Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body? • Hacker News Board

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#91

Post by taisto29 » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 11:52 AM UTC

the8472 wrote: post #69

keiferski wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point is that the reason we consider the entire body to be a “swappable part” is because we have constructed a metaphysics in which it is. That doesn’t make it actually the case, and furthermore, doing so has a lot of negative consequences for our actual embodied selves.

Metaphysics? What if I put you in a coma and wake you up a few days later and tell you a team of surgeons had replaced one of your internal organs with a lab-grown genetically equivalent version. Or maybe they just cut you open and closed you up again. Sure, there's a small scar left as evidence and some residual pain. But how would you be able to tell the difference? How does it connect to your perceptible self?

You consider genetical sameness, what about the epigenetic traits, aquired traits like sickness etc? It will be erased in a new organ, and it will make the brain function and percieve differently, which you may or may not be able to attribute to this particular transplantation, of course. But scientifically, we don't treat brain as some solid finite substance that exists (born? created?) in a fixed state forever, and thus can be moved here and there and stay same in it's uniqueness. Brain/mind main property is that it's dynamic, and this dynamism is brought through by the rest of the body, and the environment it lives in and senses and adapts to.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#92

Post by the8472 » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:00 PM UTC

taisto29 wrote: post #91

the8472 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Metaphysics? What if I put you in a coma and wake you up a few days later and tell you a team of surgeons had replaced one of your internal organs with a lab-grown genetically equivalent version. Or maybe they just cut you open and closed you up again. Sure, there's a small scar left as evidence and some residual pain. But how would you be able to tell the difference? How does it connect to your perceptible self?

You consider genetical sameness, what about the epigenetic traits, aquired traits like sickness etc? It will be erased in a new organ, and it will make the brain function and percieve differently, which you may or may not be able to attribute to this particular transplantation, of course. But scientifically, we don't treat brain as some solid finite substance that exists (born? created?) in a fixed state forever, and…

> what about the epigenetic traits, aquired traits like sickness etc?

No different than getting some drug that improves your organ's health without replacing them. Perhaps via gene therapy, stem cell manipulation or whatever.

> Brain/mind main property is that it's dynamic, and this dynamism is brought through by the rest of the body, and the environment it lives in and senses and adapts.

It does that whether you transplant organs or not. Your tomorrow's self will not be quite identical to today's self either way. Replacing body parts only changes the trajectory in a similar way a change of environment would. Perhaps a drastic change, but still a decision that people could consciously make.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#93

Post by faeyanpiraat » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:02 PM UTC

Nextgrid wrote: post #72

keiferski wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point is that the reason we consider the entire body to be a “swappable part” is because we have constructed a metaphysics in which it is. That doesn’t make it actually the case, and furthermore, doing so has a lot of negative consequences for our actual embodied selves.

> That doesn’t make it actually the case To the best of our knowledge and experience with it comes to transplanting organs, it seems to be? > doing so has a lot of negative consequences for our actual embodied selves Can you elaborate? Organ transplants (and most likely other medical procedures) definitely throw wrenches into various spiritual & religious beliefs, but in the physical world (which we can observe & stu…

You have a bunch of nerve tissue around your body, which contain information.

Your brain is also calibrated to your organs.

Your brain may notice you need to release X amount of adrenaline, and sends out a signal. Then your new body releases a different amount, because your new adrenal glands are used to a slightly different signal intensity.

And the body contains an enormous amount of complicated metabolical processes which are tightly coupled together.

Imagine the chaos, if everything starts to work a little differently, because “there is a new boss”.

I have no formal education in this yopic and my comment is only speculation, but it seems logical.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#94

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:19 PM UTC

keiferski wrote: post #68

MattGaiser wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't this just science? We routinely replace every other part except the brain, whether by mechanical, artificial biological, or donor/transplant means. Prosthetic arms and legs are normal, millions need things like insulin replaced in their bodies that is manufactured by yeast, and every day thousands donate blood to be put into other people and replacing kidneys, hearts, lungs, and various other organs from those…

My point is that the reason we consider the entire body to be a “swappable part” is because we have constructed a metaphysics in which it is. That doesn’t make it actually the case, and furthermore, doing so has a lot of negative consequences for our actual embodied selves.

[deleted]

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#95

Post by tsimionescu » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:21 PM UTC

Gupie wrote: post #63

tsimionescu wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are presupposing that there is a material difference between these two. Whenever you have a discontinuation of your conscious experience (for example, when you go to sleep and wake up), you can view that as one person disappearing, and a copy waking up in the morning. In fact, unless you believe in a transcendent soul as the seat of consciousness, it must be equivalent. So, when you step into the teleporter, you…

> unless you believe in a transcendent soul as the seat of consciousness, it must be equivalent. That is a big claim considering we have no idea what causes consciousness. It is however certain that the copy is not you. Whether the original gets destroyed on teleportation or not, the original you will not feel, see, hear etc anything that the copy does.

Sure, the two copies won't feel, see, hear anything in common. But I also don't hear the sounds I heard yesterday, or feel the sand I felt last year, or even taste the tea I tasted this morning. Regardless of what gives rise to consciousness, there is no continuity in physics, every moment is separate, even if it is caused by the previous one. If you copy me, I am not either of the copies, I am the thing that existed for a brief moment while the copies were created. Even if I stepped into the teleporter, stood right there, and a copy emerged 2m away, the one that stood in the pad is no more identical to the one that walked onto the lad than the one that materialized 2m away.

