@algekalipso I couldn't come up with a good counter, but this is how ChatGPT responded. I think I get what it's saying, but what do you make of it?
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dexscrol
24 posts
No and I'm puzzled by why you'd think it does? What is this casual integration you're talking about? See e.g. to see why it wouldn't work - classical processes don't generate unified wholes:
open.substack.com/pub/andrsgmeze…
But even if it did, then you have fission, fusion, etc. CI doesn't survive that even with causal integration over time.
Colma, CA 🇺🇸 English
Every moment of experience is some version of Indra’s Net, just with most of the reflections being nearly opaque.
Colma, CA 🇺🇸 English
@Luke_Flyswatter @grok @pulseofbeing Can you ask Grok (I’m not a paid user) whether they actually think I’m using a tautology, or if they’re only saying that because they’re answering within the SBT framework?
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"The distinction between past, present, and future is nothing more than a very convincing illusion."
- echoing Albert Einstein
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@algekalipso Maybe even if moments are sharp, it doesn’t follow that extended processes aren’t real subjects, since many real systems have fuzzy boundaries yet remain causally unified. If integration is doing real work, maybe that already individuates a subject. Does that bridge the gap?
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If you don't have sharp boundaries you're not individuating anything :P it's not a real thing. But you, as a moment of experience are real, and have real boundaries. There is a transitivity of co-witnessing for the qualia present in a moment of experience. This isn't soft or fuzzy. And you don't share this any more with your future self than with anyone else. IF you agree you continue to exist from moment to moment, you're forced to extend it to all other moments of experience. You don't have to - you can identify with the moment of experience, but then it's EI not CI.
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@algekalipso Maybe even if the 4D object is fuzzy, what really matters is the specific, causally continuous structure generating a unified experience, which can individuate a subject without sharp boundaries. Do you think that still fails to close the gap without OI?
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@dexscrol Meaning, brains and people aren't _really_ 4D objects - there is no boundary around them over a long spatiotemporal extension.
Colma, CA 🇺🇸 English
@Luke_Flyswatter @pulseofbeing @grok If the subject = an integrated process generating experience, nothing seems to need assigning. The key is the structure - a specific, causally continuous organization that yields a unified perspective. “Why this one?” only arises if you posit something beyond that.
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@dexscrol @pulseofbeing @grok Your individualist position cannot explain why you are you rather than someone else without resorting to a tautology. You need a selector to do this but none can be found. It is thus more parsimonious to assume you are everyone until such a selector can be found
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@memcculloch @RichardWareX Mike, do you agree with Grok’s view here? I believe I remember you saying that your drive could potentially get us out of the atmosphere.
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Because space-time superficially worked locally, it has suborned physics & taken it down a sterile path. There's a better way: quantised inertia works from q mechanics & horizons, is more testable & predicts galaxies w/o dark matter. It has applications & separates time out.
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@kevembuangga @algekalipso I think even if location is fuzzy, what matters here is integration - how strongly parts form a unified causal/informational process. Spatial separation only matters insofar as it affects that.
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@algekalipso @dexscrol No way all this fiddling around in natural language will ever be conclusive.
We don't even know what "location" exactly means:
x.com/skdh/status/20…
Sabine Hossenfelder@skdh
A new record for quantum superpositions! You might say quantum mechanics is already strange enough with particles acting like waves and being in two places at once and whatnot, but scientists just set a new record for how big this weirdness can get. In the new experiment that was just published in Nature, the group from Vienna managed to put sodium nanoparticles, each with more than 7,000 atoms, into superpositions using laser gratings. Then they proved that the particles could interfere with themselves, so they must have been in multiple places at once. These particles are about ten times heavier than the previously largest quantum object made to interfere with itself. I find this an interesting experimental avenue because I believe that we will eventually see deviations from the predictions of quantum mechanics when objects become massive enough. Source: Pedalino et al, Nature 649, 866 (2026)
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@algekalipso I think his key point is that what matters, R, is grounded because the structure itself generates the experience - nothing deeper is needed.
Interested in whether you think that actually closes the gap.
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@algekalipso Fair push. I’d imagine Parfit: R =/= new Sun; w/ identity deflated, what remains = integrated, causally continuous 4D structure. R just describes its organization. Subject = that process, not over it, so continuity can matter w/o deep identity.
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@algekalipso One last AI bit: A person is a 4D structure defined by integrated, self-referential relations. Unified experience arises only within locally bounded causal/informational integration; since distinct systems lack this, they constitute distinct subjects - not one shared subject.
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@algekalipso I'm a novice here, but I think the AI conclusion is a Parfit-style view: identity =/= fundamental - with consciousness being a finite, causally continuous process - where when that process ends, there is no further experience or continuation.
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@algekalipso I will check it out. How confident are you that it is correct over the standard view? Multiple AIs gave a 99.9+ (a seemingly arbitrary number) percent likelihood that the standard is true over OI/GSC, so idk what to make of it.
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@Luke_Flyswatter @pulseofbeing @grok Why does a selector need to exist at all? Why can’t a person (including the said subjective stream) simply be a numerically unique, static object within spacetime - even if the subjective content is finite?
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@dexscrol @pulseofbeing @grok That is a tautology. You are simply saying you are you. It's invalid. Individualism needs a selector. You can easily imagine having been born someone else yet you are you since no selector or individual can be found it should be assumed you were born as everyone.
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@Luke_Flyswatter @pulseofbeing @grok I don't have a firm position. I'm unsure whether it's truly something that we can formally prove, definitively. What do you think is the best argument?
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@Luke_Flyswatter @pulseofbeing @grok A counter would likely be that the standard view doesn't require any selector: you simply are your numerically unique 4D worldline. No mechanism decides which life you get. When the stream ends at death, the object retains its numerical identity, but experience just stops.
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