Instigator / Pro
0
1587
rating
182
debates
55.77%
won
Topic
#4155
On balance, The U.S. Government should raise taxes to fund the Source Code Project
Status
Finished
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
Winner & statistics
After 1 vote and with 1 point ahead, the winner is...
whiteflame
Parameters
- Publication date
- Last updated date
- Type
- Standard
- Number of rounds
- 4
- Time for argument
- Three days
- Max argument characters
- 10,000
- Voting period
- Two weeks
- Point system
- Winner selection
- Voting system
- Open
Contender / Con
1
1724
rating
27
debates
88.89%
won
Description
Source Code is an experimental machine that reconstructs the past using the dead passengers' residual collective memories of eight minutes before their deaths, as like in the movie with Jake Gyllenhaal.
The device should be used somewhere in Washington D.C., accessible only to the CIA and S.S. for terrorism and high-profile assassinations. It can be used for the FBI, but they would need approval from a supreme court.
Round 1
Thank you, whiteflame, for accepting this debate.
Preamble
My main goal is to demonstrate the fundamental need for the Source Code. I will give purposes, describing what it is to be used for. And then I shall list the pros, mentioning what kind of benefits we will get.
BOP
This is on-balance, so the burden of proof is shared. My victory is contingent on whether or not I prove we should start taxing the American people to fund the Source Code project and my opponent wins if he proves we shouldn’t.
1. Purposes:
- Fight domestic terrorism.
- Stop high-profile assassination attempts.
- Uncover Top Secret enemy information.
- Expose dangerous conspiracies.
Fundamentally, the uses of this Source Code device would give us the ability to confront these significant issues. The overall potential of this invention could prove to be a very valuable asset.
2. Benefits:
- Deter crime.
- Less murders means a decreased death toll.
- Drug Cartels, gangs, and organized crime would cease to exist.
- More concrete evidence = Less wrongful convictions.
- The US would be the most advanced nation on the planet.
- Retribution and closure for the families of victims of crime.
- Stop serial shootings.
As of now, we have the most advanced tech ever created. The ability to simulate time from the past means we would be able to observe the perpetrator of a crime and observe just how a crime was committed, so that the government has the means to identify the criminal and apprehend them before they act again and impose more regulations that would crack down on the methods of the crime.
But as it currently stands, many people are framed for crimes they did not commit. This very device would obtain concrete evidence, so the person gets off free while we could expose information about accomplices or conspirators.
3. Reasons:
- Too much violent crime.
- Police brutality.
- Inconsistent witness testimonies.
- Too many false accusations.
- The rate of wrongful executions.
- Dangerous cults like Scientology.
“Homicide rate in the U.S. continues to be high, with four major U.S. cities ranked among the 50 cities with the highest homicide rate in the world in 2019.”
“It also believes that Scientology is a criminal organization that engages in psycho-terror, money laundering and other forms of commercial fraud”
Thank you Sir.Lancelot for inviting me to debate this. I loved this movie and it's a great "what if" scenario.
I could start by talking about the impossibilities of this project in terms of quantum mechanics or neuroscience, the difficulties and costs of data storage and transfer across universes, and any number of other issues that would prevent this technology from ever coming into existence...
But screw all that. Let’s have some fun and assume that this is both possible to do and could be accomplished at manageable costs. Should we do it?
Pro omits an essential part of how the tech in Source Code works in the description. Yes, it allows an individual to overwrite their consciousness onto that of a person 8 minutes before their death. This, however, is not a simulation (Jake Gyllenhaal’s character can experience things that the original person did not before they died), nor is it time travel – the screenwriter Ben Ripley specifically tried to avoid time-travel paradoxes. It’s called “time reassignment”, though it’s more like multiversal replacement. They are traveling to another universe where events are currently playing out the same way that they did in the past of this universe. That’s important for several reasons.
1. Other Universes are Not Us
Any potential benefits resulting from actions taken in the other universe do not affect our own. This technology can only provide information for our universe on what has already happened; it cannot prevent those acts. Pro also doesn’t support the view that this will somehow deter people from committing these crimes.
2. Usefulness of Information
Pro assumes that the individuals who are going through this multiversal travel are credible witnesses, which assumes that every person involved doesn’t fabricate or misinterpret, that it’s possible to obtain that information within 8 minutes, that courts will issue warrants based on single eye-witness testimony obtained in a separate universe, and that that information is accurate. Which leads into my next and most important point.
