Dennett’sWhere Am I?

Dennett’s “Where Am I?”Cast of Characters

• Yorick: Dennett’s original brain

• Hamlet: Dennett’s original body

• Fortinbras: second body (Yorick’s 2nd, Hubert’s 1st)

• Hubert: a computer that instantiates Yorick

• Narrator: “Dennett”

Two Things to Consider

• False Dilemma

• Here, There, Now, Today, I

What do these words have in common?

The Plot

Scientists approach Dennett to go on a secret mission to disarm a nuclear device named STUD. The mission could be highly dangerous to Dennett’s brain (but not his body). Scientists have figured out a way to send Dennett’s body (Hamlet) on the mission while leaving his brain (Yorick) behind in the lab.

Act IDennett goes wireless

• Dennett agrees to go. His brain is surgically removed from his body and placed in a vat.

• His brain controls his body via implants, transmitters and antennae. With the flip of a switch, the connection between his brain and his body can be severed. With another flip of the switch, the connection can be re-established.

Surgery is a Success

• Where am I?• Indexicals: here vs. there• Where are his thoughts tokened?

Where is Dennett?

Hamlet YorickPOV

1st Possible AnswerHamlet (body)

• Brain/Body Swap

• Which would he prefer survive, body or brain?

The Body

P1: If Dennett is Hamlet Dennett prefers to go the ⊃

way of Hamlet.P2: Dennett doesn’t prefer to go the way of Hamlet.C: Therefore, Dennett isn’t Hamlet.

Brain/Body Swap

2nd Possible AnswerYorick (brain)

• Suppose Hamlet (body) gets on a train in Texas for CA where he holds up a liquor store. The police capture him.

Which Do We Lock Up?

• Yorick in Texas or Hamlet in CA

If Dennett is Yorick

P1: They want to convict DennettP2: Dennett is YorickC: They must convict and lock up Yorick.

What’s the problem?

Is Dennett Still Free?

The BrainYorick

P1: If Dennett is Yorick Dennett is imprisoned when ⊃Yorick is.P2: Dennett isn’t imprisoned when Yorick is.C: Therefore, Dennett isn’t Yorick.

3rd Possible Answer Point of View

Personal identity is a matter of POV At any given time a person has a POV, the person just is wherever that POV is.

3rd Possible Answer POV

• Dennett (I) heads for Tulsa.• Dennett (I) descends into the earth under Tulsa in

search of the atomic warhead.• Trouble: radio links break down, the body loses all

contact with the brain• Result: shift in POV• Buried alive in Oklahoma --> Disembodied in Houston

Problems

False Dilemma

Act II

• Dennett disarms the STUD. Hamlet is destroyed in the process. Yorick lives on in the vat, but is now deprived of all sensory input.

Act III Enter Fortinbras

• Scientists establish a connection between Yorick and the new body, Fortinbras.

Act III

• Fortinbras vists Yorick and learns about Hubert. Hubert is running alongside Yorick.

• Hubert is a computer program that instantiates Yorick exactly. (If as AI would have it, brain is a computer and the mind is the program then the mind is capable of multiple realizations)

Act III

• Both Yorick & Hubert can interact with Fortinbras. A switch allows either to be in control & there is a feedback between the two.

• Both brains work in conjunction with Fortinbras (the body). They both carry the same stream of memory and consciousness (Dennett’s).

Where is Dennett?

Two Dennetts?

• Suppose someone detaches Yorick or Hubert from Fortinbras and hitches it to some other body?

Grand Finale

• Who has been telling the story?• Yorick and Hubert don’t seem to have the same

voice, don’t seem to share the same identity