I appreciate your detailed reply. Let me begin with a small clarification. I would say Universalism is better conceived of as there being simply a universal property (the immediacy of experience) that defines me, rather than any kind of “unified consciousness.”
I think that your original calculation failed to deliver a result, because it began with the assumption that human #7029501952 (Joe) already existed. Then of course, when Joe asks himself, what is the probability that I, human #7029501952 exist, this cannot count as evidence favoring either hypothesis.
It is equivalent to altering the Awakening Game above, where the pattern of coin flips is a priori stipulated to be the specific pattern matching the sleeper, which of course would not help the awakener decide which game was played.
Given that, let me explain how I see the Bayesian reasoning apply to deciding between these two hypotheses in personal identity:
A—Universalism (I exist in every conscious perspective, regardless of conditions/configurations) B—The Usual View (I exist only because an absolutely specific pattern of begettings occurred) O—The observation that “I exist”
Again let’s set both priors to 0.5.
P(A) = 0.5 P(B) = 0.5
And P(O) = 1 (the starting basis of our assumption, I exist, or I have awakened)
Note that the difference between A and B is that B requires a specific pattern of antecedent begettings, or else, “I would not exist”, “I would never have been born”, etc. If we go back to consider just 3 human begettings each of which requires winning a “sperm cell lottery” having odds of 1 in 200,000,000, then those 3 begettings have a probability of 1 in 8 septillion.
Let’s call this probability of winning the ancestral sperm cell lottery: P(O | B) = (1/200,000,000)^3 = 1.25 × 10^-25 = 0.0000000000000000000000125%
But note that the above improbability only applies to the Usual View, for only the Usual View introduced the assumption that being born required a specific pattern of begettings. But one doesn’t have to win any lotteries in the case of universalism, so: P(O | A) = 100%.
Now let us update our priors given the evidence/observation “I exist” (O):
Note that the sharp reduction in probability for P(B | O) is entirely due to B’s additional constraint that stipulates your existence on the existence a very particular being, brought about by a very particular set of circumstances. Universalism doesn’t do this, and so survives the improbability of the sperm cell lotteries unscathed.
Now as to what you say in part (ii) of your reply, I agree. I think thought experiments involving duplication, cloning, teletransporters, etc. show that “being me” is not a matter of inheriting any particular physical body. And likewise, thought experiments involving partial or total amnesia, memory implantation, psychological changes induced by brain injury, drugs, or aging, etc. undermine the notion that bundles of memories or personality traits are what “makes me me.” Universalism then, is the natural conclusion that follows from abandoning both bodily, and psychological continuity theories when it comes to personal identity. But then, what is left that makes an experience mine? As Zuboff writes on page 26: https://www.pdcnet.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/Zuboff_MSP-Supplement_2025.pdf
“It would be a very weird view that something as obviously incidental as wearing a blue shirt was essential to my existence as an individual subject of experience. Nobody would think that my putting on a different coloured shirt would replace me with someone else whose experience and self-interest would no longer be mine. The usual view is that something far more substantive-seeming, like the identity of my body (or soul) or the continuing of my memories (which might in some strange hypothetical case be redirected into a different body or soul) is what is essentially involved in my continuing existence as a particular centre of experience and self-interest. Replace the body (or soul) or replace the mental continuity by a different mental stream and then I’d no longer be there but rather someone else. Universalism says that what’s essential is just the much more general property of the experience being immediate—the experience being had in first-person style. As we’ve seen in answering the riddle of finding myself, the experience being immediate, being fist-person in style, is the only way I identify which being I am; and, as I am also saying, that is all that’s really involved in making something be me.”
Given what you write in “Relativity Theory for What the Future ‘You’ Is and Isn’t.” I think you would much enjoy the rest of Zuboff’s book.
Thanks, the suggestion sounds interesting. However; first quick update fwiw: I’ve only had the chance to read the first small section, “A Brief Proof at You Are Every Conscious Thing”, and I must say to me it seems totally clear he’s essentially making the same Bayesian mistake—or sort of Anthropic reasoning mistake—that OP contains. It’s totally not making sense the way he puts it, and I’m slightly surprised he published it like that.
I plan to read more and to provide my view on the rest of his argument—hopefully I’ll not fail despite time pressure.
Hi FlorianH,
I appreciate your detailed reply. Let me begin with a small clarification. I would say Universalism is better conceived of as there being simply a universal property (the immediacy of experience) that defines me, rather than any kind of “unified consciousness.”