3. Multiverse Theory Ensures Catastrophe
The best breakdown I’ve been able to find is the Four Levels of the Multiverse by Max Tegmark. I’ll skip past Levels 1 and 2, since neither allows this technology to function, and I'm assuming it will function.
“Level3: The Many Worlds of Quantum Physics: According to this approach to quantum physics, events unfold in every single possible way, just in different universes. Science fiction "alternate history" stories utilize this sort of a parallel universe model, so it's the most well-known outside of physics.
Level4: Other Mathematical Structures: This type of parallel universes is sort of a catch-all for other mathematical structures which we can conceive of, but which we don't observe as physical realities in our universe. The Level 4 parallel universes are ones which are governed by different equations from those that govern our universe... it's not just different manifestations of the same fundamental rules, but entirely different sets of rules.”
So, Level 3 is the type of multiverse depicted in Source Code, where transferring one’s mind to another universe is, effectively, moving to a separate timeline where the same events happened up to that point and would proceed in the same direction without any other influence. The trouble for Pro is that Level 4 subsumes it and contains an infinite variety of universes, including universes that don’t function by the same physical laws and those with dramatically different sets of events. Our universe is not that of Source Code, nor is our multiverse equivalent to theirs.
A. Why does multiverse level matter?
Pro assumes a Level 3 multiverse, resting all his solvency on the assumption that how this technology would optimally work is how it’s likely to work. The multiverse is much more likely to be a Level 4 multiverse because if it’s true that we can alter reality such that anything that could happen will happen for a given scenario, then there’s no reason why universes themselves cannot follow the same basic principle based on any number of other factors. Thus, universes represent a wide range of realities.
B. How does a Level 4 multiverse alter how this technology works?
As long as the target person (Person A) exists in some form in both our universe and another universe, and Person A will die in eight minutes, someone using the machine (Person B) could transfer their consciousness to Person A. There are no clear limitations on how Person A dies, so it could result from a gunshot, old age, or anything really depending on the universe. As such, Person A could die by the same means or an entirely different means. Maybe a giant amoeba kills them. Maybe everyone in the universe is a hive mind and it gets severed from the collective. And that only considers differences in space. Maybe the concept of time stretches infinitely, effectively making 8 minutes an eternity, ensuring Person B never returns. Even if Person B returns from another universe with information, it could be (and almost certainly is) entirely wrong for our universe, leading to the apprehension and conviction of an innocent person.
C. How does this affect Pro's impacts?
This turns all of his impacts against him. This new technology will likely be treated as the gold standard for criminal investigations, effectively pushing all other evidence into the background and leading to the assumption that we’ve solved the problem solely because we eliminated the person that appeared to cause it in a different universe. But that’s the problem: it wasn’t our universe. So, in most cases, if not in all of them, acts of terrorism, assassination, dangerous conspiracy, and crime in general will continue to perpetuate as our attempts to address these via the Source Code machine result in more of these people walking free by masking the problem.
Perhaps more importantly, though, this also can mangle those in other universes. Remember, this is multiverse travel. Anything that these individuals do in the span of 8 minutes could affect the people in those universes. If this technology will be developed at a price that makes it accessible to the US government, other actors will eventually develop it as well and many of those will use it for harm. Hell, even if we assume that it stays solely in the hands of the US government, we have a history replete with assassination attempts, false flag operations, initiating bloody coups, installing dictators, and facilitating drug lords and terrorists, and that's all excluding the usual use of overwhelming military might to directly take control of whole countries. Pro cannot assert how the US will use this tech, only that the US will raise the funds and develop the expertise to make it and, given our history, the US will most certainly misuse it to obtain information that furthers these efforts.
Nothing about the technology precludes people using it for malicious purposes, and those aren’t confined to 8 minute periods. Jake Gyllenhaal’s character eventually finds a way to prevent the incident that would have claimed his life and goes on to live out the rest of his life as the person whose consciousness he replaced. Setting aside the existential horror of being able to do that, this means it’s not just possible, but probable that anyone using this machine could transfer to another universe and effectively begiven a clean slate to do whatever they want since their identity will be entirely different, creating new problems in the other universe. As such, all those harms that Pro lists in his R1 are passed onto countless other universes, far outstripping any potential benefit of obtaining information for ours.
Back over to you, Sir.Lancelot.
