The Plastic Knives

Here I recount the dream with the longest time-coherency that I’ve ever had in my life -- the main quest/objective actually stayed the same for over 5-10+ minutes without veering off into completely unrelated topics like most dreams do, which I find to be remarkable.

In a neighborhood residential street, a couple of street performers were enveloped by a crowd. I then saw one of the street performers inhaling a white powder through their nose, presumably as some sort of trick, though I suspected it was actually cocaine. In fact, more street performers and even audience members joined in on this “trick” and there became so much white powder in the air that it started to blow downstream with the wind.

I thought to myself, “am I going to get a second-hand cocaine high?”

Seconds later it hit me; I was definitely high. My mental state became very foggy, colors were changing, and everything became slightly more scary. Fortunately it was daytime so it wasn’t too scary. But as we left the crowd and started walking downhill on a street (we were on a steep hill like in those San Francisco streets), we approached a large cavern opening. Inside there was a jungle, but it was full of cliff edges with sheer drop offs (leading to more jungle below).

I spotted an evil-looking creature, something like a cross between a raptor and pterodactyl. One of my friends was too far ahead, and was cut off from the main party. The raptor looked like it might attack, and we needed backup. I then realized there were actually a lot of these flying raptor things. I saw that they could fly, as they were flying in the open space past where the cliffs dropped off. Fortunately, humans were standing on the edges of these cliffs and had the high ground. They were throwing boomerangs at the monsters to take them down.

I approached the people with the boomerangs and upon inquiry, discovered their weapon of choice: Plastic knives. These “natives” (actually they looked like college engineering students) had figured out how to weaponize plastic knives as boomerangs by throwing them in a specific way to control the population of the flying raptors. The problem was, the battle was at a critical point where they were running out of plastic knives and the raptors were still coming in droves. I needed to get more.

So I left the area to get more. I didn’t really know where I was going, but I’d know when I got there.

There were a number of strange obstacles I had to traverse, most of which I don’t remember. One of them stands out in my memory: An extremely steep escalator. The slope grew so steep that I had to grab onto the handrail to prevent tumbling down all the way back. And to complicate things, there were cars coming in the opposite direction. Yes, cars on escalators. I had to jump over each car. Most of them were sedans, but one of them was a minivan which was particularly challenging. The handrail became more than just a handrail; it was now flexible whip-like reigns. They could stay in my hand as I jumped over the cars so I could keep holding onto them.

I breathed a sigh of relief as we finally crested over the top.

After some more wandering I happened across a food court. Yes, this was the place. There must be plastic knives here, I thought. In a moment of panic I realized I had nothing but a T-shirt and jeans and nothing to carry them in. Then my jacket materialized around me. I found and gathered as many plastic knives as I could, stuffing them into my jacket pockets. I even managed to find a completely unopened pack of about 400 in a paper bag. Satisfied, I started to head back in the direction from which I came.

The “townspeople” of the food court understood the importance of my quest. They tasked one of their warriors, a young woman, to accompany me on the way back. But I was in a hurry, and she had other things to do, so as I ran on ahead of her, she asked if I needed a gun. I said yes, so she tossed me a blaster.

As I continued my quest back to the flying raptors location I promptly forgot about the gun and woman who both disappeared from the scene. But I still had the plastic knives; that was the important part.

I didn’t have to take the escalator with the cars this time. There was a tunnel that ran underneath the escalator, which wasn’t available before.

I stepped outdoors into snow. Really deep fluffy snow which slowed me down via the dreaded “dream walking”. I was on a college campus now, maybe University of Chicago, crossing small single-lane streets with cars backed up as far as the eye could see, and party music blaring from nearby frat houses. The sun was still out, but tonight would definitely be a party night. Clearly the setting surrounding the flying raptors had changed greatly. But it didn’t matter, because I still had the plastic knives, and I instinctively knew where to go.

I entered a frat house, which I knew would somehow lead to the jungle where the humans were in dire need of the plastic knives. There were two frat bros acting as gatekeepers, typical of many frat parties. I was lucky -- they only needed to see my ID and I’d be allowed inside. But when I took out my wallet, in place of where my ID should’ve been was a blank card along with the words “Fuck you, Max!” written on the backside (my brain must’ve gotten this from the TV series “Newsroom”).

I was doomed… but no. I checked the other card slots in my wallet. I took out an old wrinkly card which I’d had my entire life, and never really known what it was for. I didn’t even know why I kept it with me for so long. But here it was, and reading the words, I finally understood their meaning: “The man who would save the world, and would eventually need this card”. I handed this to the frat bros, who seemed to understand, and they let me through.

In the frat house, there were people in the know. They guided me through a couple doors/hallways and I stepped through a portal which led me to a beautiful outdoors park which was within walking distance of the jungle location. Here I finally offloaded all my plastic knives to a runner who would get them to the right people on time.

