Reincarnation FAIL

Most of what The Amazing Atheist says seems reasonable except for:

AT 3:50 The Amazing Atheist says: We are data. You are your memories, your thoughts, your feelings, etc.,etc. If those thing are gone then how are you, you? I do not think that you are. The self is destroyed when the data is destroyed. Putting some new data on the same chip doesn't mean that chip is still you. Its not. Its someone else. So even if you do believe in reincarnation its totally pointless because what of you is really surviving. Its very vague very nebulous it doesn't really means much of anything.

There are a number of problems with The Amazing Atheist data analogy. Data is not memories, thoughts, feelings, etc., any more than the computer program is the computer output. It takes the functioning of the computer using the data to produce the desired output. In the same way it is the structure and functioning of the brain over time that produces consciousness etc., There can be data about each point in the structure and functioning of the brain. But this one point of data no matter how complex does not correspond to any conscious aspect of a person. You need the actual structure and functioning to produce consciousness. However, there can be data about this structure and functioning of the body and brain.

A second problem is that data can be duplicated in many different ways and places forever. So according to the data theory there can be any number of "yous" at any time period through out space and time. Not only that but this data, if it can exist at and for one point in your lifetime, it also existed at all points in your life time. Thus this data theory allows for the duplication of you at any point in your past life or at any point in the your future life as well.

It sort of seems like you are proposing a data and body theory the chip that you show is supposed to represent the body. If this is true then why can't the data be put back into the body? You said that by changing the data you change the person. This is interesting because you have created a new person or some one that has already existed in the past. If you have created someone that has existed in the past then you have a case of life after death. If this is someone brand new it means that you do not have to have the original data you can create it. Thus through experimentation and recording the results you can produce any one that has existed, is existing, or can, or will exist. If you create someone that already exists then you have shown that people are more than singular beings they are multiple.

The only different between this data theory and superimmortality is that superimmortality requires the duplication of structure and functioning of matter not data. But superimmortality predicts that there can be all sorts of types of data about the specifics of the structure and functioning of the brain and or body of a person or other conscious being.

This data theory does not require a soul or other supernatural things. Neither does superimmortality.

AT 5:08 The Amazing Atheist says: Saying that your life will continue in any form, past death, is like saying that a body shop will continue to fix cars after the employees have all left for the evening. What sense is there in that kind of thinking. None that I can find.

Since there can be many different bodies that can produce many different consciousnesses that you can experience you likely did experience many not so nice lives in the past and could again experience these types of lives in the future. To make these future lives better it is a good idea to support the advancement of science and education for creating better problem solving abilities.

Superimmortality helps people escape the fear of death by giving them hope and purpose to their lives. Your future existence depends on the survival of conscious beings that wants to spread out into the universe and continue to produce conscious beings into the future.

Religions do exploit people's fear of death and suffering. But superimmortality's goal is not to exploit ignorance but to pursue and advance our knowledge.