Nice, good, thank you for the thorough response.
They share a history. — Dawnstorm
This is not a meaningful thing, unless you're restricting the discussion to the exact moment of duplication - at which time its extremely important. But, in the TE, the destruction of P1 happens before P2 comes into existence. So, it's even less of a problem than I had put forward. If you want to plum say "Ok, well then P2 clearly takes on P1s past and constitutes P1s future", fine that's a very practical and likely the most workable version, wihch (in reference to your closing portion) would influence policy and law I'd think.
But in the branchline case, that's not possible. There are two people. Two
different people. The one which came into existence five seconds ago(P2) did not do and is not responsible for
anything at all that P1 did and as soon as the exact moment of their creation passes, they are no longer analogous, identical to, or able to be understood
as P1. So, the fact they share a hsitory is not meaningful. It is not, as far as I can tell, even true viz. they share memory, not history. The body of P2 simply did not do anything the body of P1 did. Nor did their brain. Or their intention. Or anything else. They didn't exist at the relevant time. You can here think about false memories, influenced memories, implanted memories etc.. etc... We cannot use memory as an accountant, in this discussion. The biggest problem is how its possible that P2 (in the original case) can be conferred the rights and responsibilities of P1, which they are not constitutive of. Is this just basically a rights transference by Deed? Could be. But nothing logical allows it.
P(t1) --Duplication event--> P1(t2) and P2(t2). There is no P1(t1)/P2(t1). There's only P(t1). — Dawnstorm
Sort of, and would agree on that arrangement but I would arrange it this way
P(t1) ->Duplication event
is t2 and here we have P1 and P2 at t2-> any infintesimal period of time later is t3 and then we have P1(t3) and P2(t3):
separated, not even confusable as identical due to the sheer difference in body, mentality and situation (again, rejecting an immaterial soul concept) and anything but superficial appearance (as their actual bodily make up will be difference after any infintesimal amount of time.
There is absolutely a single moment of convergence where there is no notable (in this sense, I mean, it wouldn't be detectable by any means even if its logically there) difference between the two Ps. However, this moment is so faint and insignificant I can't rightly give it much at all.
I don't think any of our current intuitions can prepare us for this type of technology. — Dawnstorm
Definitely agree, and have fun with these things rather than 'care' to much of a degree. We're no where near this type of tech, if it's even possible.
What any one person believes is besides the point. — Dawnstorm
This (and the rest of the para) isn't quite groking what I"m saying. You're making an argument based on legal positivism. It's a practical argument, based on the fact you believe the law is a legitimate system for regulating technology. If you didn't believe this, your arguments would be different (this is an assumption, i'm just aclarifying my point because it's been missed). It's not a philosophical argument.
They were the same person before the splitting event, which is when the certificate was issued. — Dawnstorm
I'm sorry, because I don't want to sound so incredulous given how reasonable you are - but what the heck? There
s no P2 to be discussed before the event. This is a complete nonsense. There was
only P1 before the splitting even - regardless of Classic or Branchline version. There simply is nothing to be discussed, unless the split has taken place. You cannot read from P2 backwards to before the splitting event. They did not exist at that time. They share absolutely nothing but memory. And even this is divergent, immediately P2 gains awareness. P1 doesn't ahve that memory, and P2 doesn't have the memory of hte machine(and anything after that) post-button-pressing.
c) The certificate is valid for one of them, and invalid for the other (no idea how to argue for this; my least favourite) — Dawnstorm
This is the only reasonable item from your list to me, and i've made the argument. Hopefully it hits. The other two are clearly not true, in any sense of that word, in the TE.
My immediate intuition went to "contract", but that wouldn't work, since the potentially disagreeing parties are at that time still one person. A type of "will"? I will let this to P1 and this to P2? — Dawnstorm
I would (as a legal professional) posit that you would need two things:
A deed conferring your rights on P2 assuming the machine works; and
A clause within the Deed that allows you to retain all rights and responsibilities in the event you do not predecease P2 (which is the expected outcome). All that needs to happen is that 'ideally' when a person is created on Mars (
and the branch occurs) they receive a (futuristic) birth certificate (or creation certificate). In the Classic case, no one would care. Its just impractical to care, unless there's a significant amount of time that they both exist.
I would imagine this would go hand-in-hand with a (futuristic) Will in the sense that, what if both die? Or the split doesn't happen, yet you're destroyed. In this way, the problem is entirely avoided. P2 needs to come up with his/her own life after the Branching, if it happens. It's not P1s fault, and P2 is an accident, essentially. Though, in the original Branchline P1 dies three days later, so by the time P1 dies, P2 is an entirely different person with nothing shared between them except superficial appearance. I see no issue. The problem here, would be that all P1s significant relations knows someone who looks exactly like the deceased is out there, not being the deceased. And that would hurt.
I have digressed way too far from my points of interest here though - The legal ramifications appear extremely easy to deal with for me. It does assume a certain level of understanding in any P1 going into the machine, but we can't assume the worst if we want the future to rise above it. My points of interest are in establishing Identity, or why/why not.
I don't think identity can be established. And I don't think it matters. It's very uncomfortable, and I'd like to be wrong.