Imagine a scenario where you can switch bodies with someone: both of you are anesthetized, then undergo plastic surgery to match each other’s appearance. You both have your brains rewired to essentially switch brains, and finally, you swap houses, names, bank accounts and all social and legal identities.
Let’s say Alice (like many people) believes in continuity of personhood and in this situation she’d say she’s still “bound to the same atoms”, only her mind and name etc. has been changed. (And I’ll assume you identify more with your mind etc.)
You can then ask her how much she’d need to be paid to agree to undergo this procedure—let’s assume she says 10 million dollars . But, since she believes she’ll end up in your body and with your bank account, Alice actually needs to pay you. And then you switch.
So then she (according to her) ends up as you with 10 million dollars. And you also end up as you with 10 million dollars. (Unfortunately someone also ends up as Alice in debt but it’s “neither of you” shrug)
Repeat this, until you have more money than you know how to use ;)
(Edit: maybe I should clarify that I don’t expect many people to agree to such a swap from Alice’s side, and even if they do, they’d be exploited out of existence. This thought experiment is rather aimed at people who claim to believe in continuity of personhood, to test how “committed” they are to this idea, and hopefully seed some doubt in them.)
Infinite money hack
Imagine a scenario where you can switch bodies with someone: both of you are anesthetized, then undergo plastic surgery to match each other’s appearance. You both have your brains rewired to essentially switch brains, and finally, you swap houses, names, bank accounts and all social and legal identities.
Let’s say Alice (like many people) believes in continuity of personhood and in this situation she’d say she’s still “bound to the same atoms”, only her mind and name etc. has been changed. (And I’ll assume you identify more with your mind etc.)
You can then ask her how much she’d need to be paid to agree to undergo this procedure—let’s assume she says 10 million dollars . But, since she believes she’ll end up in your body and with your bank account, Alice actually needs to pay you. And then you switch.
So then she (according to her) ends up as you with 10 million dollars. And you also end up as you with 10 million dollars. (Unfortunately someone also ends up as Alice in debt but it’s “neither of you” shrug)
Repeat this, until you have more money than you know how to use ;)
(Edit: maybe I should clarify that I don’t expect many people to agree to such a swap from Alice’s side, and even if they do, they’d be exploited out of existence. This thought experiment is rather aimed at people who claim to believe in continuity of personhood, to test how “committed” they are to this idea, and hopefully seed some doubt in them.)