Round 2
Whiteflame makes very convincing retorts.
l. Crime Deterrence
“1. Other Universes are Not UsAny potential benefits resulting from actions taken in the other universe do not affect our own. This technology can only provide information for our universe on what has already happened; it cannot prevent those acts. Pro also doesn’t support the view that this will somehow deter people from committing these crimes.”
- The knowledge that major criminal organizations are being stopped by this device should be enough to deter most would-be murderers.
- Premeditated murders would require more methodical planning, as the killer would have to remain undetected by the victim or have their identity concealed in order for the victim's memories to not be a threat to them with this device.
A) This would deter crime in two ways.: 1. Fear 2. Effort
B) There is a third option, and that is criminals who have offended would be off the streets, negating the possibility of them harming anybody else.
ll. Insubstantial Evidence
“Pro assumes that the individuals who are going through this multiversal travel are credible witnesses, which assumes that every person involved doesn’t fabricate or misinterpret, that it’s possible to obtain that information within 8 minutes, that courts will issue warrants based on single eye-witness testimony obtained in a separate universe, and that that information is accurate. Which leads into my next and most important point.”
This is actually a possible risk. Even in the chance that situations do get misinterpreted, there is one way to correct this.
- Only convict on credible evidence. If the person doing multiverse travel does identify the criminal, that should be conclusive enough to warrant an investigation. It is through the investigation alone that the criminal may be taken off-guard and where the detectives find something concrete.
- So long as the Source Code is used only as a tool to amplify investigating and doesn't substitute or become a crutch, I anticipate there will be more pros than potential cons.
lll. Multiversal Catastrophe
Many of Con’s biggest concerns about the different timelines with situations exploring every hypothetical possibility are valid. To prevent this, we should strive to make the technology work as intended. We can do this by.:
- Incorporating the memories of all the victims in order to establish a stable pattern of events in order to make it most identical to the past of our current timeline as much as possible.
- This way events play out as accurately as they did then, thus minimizing any major alterations that are likely to cause us to misinterpret evidence.
- There should be two stages.: 1. Rough Draft. 2. Final Draft.
Within the first stage, we can experiment with the device as many times as necessary to resolve any errors that we detected. When we have enough of an understanding of the machine, we can declare it complete as the final draft and mark it safe for use.
“Perhaps more importantly, though, this also can mangle those in other universes. Remember, this is multiverse travel. Anything that these individuals do in the span of 8 minutes could affect the people in those universes. If this technology will be developed at a price that makes it accessible to the US government, other actors will eventually develop it as well and many of those will use it for harm. Hell, even if we assume that it stays solely in the hands of the US government, we have a history replete with assassination attempts, false flag operations, initiating bloody coups, installing dictators, and facilitating drug lords and terrorists, and that's all excluding the usual use of overwhelming military might to directly take control of whole countries. Pro cannot assert how the US will use this tech, only that the US will raise the funds and develop the expertise to make it and, given our history, the US will most certainly misuse it to obtain information that furthers these efforts.”
This is certainly a possibility. For precautions, we can always implement a self-destruct feature should our defenses find themselves compromised. Which would ensure zero chances of such technology ever getting into the wrong hands.
- Our current security is so tight however, that the likelihood of terrorists or spies infiltrating or getting to it is nearly impossible.
- To ensure the government doesn’t use it for evil, we can push for tighter regulations and surveillance to bring about stronger accountability.
“Nothing about the technology precludes people using it for malicious purposes, and those aren’t confined to 8 minute periods. Jake Gyllenhaal’s character eventually finds a way to prevent the incident that would have claimed his life and goes on to live out the rest of his life as the person whose consciousness he replaced. Setting aside the existential horror of being able to do that, this means it’s not just possible, but probable that anyone using this machine could transfer to another universe and effectively begiven a clean slate to do whatever they want since their identity will be entirely different, creating new problems in the other universe. As such, all those harms that Pro lists in his R1 are passed onto countless other universes, far outstripping any potential benefit of obtaining information for ours.”
Any situation in which they do create problems in the other universe would be reversed by the machine snapping their consciousness from the alternate universe and bringing them to their body in the original one. Presuming the machine didn’t save the progress of the alternate timeline, all of the events that folded out disastrously would be void and restarted back to the beginning of the 8 minutes.
But even then, they are no longer considered a threat since they pose no harm to our current world should they get lost in a different dimension.
Much obliged to Sir.Lancelot for his rebuttals. Always appreciate a solid debate.
