuals might instead validate benevolent despotism towards collective goods.
Neuroscience and the Self
No localization in the brain Many processes: Senses,
Proprioception, Awareness, Cognition
Split brain Memory is narrative fiction
Kahneman: experiencing self vs. remembered self
Thomas Metzinger Self-identity is fluid, selective
Derek Parfit
Reasons and Persons Identity is probabilistic over time Eventually our identity with our
future selves declines to equal identity with interests of all others
Post-self utilitarianism: act in the interest of all future persons as if own self
Transhumanism and Identity
“Future Minds: Transhumanism, Cognitive Enhancement and the Nature of Persons” Susan Schneider (2009) drawing on Ray Kurzweil
1.Ego (Ensoulment)
2.Materialism (You are your body)
3.Psychological continuity (Patternism)
4.No Self
Transhumanist FAQ “Many philosophers who have studied the
problem think that at least under some conditions, an upload of your brain would be you. A widely accepted position is that you survive so long as certain information patterns are conserved, such as your memories, values, attitudes, and emotional dispositions, and so long as there is causal continuity so that earlier stages of yourself help determine later stages of yourself.... These problems are being intensely studied by contemporary analytic philosophers, and although some progress has been made, e.g. in Derek Parfit’s work on personal identity, they have still not been resolved to general satisfaction.”
Patternists: Cryonics
Replace the body, but maintain the contents of the brain
But how much can be recovered?
Patternists: Mark Walker
" Cognitive Enhancement and the Identity Objection” (2008)Changing too quickly could destroy self-continuityWhy does pace of change matter to identity from time A to time B?Acknowledges that identity is only subjective
Patternists: Martine Rothblatt You are a collection of bemes
Bemes are fundamental, transmissible, mutate-able units of beingness; elements of personality, mannerisms, feelings, recollections, beliefs, values, and attitudes.
Putting back together enough of your bemes will re-create you
Not the kind of rich subjectivity most people associate with identity
Constantly changing?
Multiple copies? Recombinant?
Patternists: Max More
"The Diachronic Self: Identity, Continuity, Transformation“ (1995)If you maintain strong values, even if you lose all memories, you are still youEspecially if self-transformation is your strong valuePersonality erasure not what most transhumanists sign up for
Robin Hanson
“If uploads come first” (1994)
If there are a thousand copies of you, who owns your stuff?
Transhumanism and No Self Radical cognitive malleability
Memory recording, erasure, modification, sharing
Conscious identity selection, merged identity
Body identity modification: none, extra, multiple
Supression, selection, enhancement of values
Radical life extension and transmigration
Identity maintenance over millions of years?
Over multiple types of instantiation?
End of Liberal Individualism
Anomic disorientation End of individual
accountability Debate over criminal liability
Borgian communitarianism (self at a higher level)
Buddhist answer: self and no-self
Post-Self Society as X-RiskNick Bostrom (2004): “We can thus imagine a technologically highly advanced society, containing many sorts of complex structures, some of which are much smarter and more intricate than anything that exists today, in which there would nevertheless be a complete absence of any type of being whose welfare has moral significance.
In a sense, this would be an uninhabited society. All the kinds of being that we care even remotely about would have vanished… the catastrophe would be that such a world would not contain even the right kind of machines, i.e. ones that are conscious and whose welfare matters. (Bostrom, 2004)
Buddhist No Self
Embracing the reality of the constantly changing and illusory nature of self is liberating
We can, and must, use self concept while recognizing its emptiness
Property, legal liability, contracts presume continuity, but we need (arbitrary) agreements about when identity is lost
New Enlightenment
Beyond the myth of the liberal self Beyond the illusive goal of
personal immortality Beyond the identity/rupture of
humanity to posthumanity Consciously embracing the reality
of our continual self-imagination To what ends?
For more:
“Contradictions of the Enlightenment: Liberal Individualism versus the Erosion of Personal Identity”http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/hughes20111119
