Re: David Gerrold - War with the Cthorr

Michael Alan Chary wrote:
> William December Starr <wdstarr@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> If "*immediately*" is taken literally -- meaning, I suppose, that
>> only single Planck-Wheeler intervals pass between (a) "snapshot of
>> living Samantha is taken," (b) "Samantha is struck by effects of
>> weapon" and (c) "Samantha is dead," and then the snapshot from (a)
>> is used to reconstruct Samantha -- then _I_ would say that no
>> homicide has occurred[*1].  Various societies' legal systems may
>> feel otherwise, of course.
> 
> Interesting theory. I invite you to argue it out with her family's
estate 
> lawyers depending on how wealthy she is.

As Michael said right in the text you quoted, what he thinks and what 
various legal systems will think on the matter aren't necessarily the 
same. So I'm not sure what the point of this comment is.

> How about not immediately? How about a second? Two seconds? A minute? An

> hour? (Roger Zelazny's _Isle of the Dead_ used this sort of things as a 
> plot point, actually.)

Different people have different standards of divergence before they call 
two copies "different people". Depending on the cir***stances, I 
personally would be okay with months of divergence. Others wouldn't even 
accept the Planck-Wheeler interval mentioned earlier.

>> *1: _Other_ crimes or torts may have been committed with Samantha
>>     as the victim, of course, and they may be ones that don't exist
>>     yet in any real-world legal system because the cir***stances
>>     have never arisen, but I don't think that she has been killed.
> 
> Well, then for her there is no difference. Are you willing try it 
> yourself should the occasion arise? (As Larry Niven once said, "I'm not 
> going to ride in one of the damned things.")

If the technology existed, I'd back myself up in a heartbeat. But I 
wouldn't voluntarily die unless there was a darn good reason, even with 
a backup. I don't see why it's necessary to be willing to go through 
that in order to sup****t one's position on backups.