Something I was interested in talking about in regards of how we perceive our experiences, how most of our sci-fi fears have existed before we were born.
Everything is going to get replaced. We typically think about jobs, or ads, or people that can make illustrations. And yes, there still will be a market. There are people who enjoy and prefer a ‘handmade wallet’ in a midwestern town brandished with a burn mark from a 200 year old family farm over one that was made by a machine 5,000 miles away. I’m not talking about those types of people. There will always be a market for both.
I’m talking about the replacement of you existing.
Sorry if that sounded scary. Here are reminders if that statement sounded like the end of the world:
Let’s get into the orange juice one, because I think this would help. You of course remember the taste of oranges and orange juice. (Sorry in advance if you have an OJ allergy) You can recall that flavor. There’s a folder somewhere in your mind that has the flavor and taste profile saved, but the original recorder does not exist in your body.
If you have had a pet, you can remember the softness of their fur, the warmth of their body, and maybe even the heartbeat or breath as you pet them. Once around a month passes, the cells on your hand that recorded that feeling for you - the feeling of warmth or the reminder of a loving pet no longer exist. Your mind will keep those memories, and record a profile of the fur, warmth, and heartbeat. If a month passed, you don't have the cells that held your pet with your body anymore.
You didn’t really lose a memory, because if you pet them right now it would feel the same. Your experiences stay, but the way you made them don’t.
Eons passed. Aedon had lived as rich and poor, kind and cruel, strong and weak. They were every gender, every race, every creed. They experienced the height of human triumph and the depths of human despair.
Finally, Aedon stood once more before the Great Presence, no longer the same. Their soul was vast, a galaxy of memories.
“I have lived every life,” Aedon said. “I have felt every joy, endured every pain. I understand humanity in its infinite complexity.”
“Then tell me,” the Presence asked, “what have you learned?”
I am neither Aedon nor the Presence, so I’m not going to even attempt at answering the question. I do think, hopefully, once machinery and intelligence get to a point where we are able to attain the collective experience of everything that has ever existed, we will be able to answer the question.
I don't care if we answer it wrong the first time. I’m happy that we were brave enough to do it.
The rest of my thoughts i've written about.