With the world having been saved, the tension was dramatically reduced. A melancholy soundtrack started to play: [Plastic Knives theme by Max Loh]. I took a walk around a nearby lake where quite a lot of people were playing or relaxing. A 7-year-old boy sat alone in front of an apparatus which looked like a totem pole made of legos. As he typed something into the totem pole, words started to appear and float over the lake: “I have had to hold Him back”. “Him” of course must have been referring to Lord Voldemort, who was the reason for the whole flying raptor infestation in the first place. The revelation was poignant: Even though Lord Voldemort hardly ever listened to anyone, he had a soft spot for the boy. If he was torturing someone and the boy told him to stop, he often would. The kid had power, but in a twisted way that must’ve been very stressful to bear. He had my sympathies.

Mind Uploading Would Actually Transfer Your Consciousness: Debunking the "One Me" Fallacy

Imagine someone presents you with a replication device similar to the Star Trek Teleporter which instantly makes a totally perfect copy of your body, and simultaneously destroys your original body. Would you get in such a device, if given a million dollars? Most people would say "No, because the copy wouldn't actually be me". I will explain why most people are wrong. I know it sounds ridiculous, but copying and simultaneously killing yourself is the same thing as a true "transfer" of consciousness (mainly because there is nothing to transfer in the first place). 

Imagine the same replication device described above, with a twist. Right after copying you, but before destroying the original body, it is allowed to switch an identical portion of your brains (assuming you believe you are your brain)*. It has a settings knob titled "swap percentage" that is adjustable from 0% to 100% which determines the % of brain switched. For example:

• At 0%, nothing is switched; it just copies you and destroys the original like before. 
• At 10%, it cuts out the same 10%-sized chunk out of each brain and surgically swaps them perfectly before killing the original. 
• At 100%, it does a full brain transplant to swap the brains before killing the original; at this point it's basically killing the copy and leaving the original intact. 

If you're like most people, you believe that you'll die and be replaced if the settings knob is at 0% (because the machine killed the original you), but you'll live if the settings knob is at 100% (because your brain was moved over, before killing the original body), right?

Assuming this is true, if 0% results in death and 100% results in survival, then one of the following must be true for the in-between percentages between 0-100: Either at some point the answer abruptly changes from "death" to "survival", or increasing the percentage knob gradually changes the result from "death" to "survival".

1. Abrupt: If the answer abruptly changed from death to survival at some point, that would mean there exists some "threshold" percentage of brain matter swapped, which when crossed would suddenly result in your original consciousness "jumping over" to the new brain, despite it being physically identical to previous scenarios with slightly lower percent. In other words, you'd be claiming that there exists some percent, e.g. 50%, whereby if we swap exactly 50% of your brain matter, you will jump into the copied brain, but at 49.9999%, you will stay in the original brain. 
2. Gradual: If increasing the percent of the scenario gradually makes you more and more alive, that implies that in between, it is possible for you to be in a half-alive state, with your consciousness straddling two brains. In other words, you'd be claiming that at some percent e.g. 50%, your true consciousness is half in one brain and half in the other brain, even though in this scenario both brains are exactly physically identical to before the operation, thus have no physical capability to feel any different than what they would've normally felt without any modification.

We established earlier that if it's true you die at 0% swap and live at 100% swap, either the abrupt or gradual case must be true. If you agree neither the abrupt nor gradual cases make sense, then there is only one rational conclusion: The original assumption was wrong. Your answer to whether you live or die, must be the same at 0% swap as at 100% swap. In other words: Copying you and killing your original self, has the same exact effect on your consciousness as copying you and killing the copy!

How is this possible? In short: "One true you" is an illusion. The uncanny first-person awareness exists only in the present moment, and every passing moment can be thought of as a different person inheriting the old one's memories. The physical memories in your brain are the only reason you feel like a single continuous entity throughout time. 

You are not the brain. You are a moment of information produced by the brain. I know it's hard to digest, but I think it is a lot more believable than the "abrupt" and "gradual" options I have outlined above. 

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*Responses to common rebuttals:

"Isn't this just Ship of Theseus?"

No, you're not gradually moving more and more of your brain; you're setting the knob between 0%-100%; the machine switches out that amount of your brain in one fell swoop.

Isn't this just Sorites Paradox?"

No, Sorites Paradox literally just ignores that changes can be fuzzy/gradual. Something I explicitly addressed and debunked is the possibility of fuzzy/gradual change in your consciousness in spite of your brain remaining completely the same. 

"But of course consciousness exists; how can you deny the first-person experience?"

The only sure thing about the first-person view is that it's happening right now. It's "I think therefore I am", not "I think therefore I was". There's no evidence your first-person awareness has any connection to the past, beyond what your physical brain memories are telling you. 

"It's impossible to partially replace the brain and have everything be okay. The result will be brain-damaged etc."