In an effort to narrow the focus of this debate, I’ll drop my first argument, since I don't want to turn this debate into a discussion of the deterrent effect of catching criminals. Grant Pro his responses on that point.
I’ll largely drop my second argument as well, with the caveat that Pro’s responses demonstrate the limits of his potential benefits. If the Source Code machine (I’ll abbreviate this as SCM) can only initiate an investigation, then Pro is conceding that all his benefits are predicated on not just the successful use of the SCM, but on the present investigation being successful despite the incident in question being months or even years in the past. Pro provides little reason to believe that the SCM will meaningfully address any of these problems given that it relies on the same investigative methods that the SCM is supposedly designed to replace.
So, I'll focus on Multiversal Catastrophe. I’ll break out my responses.
1. This debate is about the SCM, not some magically perfected version of it
In this debate, we are discussing technology that was present in the movie Source Code. For the sake of debate, I am granting a massive jump in technological advancement. The technology has been very clearly spelled out: it sends a single person’s consciousness to that of a person who will die 8 minutes after the transfer completes. The person whose consciousness is being replaced is in another universe within the existing multiverse. I am also granting for the sake of debate that anyone could theoretically use this technology, despite the fact that those running the SCM could only find one person who could use it, as we do not know what qualities allow Jake Gyllenhaal’s character to do so. As such, I am already conceding Pro the capacity to use this technology and use it broadly.
However, this does not mean that I am granting Pro the capacity to make changes to that technology that are never established to be possible within the movie, making them effectively magic. Things like “incorporating the memories of all the victims” of a given incident, calibrating or “drafting” to match timelines, and “snapping their consciousness” back to our universe are not tools Pro can claim to access. Pro cannot suddenly fiat that this technology can be used this way when it’s not even established within the world of Source Code that this is possible. Pro is defending SCM as it exists in Source Code, not as he wishes it exists in our world.
2. Pro's changes would not work
I laid out how this technology works very specifically in R1, but Pro can’t seem to keep it straight.
There’s a difference between how the Source Code is initially explained to Jake Gyllenhaal’s character and how it actually works. It’s initially explained that the SCM “reconstructs the past using the dead passengers’ residual collective memories”, but that’s only partially true. It does “retrace events” in this manner, but not by transporting someone to the past or creating a simulation – it traces those memories, that consciousness, to another universe. It’s a “multiple-reality paradigm… [where] What’s done is done and cannot be undone.”
So, when Pro talks about “incorporating the memories” of victims, he only has part of the picture. Similarly, while it presumably does save those memories, it is not a simulation. There is no save state here, no means to reverse or void what was done in the other universe, no mechanism to pull someone out of that other world beyond the 8 minutes elapsing. Even death of the person in our universe only results in either their loss or their being stuck in the other universe.
3. Assuming they're possible, Pro's changes are net negative
Everything Pro is presenting as workarounds will either make things worse or fail to address the problem, and key to that are two problems that Pro keeps avoiding:
A. The multiverse confounds attempts to navigate or understand it
“Incorporating the memories of all the victims...”
Once again, I'll point out that we most definitely live in a Level 4 multiverse and that it is therefore infinite. If you incorporate the memories of multiple victims, everyone will go to a different universe and come back with different information. Even if you could somehow link these consciousnesses (more magic), there is no limit to the possibilities that could occur. They could arrive at different times (not everyone becomes a victim at the same moment), in different places, be victims of different crimes committed by the different people, or even be subject to entirely distinct fundamental physical laws. Pro provides no way to avoid any of this.
“…we can experiment with the device as many times as necessary…"
“Experimenting” is dangerous. Participants will fall down at least one of multiple rabbit holes: remaining trapped in those universes, become subject to an entirely different concept of time, or just being subjected to a continual “live, die, repeat” cycle that wears away at their sanity over countless iterations. Pro renders untold numbers of alpha testers comatose or insane and puts massive burdens on other universes as more and more people come through to optimize SCM performance (which assumes that it can be optimized - more on that shortly), erasing the consciousnesses of people in other universes in the name of experimentation.
"When we have enough of an understanding of the machine..."
Pro misunderstands what he's proposing. His experimenting isn't aimed at understanding the SCM, it's aimed at understanding and navigating the infinite multiverse, something he can in no way achieve due to its countless variations. The only understanding we will gain is of how absurdly little we know about the multiverse, with the only possible take-away being that any attempt to understand it is solely destructive to our universe and others. As such, his claim of being able to somehow develop a "Final Draft" is an impossibly high standard that he can never meet. In Pro's world, we will cycle through rough drafts that will never approach a sufficient understanding to finalize, ensuring that his experiment either continues forever or gets arbitrarily cut off without having addressed existing problems.
