We ar immortal and in in ugly way - David Lewis

[Alexander1304]

Hello All,
Lately I've reading a lot about many worlds, multiverse and immortality.One peace was the latest work of philosopher David Lewis,"How many lives has Schroedinger Cat?".He states "if there is no collapse,then you will not die,you will go on forever" .

http://www.artsrn.ualberta.ca/pex/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/lewis.pdf

As you survive deadly danger over and over again,you should also expect to suffer repeated harms.You should expect to lose your lover,your eyes,your limbs ,your mental powers and health.

It is not to be welcomed but feared

Any thoughts? David Lewis is considered to be one of the most prominent philosophers of the 20th century.But maybe it is just theory or speculation abyway?...I became really depressed after reading it

 

[Bikewer]

Well, I'm not about to wade through all that...
Let me see; this guy is a philosopher, correct? Not a physicist? And I'm guessing that he buys into that twaddle about the multiverse in the context where every "event' splits off another universe where that event occurred differently?
Which would imply there are infinite copies of "us" floating around in this necessarily-nearly-infinite number of universes?
Mind you, I'm just guessing here...

 

[Alexander1304]

Well, I'm not about to wade through all that...
Let me see; this guy is a philosopher, correct? Not a physicist? And I'm guessing that he buys into that twaddle about the multiverse in the context where every "event' splits off another universe where that event occurred differently?
Which would imply there are infinite copies of "us" floating around in this necessarily-nearly-infinite number of universes?
Mind you, I'm just guessing here...

Yes,he was philosopher,and he bought into what You described

 

[Ziggurat]

It's stupid nonphysical nonsense. First off, there is "collapse", all the friggin' time, pretty much constantly. You have to work hard to NOT get "collapse" on anything past the atomic scale. Second, it's possible to drive transitions between states to 100% probability even without any "collapse".

Let me quote from David Griffiths' "Introduction to Quantum Mechanics" (highlights mine):

To the layman, the philosopher, or the classical physicist, a statement of the form "this particle doesn't have a well-defined position" (or momentum, or x-component of spin angular momentum, or whatever) sounds vague, incompetent, or (worst of all) profound. It is none of these. But its precise meaning is, I think, almost impossible to convey to anyone who has not studied quantum mechanics in some depth.

This sort of paper is exactly what he's talking about: a philosopher who thinks he has stumbled upon great profundity in quantum mechanics, and badly overshoots the mark.

 

[Dancing David]

Hello All,
Lately I've reading a lot about many worlds, multiverse and immortality.One peace was the latest work of philosopher David Lewis,"How many lives has Schroedinger Cat?".He states "if there is no collapse,then you will not die,you will go on forever" .

http://www.artsrn.ualberta.ca/pex/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/lewis.pdf





Any thoughts? David Lewis is considered to be one of the most prominent philosophers of the 20th century.But maybe it is just theory or speculation abyway?...I became really depressed after reading it

[Handwaving] Because I pretend that quantum mechanics says so...[/handwaving]

 

[Caper]

The farther you get into science... the more insane it gets.

 

[MikeG]

........Any thoughts?.....

Yep. It's as half-baked as the attempt to write a title for this thread.

 

[Toontown]

It's stupid nonphysical nonsense. First off, there is "collapse", all the friggin' time, pretty much constantly. You have to work hard to NOT get "collapse" on anything past the atomic scale.

...

Unless what you think is "collapse" is actually decoherence.

Is there a theory which explains how and when "collapse" happens? Such a theory would put the Everett interpretation to rest, but as far as I know it's not been put to rest yet. OTC, the Everett interpretation has gained some acceptance, if only for practical purposes.

BTW, I do not agree that there is any chance of living forever in an increasingly decrepit state, even if there is no "collapse". Only the possible happens, irrespective of QM interpretation.

 

[Alexander1304]

Guys, I don't urge you to read the whole paper that I linked in OP,only perhaps the last part of it, it is the most telling.
And as far as I know S.Hawking and S.Carroll believe in MWI but insist that death is the end of existence.Perhaps they are simply unfamiliar with Lewis's lecture...

 

[Ziggurat]

Is there a theory which explains how and when "collapse" happens?

No, there isn't.

But as a practical matter, collapse is usually what happens when you want to stop doing quantum mechanics because your quantum system interacts with something that you can't model accurately with quantum mechanics (such as a macroscopic measurement device). As such, there isn't too much point in worrying about what exactly it all means.

 

[Alexander1304]

Well,according to one poll in 2009 Lewis was on 13 as best philosophers of last 200 years,and 3rd philosopher of 20th century

 

[Ziggurat]

Well,according to one poll in 2009 Lewis was on 13 as best philosophers of last 200 years,and 3rd philosopher of 20th century

And?

