Anyhow, we’ll set the rest of that discussion aside for now, since I want to clarify how I differ from some of the others.
I don’t believe in the purely mind-pattern definition of self.
I don’t see uploads, if possible, as being identical people to the originals. You might be able to Ship-of-Theseus something to cross that causal barrier, but then you have to actually Ship-of-Theseus it to get the appropriate causal entangling.
If I get shot, and you re-instance a brain backup into the blank nervous system of some sort of empty clone doll, I don’t wake up - the clone does.
My suspicion has only grown greater on this with the whole quantum stuff.
…not that having a near-identical clone go on without me isn’t at least somewhat comforting as an idea, but then, so is a nice grave compared to naught at all.
What about sleep?
It’s the same physical hardware, and I think that makes a difference.
Does that apply to your hypothetical digital copies as well, do they have to go through elaborate protocols of continuous operation to transfer from one datacentre to another without dying, or is it just the flesh-to-silicon transition that has this problem?
do they have to go through elaborate protocols of continuous operation to transfer from one datacentre to another without dying,
I would think so, but I am less likely to believe that consciousness is purely classical these days.