Transbeman Law Colloquium Florida, December 10, 2007 Max More, PhD Strategic Philosopher Terasem

A Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds

transbemans & cyberminds cryosuspension revivee self-aware AI uploads duplicates teleported people Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds The transbeman person: a being who claims to have the rights and obligations associated with being human, but is beyond accepted notions of legal personhood

on a bioconservative view of the legal status of transbemans reconstructed from mindfiles… uploaded… you’re revived from suspension… and complain complain Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds you’ve been stripped of all assets, citizenship, rights, and status live a poor and nasty existence in a “reservation” or concentration camp or you’re hunted down and “retired”

personhood and legal status The legal status of cyberminds should depend on possession of enough of the elements of personhood A person is an independent center of activity who identifies with those capacities, physical and mental, to which he has direct access PI = individualized elements of personhood Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds

central identity traits Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds a trait may be central to a person’s identity depending on:  the extent of other traits dependence on it (objective effects)  the degree of its contextual or regional effects  the degree to which it is difficult to change the trait  the degree of its social effects  the extent to which it dominates other traits when in conflict  the degree to which it is appropriated as important in that the person regards herself as radically changed if the trait is lost or strongly modified a person’s identity is constituted by a pattern of central traits

elements of identity memories desires dispositions psychological traits social role identity ideal identity/values Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds (beme-complexes) projects

reconstructing the self beme me up, Scotty! MyLifeBits Projecthttp://lifenaut.com/ Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds This implies we can improve our odds of long-term survival by preserving sufficient self-data (bemes) to reconstruct those elements of self Informational continuity is what matters, not structural or even functional continuity

a contractarian foundation shows how the personhood criterion provides a basis for the legal status of cyberminds the method: what two people would contract to do in relation to one another, when their contract is made under conditions of perfect mutuality, would be morally acceptable to each of them basing legal status on the personhood criterion and the psychological continuity view of personal identity will be strongly morally justified if persons pursuing mutual advantage in a fair bargain would agree to it Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds

contractarian history Thomas Hobbes John Locke David Hume John Rawls David Gauthier Jan Narveson Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds

application the right to life of a person in suspension (or uploaded or reconstructed) others should have only productive obligations the goal: an arrangement of rights and obligations that best harmonizes the interests of all Proactive-Pragmatic Approach to the Legal Status of Cyberminds what contract would be in everyone’s interest for the management of this person?

Max More, PhD Strategic Philosopher Transbeman Law Colloquium Florida, December 10, 2007 Terasem Thank you.