View source for What matters for the continuation of self

What matters for the continuation of self? Does it really matter what personality traits or memories you have to be a continuation of the yourself?[[Superimmortality]] defines the self not as a personality but as any consciousness that you experience or will experience when they are produced. Two examples: lets say there is a body that produces your personality but you do not experience that consciousness, and a different body that produces a different personality with different memories and even a different self identity, which body is a continuation of you? If you do not experience a consciousness produced by a body it can not be you. Is it really necessary for you to have the same memories and self identity? If you all of a sudden get a brain injury or brain structure and functioning change and have amnesia where you loose your memories and you no longer know your name and information about yourself but yet can still experience life and make new memories, communicate and speak with others, have new and, or, the same skills and abilities, can this still be you and is this a "you" that is better than being dead?
;It is often the case that we want clear distinctions in our understanding and knowledge. It is either A or not A. there is nothing in the middle. Superimmortality predicts that consciousness and [[ixperiencitness]] is not like this, they are like continuum concepts where there can be a [[percentage like identity]] in a consciousness and ixperiencitness. This is because there can be very gradual change in structure and functioning of the brain, thus a very gradual change in the consciousness and ixperiencitness produced by the brain.

What matters for the continuation of self is the production of consciousnesses that "you" experience. What is the "you" that you experience? Most people at any one moment are experiencing a consciousness. Ask "yourself" is this you that is experiencing this consciousness or someone else. Whoever is experiencing this consciousness is "you". However, did you experience anything in the past or do you just have memories of events that happened to some other "you"? And will you experience anything in the future or will another "you" be produced in or by your body? You the body, you the personality are constantly changing. How can we know that there is a "you" for more than a moment? Are there any mysterious aspects of you that would make you believe that the "you" now is not the "you" in the past. Do we have any reason to believe that the "you" in the past was so different that even though you have memories of experiencing being conscious in the past you weren't? It is a possibility that you weren't conscious in the past but there is much more evidence that you were. Lacking proof other wise, and not having a theory explaining how one "you" ends and another different "you" begins that is not dependent on the structure and functioning of the brain changing enough, we have little reason not to believe that in most cases the "you" survives in your body for relatively long periods of time.
;Is there an actual physical test that can tell one "you" from the next different "you"? "You" are a continuum concept where there is no clear dividing point between "you" and another different "you". If we consider the numbers one and two and no others there is a clear distinction between them because we have not allowed for any other numbers. In reality there are an infinite amount of numbers between them. Is one and a half, two or one? It is neither for a continuum like the real numbers.