I think that your original calculation failed to deliver a result, because it began with the assumption that human #7029501952 (Joe) already existed. Then of course, when Joe asks himself, what is the probability that I, human #7029501952 exist, this cannot count as evidence favoring either hypothesis.
It is equivalent to altering the Awakening Game above, where the pattern of coin flips is a priori stipulated to be the specific pattern matching the sleeper, which of course would not help the awakener decide which game was played.
Given that, let me explain how I see the Bayesian reasoning apply to deciding between these two hypotheses in personal identity:
A—Universalism (I exist in every conscious perspective, regardless of conditions/configurations)
B—The Usual View (I exist only because an absolutely specific pattern of begettings occurred)
O—The observation that “I exist”
Again let’s set both priors to 0.5.
P(A) = 0.5
P(B) = 0.5
And P(O) = 1 (the starting basis of our assumption, I exist, or I have awakened)
Note that the difference between A and B is that B requires a specific pattern of antecedent begettings, or else, “I would not exist”, “I would never have been born”, etc. If we go back to consider just 3 human begettings each of which requires winning a “sperm cell lottery” having odds of 1 in 200,000,000, then those 3 begettings have a probability of 1 in 8 septillion.
Let’s call this probability of winning the ancestral sperm cell lottery:
P(O | B) = (1/200,000,000)^3 = 1.25 × 10^-25 = 0.0000000000000000000000125%
But note that the above improbability only applies to the Usual View, for only the Usual View introduced the assumption that being born required a specific pattern of begettings. But one doesn’t have to win any lotteries in the case of universalism, so:
P(O | A) = 100%.
Now let us update our priors given the evidence/observation “I exist” (O):
P(A | O) = (P(O | A) × P(A)) / P(O) = (1 × 0.5) / 1 = 0.5
P(B | O) = (P(O | B) × P(B)) / P(O) = (0.0000000000000000000000125% × 0.5 / 1 = 6.25 × 10^-26
Note that the sharp reduction in probability for P(B | O) is entirely due to B’s additional constraint that stipulates your existence on the existence a very particular being, brought about by a very particular set of circumstances. Universalism doesn’t do this, and so survives the improbability of the sperm cell lotteries unscathed.
Now as to what you say in part (ii) of your reply, I agree. I think thought experiments involving duplication, cloning, teletransporters, etc. show that “being me” is not a matter of inheriting any particular physical body. And likewise, thought experiments involving partial or total amnesia, memory implantation, psychological changes induced by brain injury, drugs, or aging, etc. undermine the notion that bundles of memories or personality traits are what “makes me me.” Universalism then, is the natural conclusion that follows from abandoning both bodily, and psychological continuity theories when it comes to personal identity. But then, what is left that makes an experience mine? As Zuboff writes on page 26: https://www.pdcnet.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/Zuboff_MSP-Supplement_2025.pdf
“It would be a very weird view that something as obviously incidental as wearing a blue shirt was essential to my existence as an individual subject of experience. Nobody would think that my putting on a different coloured shirt would replace me with someone else whose experience and self-interest would no longer be mine.
The usual view is that something far more substantive-seeming, like the identity of my body (or soul) or the continuing of my memories (which might in some strange hypothetical case be redirected into a different body or soul) is what is essentially involved in my continuing existence as a particular centre of experience and self-interest. Replace the body (or soul) or replace the mental continuity by a different mental stream and then I’d no longer be there but rather someone else.
Universalism says that what’s essential is just the much more general property of the experience being immediate—the experience being had in first-person style. As we’ve seen in answering the riddle of finding myself, the experience being immediate, being fist-person in style, is the only way I identify which being I am; and, as I am also saying, that is all that’s really involved in making something be me.”
Given what you write in “Relativity Theory for What the Future ‘You’ Is and Isn’t.” I think you would much enjoy the rest of Zuboff’s book.
Thanks, the suggestion sounds interesting. However; first quick update fwiw: I’ve only had the chance to read the first small section, “A Brief Proof at You Are Every Conscious Thing”, and I must say to me it seems totally clear he’s essentially making the same Bayesian mistake—or sort of Anthropic reasoning mistake—that OP contains. It’s totally not making sense the way he puts it, and I’m slightly surprised he published it like that.
I plan to read more and to provide my view on the rest of his argument—hopefully I’ll not fail despite time pressure.