Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site mit-hermes.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!mit-hermes!daemon From: daemon@mit-hermes.ARPA (The devil himself) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: philosophy Message-ID: <2454@mit-hermes.ARPA> Date: Sun, 25-Aug-85 19:55:09 EDT Article-I.D.: mit-herm.2454 Posted: Sun Aug 25 19:55:09 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 28-Aug-85 02:20:28 EDT Organization: The MIT AI Lab, Cambridge, MA Lines: 52 From ROBCHRJ%YALEVMX.BITNET@Berkeley Sun Aug 25 19:54:35 1985 Received: from UCB-VAX.ARPA (ucb-vax.arpa.ARPA) by MIT-HERMES.ARPA (4.12/4.8) id AA16755; Sun, 25 Aug 85 19:54:35 edt Received: from ucbjade.Berkeley.Edu (ucbjade.ARPA) by UCB-VAX.ARPA (4.24/5.3) id AA13486; Sun, 25 Aug 85 16:49:15 pdt Received: from UCBVAX.ARPA by ucbjade.Berkeley.Edu (4.19/4.38.1) id AA06261; Sun, 25 Aug 85 16:51:40 pdt Date: Sun, 25 Aug 85 16:51:38 pdt From: ROBCHRJ%YALEVMX.BITNET@Berkeley Message-Id: <8508252351.AA06261@ucbjade.Berkeley.Edu> Apparently-To: Subject: Continuity of life and the afterlife References: <588@utastro.UUCP> <1357@umcp-cs.UUCP> <592@utastro.UUCP> <483@spar.UUCP> <599@utastro.UUCP> [Houlihan] >> 1) Let A be life before death, and B life after death, >> 2) we have X at A where X is the 'we' in 'we are resurrected' >> 3) we have X at B where X is the 'we' in 'we are resurrected' >> >>These assumptions are implicit in the resurrection claim. These are not >>being challenged here. Now X forms an uninterrupted succession, therefore >>it is continuous. As has been pointed out several times, this is not so. Let me put this in terms perhaps a bit more appropriate to the discussion of life after death: Assume that there is a supernatural being ("God") capable of a lot of things that are at present deemed impossible (reversing entropy, etc.). Assume that Jane Doe is dying. If at the moment of her death, God memorizes the positions of every atom in her body, he can (we assume) recreate that same body at some point in the future. If in the year 80,000, God does so, and prevents her from dying this time, restores health, youth, etc. without destroying her memory, is she the same Jane Doe? If we agree that this is in fact Jane Doe, then her life is not continuous, and the only thing that is continuous between her death and her rebirth is the *information* about her bodily makeup that is in God's mind. Hence we do not need to assume that there is any such thing as a soul, unless you want to call that information Jane's soul. Of course, the assumptions made in the argument are (at least) in need of substantiation. But I think it can be granted that resurrection of this sort would not require any such entity as the soul to take place. Christopher Roberson Calhoun College, Yale University ---- YOW!!