I make no claim about the quality of any other work by Lewis. Maybe it's great, I really don't know or care. But this is crap.

 

[catsmate]

Guys, I don't urge you to read the whole paper that I linked in OP,only perhaps the last part of it, it is the most telling.
And as far as I know S.Hawking and S.Carroll believe in MWI but insist that death is the end of existence.Perhaps they are simply unfamiliar with Lewis's lecture...

Perhaps bring actual scientists they understand things rather better than a mere philosopher.
Also the paper you cite is 14 years old and Lewis died six years ago, calling this nonsense his "latest work" is rather inaccurate.

Well,according to one poll in 2009 Lewis was on 13 as best philosophers of last 200 years,and 3rd philosopher of 20th century

Perhaps he should have studied actual science before writing about it? Starting with aromatic chemistry...

 

[catsmate]

And?

I make no claim about the quality of any other work by Lewis. Maybe it's great, I really don't know or care. But this is crap.

His book on the subject ("On the Plurality of Worlds") has been heavily criticised.

 

[Toontown]

Guys, I don't urge you to read the whole paper that I linked in OP,only perhaps the last part of it, it is the most telling.
And as far as I know S.Hawking and S.Carroll believe in MWI but insist that death is the end of existence.Perhaps they are simply unfamiliar with Lewis's lecture...

Well,according to one poll in 2009 Lewis was on 13 as best philosophers of last 200 years,and 3rd philosopher of 20th century

OK, I'll play along for a bit.

Lewis may be a great philosopher, but I still think his analysis is fatally flawed.

IMO, there are no universes in which a progressively deteriorating brain does not cease to function. Conscousness requires a level of organization which precludes Lewis' idea of a progressively deteriorating immortality. In biological terms, this means a certain prerequisite level of health and vigor. A progressively deteriorating brain is not going last long in any universe.

Even if the Everett interpretation is correct, the only immortality which can reasonably be expected is a healthy (probably godlike) immortality. Perhaps if you live long enough (in some universes), some version(s) of you will see science take the measure of aging and disease (and pretty much everything else). Then, in some of those universes, some you(s) would live a long time, probably as near-gods. Not in increasingly disfunctional states. That is impossible, or if not flatly impossible to some extent, at least orders of magnitude less likely than survival in healthy (godlike) states.

Bottom line: if there are to be versions of you who will become immortal, the vast preponderance of those you(s) will not achieve that feat through weakness, helplessness, and increasing decrepitude. The vast preponderance of immortal you(s) will have relatively godlike powers. The future immortal you will be as different from today's you as today's you is different from a lemur.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Ah, a good place for my argument against immortality.

You live long enough to develop a system to allow you to travel among the stars. One day you swing too close to a neutron star. You crash on the surface of the star and gravity spreads you out into a skin one atom thick.

But you're still alive.

And you'll never leave that star.

 

[Toontown]

Ah, a good place for my argument against immortality.

You live long enough to develop a system to allow you to travel among the stars. One day you swing too close to a neutron star. You crash on the surface of the star and gravity spreads you out into a skin one atom thick.

But you're still alive.

And you'll never leave that star.

That's not an argument against immortality. That's an argument against getting careless with a neutron star.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

That's not an argument against immortality. That's an argument against getting careless with a neutron star.

If you live forever the chances that it will happen grow. But it's just an example of the many nasty things that could happen to you if you're immortal. Want another one?

You're captured by "cannibals". They cut off bits of you and leave you to die. Instead you regenerate. They now realize that they have a one human meat factory. They start experimenting to see just what it would take to actually kill you.

 

[Toontown]

If you live forever the chances that it will happen grow. But it's just an example of the many nasty things that could happen to you if you're immortal. Want another one?

You're captured by "cannibals". They cut off bits of you and leave you to die. Instead you regenerate. They now realize that they have a one human meat factory. They start experimenting to see just what it would take to actually kill you.

I'm trying to imagine what kind of unkillable immortal could exist but wouldn't be able to escape from cannibals or avoid capture in the first place. Or what kind of cannibals could actually capture and hold an unkillable immortal who apparently wouldn't even have developed a network of friends or at least some dazzling trickery during all those millenia. I'm drawing a blank. It's not that I lack imagination. I'm just trying to keep my imaginings within the realm of the physically possible.

Edited to add: heck, I can't even imagine a physically possible unkillable regenerating immortal who lives forever even if it gets stuck to a neutron star. I just don't think some of your imaginings are physically possible, Gawdzilla.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I'm trying to imagine what kind of unkillable immortal could exist but wouldn't be able to escape from cannibals or avoid capture in the first place.

When did we add super powers to the immortality?