I was, perhaps opaquely, pointing out Manfred’s false dichotomy—the choice is not between surgery with faulty anesthesia and dying; the choice is between surgery with faulty anesthesia, dying, and a myriad of other options (such as the authors’ own suggestion: intensified investigation into neural correlates of consciousness, so failed anesthesia can be detected and the surgery aborted or the anesthesia improved).
That’s reasonable, and I’d agree there are some good third options (though if the pain is managed to less than getting my teeth drilled into under local anesthesia, I wouldn’t really care). We’re pretty much faced with my dichotomy now, though. So my statement was the sort of boring one that the current cost/benefit of going into surgery for anything worth even a few weeks of life remains very similar.
We’re pretty much faced with my dichotomy now, though.
I’m not an anesthesiologist though, so I can’t agree with that. Maybe there are alternatives. I can imagine there being workarounds or trade-offs which make more sense in light of these thoughts about i-zombies, such as greater use of local anesthetics (where it’s very easy to test whether it works, as opposed to blanket general anesthetics).
I was, perhaps opaquely, pointing out Manfred’s false dichotomy—the choice is not between surgery with faulty anesthesia and dying; the choice is between surgery with faulty anesthesia, dying, and a myriad of other options (such as the authors’ own suggestion: intensified investigation into neural correlates of consciousness, so failed anesthesia can be detected and the surgery aborted or the anesthesia improved).
That’s reasonable, and I’d agree there are some good third options (though if the pain is managed to less than getting my teeth drilled into under local anesthesia, I wouldn’t really care). We’re pretty much faced with my dichotomy now, though. So my statement was the sort of boring one that the current cost/benefit of going into surgery for anything worth even a few weeks of life remains very similar.
I’m not an anesthesiologist though, so I can’t agree with that. Maybe there are alternatives. I can imagine there being workarounds or trade-offs which make more sense in light of these thoughts about i-zombies, such as greater use of local anesthetics (where it’s very easy to test whether it works, as opposed to blanket general anesthetics).