You are debating the implication of a futuristic device which can materialize a whole person atomically from scratch so completely that they're indistinguishable from the original. So why is it when I start talking about partial brain replacements it's suddenly impossible?  

"Maybe the part of the brain responsible for consciousness is just a tiny portion or even 1 neuron, or maybe some other part of the body is involved (e.g. muscle memory, gut bacteria)"

Modify the replicator in the experiment to swap a % of whatever physical thing you think produces consciousness. Whether it's a brain or something else is inconsequential to the argument as long as it's physical and divisible. 

"Even the slightest modification of the brain results in an impostor who just thinks he's you, so you're actually dying in all the scenarios except 100% swap."

Then you believe you're replaced by a new consciousness even if you lightly bump your head and kill 1 neuron by accident. Either that or you misspoke and you're actually okay with switching a very small number of neurons or at least atoms, in which case the original argument still applies... 

"Mind uploading is different from physical copying"

The same scenarios can be applied to partially uploading a brain and connecting it via BCI to the corresponding un-uploaded biological part. It's the same issue as before: "drawing a line" has absurd implications about consciousness. 

"Maybe consciousness is supernatural, beyond the brain, etc"

 You are entitled to that belief and it is beyond the scope of this article. The intended audience are people who, like me, believe consciousness is purely caused by physical processes in the brain. 

The “Hard Problem of Consciousness” is actually the “Hard Problem of Now”

Everything meaningful about the hard problem of consciousness (i.e. problems that are actually "hard" or impossible to solve) always boil down to "why is there a now and why is it from my point of view" instead of "why does a brain make a subjective feeling".

• Qualia are by definition completely utterly undeniable with a 100% chance of existing. That automatically means the past and future already don't qualify. In fact, opponents like Daniel Dennett have done a pretty good job at refuting qualia, but they're refuting the idea of qualia which persists through time. The fact is even when you remember a recent memory, the only sure thing is that you feel like you're remembering a memory. The only thing that's absolutely sure to exist is whatever you're feeling at this very instant. Therefore, qualia only really ever exist in the "present moment".
• Current formulations of Hard Problem of Consciousness are extremely linguistically ambiguous. One common problem is that opposers will prove that consciousness is not mysterious in the way proposed, and supporters will say "but of course I wasn't talking about that kind of consciousness!" (this is apparent from online arguments as well as the wikipedia page). It is a lot easier and less prone to misinterpretation to reformulate it as a problem of "now". "Now" shouldn't even exist -- there's no objective evidence of it at all. There's nothing physical which denotes this moment in time as a "special point" in the universe. Yet, we can all agree it exists, and in fact is the one sure thing to exist!
• Even though we can all agree "now" exists, it is physically impossible to agree on when "now" is. Theory of Relativity proves that everyone's "now" must be different because there is no such thing as absolute simultaneity (no one reference point in the universe which says "this is the real now"). The question is why does there appear to be an undeniable singular "now", happening right now, which happens to be from your point of view, when in fact no such thing exists in the objective world.

tl;dr fundamentally Hard Problem of Consciousness is really a question about subjective inner mind vs objective world. It asks why there's a subjective inner mind in the first place. But the subjective inner mind really only ever exists "right now", so the problem should be simplified (and made much less prone to linguistic misinterpretation) by asking "why is there a now" instead of "why is there a subjective side to consciousness".

The chance of X existing is unknowable

What are the chances that Harry Potter, unicorns, etc. actually exist? Most people would say almost none, but I’m here to tell you that the answer is actually that there is no answer. It is impossible to estimate the chances that something exists if we’ve never seen that thing before.

If anyone disagrees with me, I invite them to answer the question: How do you calculate or estimate the % chance that any particular thing exists beyond our known bubble of space-time?

It would boil down to the # of expected particles needed for that thing to randomly come into being, and the total # of particles that are beyond our known bubble of space-time. We can estimate the first, which would be astronomically large. How do we even begin to estimate the latter? What if it is also astronomically large? How do we know if there are other bubbles of space-time, and if so, how many particles a “typical” one has?

If the “typical universe” has an unfathomably huge # of particles, way beyond what’s in our present-day universe (say graham’s number or some other ludicrously high number), then everything we can conceive would exist, via nothing other than the Infinite Monkeys Theorem*. Given a large enough amount of random stuff, eventually the amazing thing will be found somewhere inside that mess. A related idea is the Boltzmann Brain.

You can only estimate probability based on data if you have prior data. When you try to answer questions like “are there other universes” or “how much stuff is in a typical universe”, your sample size is literally 1. We have no way of knowing.

*There is nothing that triggers me more than someone derailing my argument by pointing out that literal infinity is impossible, or that the infinite monkey theorem needs monkeys. The infinite monkeys theorem only requires a large enough amount of stuff (monkeys is only an analogy) for the near-impossible to become probable, and does not require literal infinity unless the probability is literally zero.