Abstract
This paper examines the relationship between neural enhancement, uploading, and personal identity. Building on our earlier work, it argues that the aspects of cognitive functioning that are central to the preservation of personal identity are those surrounding consciousness. Neural enhancements that do not preserve consciousness do not preserve personal identity. Examining in particular the influential arguments of Clark, Clowes, Gärtner, and others regarding the extended mind, we argue for a pessimistic view of the ability for mind extension technologies that are currently available to provide a feasible path to transcend human biology while still preserving our personal identity.
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Notes
- 1.
In their original paper, Clark and Chalmers do mention a hypothetical Tetris game player who had a brain implant, but it is not their main focus. In subsequent years, Clark especially began to discuss implant cases in more detail. See, for instance, Clark (2003). They still were not a focus of significant discussion until later, however.
- 2.
We will refer to AI-based technologies used in the brain (e.g., neural lace, brain chips, etc.) generically as ‘neural prosthetics’ or ‘brain chips,’ as other discussions of the issue tend to do, but one should bear in mind that some of these technologies may not be microchips and they may be enhancements, rather than therapies (‘prosthetic’ may sound therapeutic).
- 3.
This is not to suggest it definitively shows that sophisticated AIs we encounter would be conscious, although it is suggestive. As Schneider underscores, we can’t assume, just because a silicon brain chip can allow conscious experience in humans, that AIs with the same chips are conscious, as consciousness likely depends upon the type of architectural configuration a system has.
- 4.
Perhaps biologically-based enhancements would be effective, however. If these can go outside of the brain or head, perhaps this would satisfy the EM hypothesis, as Katrina Vold has intriguingly suggested (Vold 2018). Indeed, perhaps they could even satisfy an extended consciousness hypothesis.
- 5.
See, for instance, our arguments in Corabi and Schneider (2012) and Schneider 2019a. See also Piccinini (this volume) for related arguments.
- 6.
For more detail and discussion of variations, see Corabi and Schneider (2012).
- 7.
For Cartesians who do not believe that the seat of consciousness (the mind or soul) has a spatial location, qualifications must be added. We do believe, however, that a version of this argument will apply even to Cartesians. See Corabi and Schneider (2012). The large distance between the two sites in this example is also meant purely for illustration. If there is any distance—as surely there would be in these paradigmatic cases—the same point applies.
- 8.
Chalmers (2012), claims that there are objects that exist with spatio-temporal gaps of this sort. He uses the example of Yale University, which moved in 1713 from Westherfield to New Haven, Connecticut. Although some of the constituents of Yale moved from its old home to its new one, no one would claim that Yale moved continuously along the route. Hence, he contends, there is a counterexample to our claim. We believe this is wrong. The main reason is that a university is a conventional object, not a natural one (of a more “joint-carving sort”) in the way a human being or human person is. Conventional objects may have strange identity and preservation conditions, and their preservation is typically very sensitive to social and contextual factors in a way that the preservation of a human being is not. See Corabi and Schneider (2014) for more details.
- 9.
See Clark and Chalmers (1998).
- 10.
To see an extreme example of such an individual, consider the case of Deacon Patrick Jones. Jones suffers from anterograde amnesia due to TBI that was a result of a large succession of concussions. In a high-tech version of the strategy in the film Memento, he uses a combination of high-tech software to deliver relevant information to him at all times, in spite of the fact that he cannot remember anything for more than a few seconds. Our thanks to Rob Clowes for pointing out this example. See Clowes (2013), Heersmink (2016), and https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/kluge/200812/what-if-hm-had-blackberry
- 11.
We owe this terminology to Rob Clowes, as well as much of the inspiration for reexamining our own position in light of these ideas about the extended mind and uploading. Clowes has been at the forefront of the movement to develop arguments along these lines. See Clowes and Gärtner (this volume).
- 12.
This argument was inspired by a presentation given by Rob Clowes at the “Minds, Selves, and twenty-first Century Technology Conference” at the New University of Lisbon in June of 2016. We do not know if he himself would endorse the argument as stated, however.
- 13.
The “something close” qualification here is designed to include cases where a person has fissioned—as plausibly occurs in situations where an embryo splits into identical twins. The relationship the later twins bear to the original embryo would be included here as relevantly close to numerical identity. (This is what in Corabi and Schneider (2012) we referred to as “continuation.”)
- 14.
Small qualifications are required to deal with Cartesianism, but these do not affect the substance of the points being made. The physical entities relevant to mentality—and hence, according to most Cartesians, relevant to the self—are still typically thought to be located entirely in the body or just the brain.
- 15.
See Clark and Chalmers (1998) for a discussion of these conditions.
- 16.
There may still be discontinuity right now, since the brain is still playing a major role, but the idea is that this role will decrease as time goes on as the sophistication of the devices we rely on increases. But we will not have to wait that long to see this decrease—nowhere near as long as the time required to produce the sorts of technologies required for uploading to take place in the way envisioned by sci-fi enthusiasts.
- 17.
Though this might not be true of more recent centuries, when carrying around paper notes was feasible. In the case of paper notes, the dispersal is not generally quite as impressive of course, but there is no reason why it could not be in principle and sometimes wasn’t in practice, particularly once railroad, auto, and air transportation became feasible
- 18.
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Schneider, S., Corabi, J. (2021). Cyborg Divas and Hybrid Minds. In: Clowes, R.W., Gärtner, K., Hipólito, I. (eds) The Mind-Technology Problem . Studies in Brain and Mind, vol 18. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-72644-7_7
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