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trying to help a Hinge match understand that a digital copy of their brain being uploaded doesn't mean they're immortal now because they don't "get" to be the copy and their meat body will still die someday and really understanding why Catherine just gave up trying to explain that to Simon in SOMA

I mean they're immortal in a sense, but not so you'd really notice. They'll get instanced like a videogame NPC, and while the instances as a whole will go on forever, individual instances will get deleted in a fairly short time. They live forever, but they also die every five minutes

Like think about what happens when you load your quicksave in a videogame. Not to YOU. What happens to the NPCs. To the people who AREN'T you. How do they experience you reloading a save. Do they experience anything at all

David Brin plays around with this a bit in Kiln People, where you can make copies of yourself to do chores for you. At the end, you reupload their experience into your own consciousness. Or are supposed to, anyway. Nobody does, because who wants to remember being bored.

David Brin was rude to Kevin Mitnick thirty years ago and I'm still mad at him. I know it's petty but that's just who I am

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