There is no known process in physics that could give meaning to that identity. So regardless of whether consciousness is emergent or quantum or computational or whatever we will discover it to be, unless it is transcendental, there is no way to physically define this continuity or give it some special meaning, such that teleportation would be meaningfully different from the normal passage of time, or that perfectly copying an individual could be said to produce anything different than moving them.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#96

Post by ImprobableTruth » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:21 PM UTC

keiferski wrote: post #88

ImprobableTruth wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It is also probably just conceptually wrong to think that our bodies are just a side accessory, especially when it comes to understanding how much of our actual intelligence comes from being embodied. There's not a single study to show this, so calling it 'probably wrong' is just disingenuous. All the current results simply say 'sensory data impacts our cognition', which people who think that the brain encompasses t…

I linked to an article about embodied cognition. It’s a serious topic studied by scientists and philosophers.

Have you read your article? Embodied cognition comes in different forms. The 'basic' idea is simply that the body plays some role in cognition.

The view that's closest to traditional cognition - and generally regarded as uncontroversial - is that the body has a strong influence on the mind. A lot of (most?) computationalists would accept this idea with no issue.

It's the idea that our mind is actually distributed, that our body is part of our mind, which is actually contentious. It's a philosophical position you can argue for, but there definitely aren't a lot of studies to back it up, as all of them (or at least all that I know, feel free to prove me wrong), can just as easily be explained with a non-distributed model.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#97

Post by marshmallow_12 » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:24 PM UTC

JProthero wrote: post #82

marshmallow_12 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i fail to see how this is an important philosophic subject, being based on absolutely no scientific data.

In the philosophy of personal identity, teleportation is an intellectual contrivance only intended to help clarify thinking about personal identity. Another version of the same concept is the 'Swampman' thought experiment [1], which is also obviously not intended to be taken seriously as a scientific possibility. Most thought experiments in the philosophy of mind and personal identity have this character, e.g. Mary's…

but all the scientists you mentioned engaged in thought experiments that actually had real life parallels. Philosophising about personal identity, is completely irrelevant to us since it isn't, and never will be, possible to switch bodies.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#98

Post by nkrisc » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:27 PM UTC

keiferski wrote: post #68

MattGaiser wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't this just science? We routinely replace every other part except the brain, whether by mechanical, artificial biological, or donor/transplant means. Prosthetic arms and legs are normal, millions need things like insulin replaced in their bodies that is manufactured by yeast, and every day thousands donate blood to be put into other people and replacing kidneys, hearts, lungs, and various other organs from those…

My point is that the reason we consider the entire body to be a “swappable part” is because we have constructed a metaphysics in which it is. That doesn’t make it actually the case, and furthermore, doing so has a lot of negative consequences for our actual embodied selves.

I think most people consider many body parts to be swappable because we've observed that they in fact are. The degree to which they are certainly varies, but every successful transplant is testament to the fact we can exchange body parts with one another.

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#99

Post by taisto29 » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:27 PM UTC

the8472 wrote: post #92

taisto29 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You consider genetical sameness, what about the epigenetic traits, aquired traits like sickness etc? It will be erased in a new organ, and it will make the brain function and percieve differently, which you may or may not be able to attribute to this particular transplantation, of course. But scientifically, we don't treat brain as some solid finite substance that exists (born? created?) in a fixed state forever, and…

> what about the epigenetic traits, aquired traits like sickness etc? No different than getting some drug that improves your organ's health without replacing them. Perhaps via gene therapy, stem cell manipulation or whatever. > Brain/mind main property is that it's dynamic, and this dynamism is brought through by the rest of the body, and the environment it lives in and senses and adapts. It does that whether you tra…

You are right about the first, but then if these things could be captured and reconstructed at scale (not like now), there is no such thing as "conscious decision" anymore, at least for some. Because if someone is able to capture this molecular turn-over, which is a static snapshot of our interaction with the reality basically - then it's possible to manufacture and control it? Not like we are not controlled now, but this is like a kernel level of control, out of which we can't exist. Sounds problematic?

Re: Transplant an organ? Why not an entire body?

#100

Post by osacial » Sun, Mar 07, 2021, 12:32 PM UTC

MattGaiser wrote: post #67

keiferski wrote: post #52

The fact that this is uncontroversial to a lot of people mostly just shows how intellect-focused our society has become. Plenty of other value systems treat the Self as the entire body, not merely the head. Perhaps if we did too, we might not have so many issues with obesity and drug abuse. Dualism has consequences. I once read someone describe academics as “floating heads with bodies attached.” I think that could ap…

Isn't this just science? We routinely replace every other part except the brain, whether by mechanical, artificial biological, or donor/transplant means. Prosthetic arms and legs are normal, millions need things like insulin replaced in their bodies that is manufactured by yeast, and every day thousands donate blood to be put into other people and replacing kidneys, hearts, lungs, and various other organs from those…

I remember reading some sci-fi story where gentleman had scrotum transplant and I had questions about that.

As it appears, now I know, that transplanted scrotum will produce semen with dna of previous owner - not recipient. Also, there are cases, where transplanted bone marrows are rewriting dna of receiver. So, brain is swappable in the end as well... sure.

Btw, your understanding of transplants is way too trivial - recipient body not always accept donor organs and people die because of it. Prosthetics are not transplants and they too can be rejected by body - and people who have them still "enjoy" side effects of not having proper arm or leg... the videos of happy sprinters with "better legs" do not convince me after I had been living with such people together, where higher body temperature is just one of those side effects of lost limb, not to mention dramatic impact on mind, where those battles about loss of limbs has to be battled every day.