• zifnab25 [he/him, any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    we’re all ships of theseus whether we use teleporters or not

    You can dry dock and refloat a "dead" ship a lot easier than a dead person. Humans spend their whole lives changing, adapting, and ultimately decaying. We're nothing like the Ship of Theseus.

      • zifnab25 [he/him, any]
        ·
        3 years ago

        the thought experiment that asks whether an entity maintains its unique identity despite having all or most of its parts swapped out for new ones

        Specifically, identical parts. The thought experiment effectively posits "Is a perfect copy the same as the original?"

        Creating an identical replica of a boat is hugely different from a replica of a human being, even before you get into the question of consciousness.

        The ship is just how the question is presented.

        The statement "We are all Ships of Theseus" doesn't make any sense, as humans going through life don't have anything in common with the thought experiment.

        We aren't identical replicas of our prior selves. We undergo significant changes over time, becoming very obviously distinct from our past incarnations.