WHAT CHOICE DO YOU HAVE? — Free will, identity, & teletransportation
Details
WHAT CHOICE DO YOU HAVE?
—What Makes You You?
https://secure.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/2/1/1/d/600_460628477.jpeg
Are you your brain?
How free are you to choose your actions?
Is there a you in there making the choices?
Is your will determined by past events?
Can free will be compatible with that?
https://secure.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/2/1/2/a/600_460628490.jpeg
Traveling to us all the way from Sydney, Australia: Kris Scott and Elyse Titus will be leading this presentation on PERSONAL IDENTITY, FREE WILL, AND TELETRANSPORTATION, taking the DISCUSSION to a new level from where they left off before talking about the ship of Theseus and the paradox of personal identity, covering classical and new questions raised by modern science.
And we do mean DISCUSSION! There will be lots of opportunity to bounce our thoughts off of each other throughout the evening.
• How do you define free will?
• Is free will compatible with a material universe?
https://secure.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/2/1/3/2/600_460628498.jpeg
Does our definition/understanding of free will change with different interpretations of quantum mechanics? e.g. :
• Copenhagen interpretation (Schrodinger's cat)
• Many-worlds interpretation
• Transactional interpretation
Free will topics/vocab:
• Determinism
• Predeterminism / Theological Determinism
• (Metaphysical) Libertarianism
• Dualism
• Compatibilism
Teletransportation questions:
Say a teleporter was invented that scanned a subject at in pod A, and sent the information of the subject to pod B, which would use available matter to assemble an exact replica of the subject. The scanning process in pod A is destructive, and would disassemble the subject in the process.
https://secure.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/2/1/b/c/600_460628636.jpeg
• Is this teleporter a form of transportation? In other words, if you were to step into pod A, would the person who steps out of pod B be you?
• If this teleporter were possible to build, would it affect our definition of free will?
• If the teleporter didn't destroy the subject in pod A, would your answers to the above questions change?
_________________________
Kris and Elyse met at Iowa State, where Kris was president of the Iowa State Atheist and Agnostic Society, a group dedicated to engaging students in topics of religion, philosophy, and science. He graduated from Iowa State with a BS in Electrical Engineering. He is now an engineer who has been banned from all philosophical conferences (source: http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=1879 (http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=1879))).
Elyse Titus is an artist from western Iowa who likes to express herself through photography, drawing, and metalsmithing. She graduated from Iowa State University with a Bachelor of Fine Art focusing on Metalsmithing and Drawing, and has done additional baccalaureate work toward her Masters. She is inspired by Alice in Wonderland, philosophy, and horses. A favorite quote: "I can't go back to yesterday, because I was a different person then." - Lewis Carroll
_________________________
https://secure.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/1/f/2/3/600_460627971.jpeg
Come early at 6:45 to get to know people. Grab something to eat from the Café and make this a prandial discussion, if you like.
Afterward, we'll philosophize even more freely together at the nearby Blue Moose.
Fred Heeren / fred@day-star.org