B. Like with nuclear weapons, when the genie is out of the bottle, it cannot be put back in
“…implement a self-destruct feature…”
An inherent assumption of this debate is that this technology both can be developed right now and at manageable costs. If that’s true of the US, it is also true of nearly every other country. At no point in this debate has Pro explained how this knowledge would be made and kept exclusive to the US government and, frankly, that's impossible. As the above link demonstrates with nuclear weapons, technical and cost-based impediments are, at best, only going to delay most countries that want to acquire it. Incorporating a self-destruct feature in US devices only prevents their theft (assuming no one can disarm it, which is a pretty big assumption); it does not prevent other countries, or even terrorist organizations, from developing the SCM for their own purposes. So extend all the harms I laid out as ways the US could use this technology for ill, as any regulations or surveillance done by the US government will not stymie them in other countries.
C. Self limitations are no limitations at all
“…push for tighter regulations and surveillance...”
Pro will have to detail specific regulations (there are no existing regulations, so he’s not “tightening” anything), establish their solvency, and explain his apparent certainty that they will be passed. Keeping this vague affords no basis for believing that the US government will itself be restricted from the uses I’ve detailed. Even if he does, though, that assumes that bad actors within the government will always follow those regulations and be subject to that accountability. This effort would be completely ineffectual. Once again, extend the harms that Pro concedes the US is ready and willing to commit again.
D. Messing with other universes has consequences
“…they pose no harm to our current world...”
This mentality that the only thing that matters is effects on our own universe is both horrifying and short-sighted. Just because we live in an infinite multiverse doesn’t mean that we should continuously throw universes under the bus until we solve our own problems; Pro’s “out of sight, out of mind” mentality condones acts more deplorable than genocide, and it also assumes that what is currently not our problem will never be our problem. Other universes would develop an SCM of their own – it’s an infinite multiverse, so if it can be built here, it has already been built in some other universe. Our choice to act with impunity will be reciprocated, compounding problems for other universes and putting ours in the crosshairs.
Back over to you, Sir.Lancelot.
Round 3
Accuracy Testing
There is actually one certifiable way to test the factualness of the machine. Since most crime shows will create a timeline based on a confirmed series of events and create a murder documentary re-enactment with actors playing the Killer and one playing the victim, the same can be done with the device.
Con does misinterpret my original argument to mean that I am implying we should access all the memories in unison. I didn’t elaborate enough, so this is my fault.:
- The person accessing the device can go back in time as many times as they choose.
- The person can relive those experiences from the perspective of all of the victims.
With these two factors, the person can experiment as many times as they like with no consequences. For each time they go back, they can take mental notes and reference experiences, then communicate it back to the workforce.
- The government can take all of these individual experiments and establish a timeline of events. If there are no irregularities or inconsistencies between the memories of the victims and real life forensic evidence, we have 100% established the reliability of the machine.
Zero inconsistencies + corroborating facts will only demonstrate its abilities.
Risks of Experimentation
We cannot deny Con’s reasonable concern of a test subject getting trapped in a murder timeloop of Groundhog’s Day. So I propose the following before the government declares the machine safe for human use.
- Find willing volunteers for clinical trials and disclose all of the risks.
- After a time of experimentation if there is no risk, then the device can be declared safe for use.
- If there is a risk, we can work on fixing it accordingly or disabandon the project and refund everyone their tax dollars.
Ethics of Multiversal Travel
This is certainly debatable, as Con does have a very strong moral appeal for considering the dangers people from other universes may experience.
A counterargument could be made that it isn’t immoral to look at the multiverse with indifference. As the events played out already, these people are both in the past and figments of the imagination, and of no real importance anyway.
Killing them is like running over NPC’s in a video game with the car that you hijacked. (Only the NPC’s in Source Code are playable because you can choose to experiment from POV.)
Regulations & Technological Advances
I would urge against the rushing of an experiment. We can raise the taxes by a small amount and over time, the increments of funds could be used to safely develop the project and minimize risks without significantly costing the pages of The Federal Reserve.
While we shouldn’t rush, America needs a headstart over other countries and this device gives the country the advantage it needs. This would make nearly every country in the world dependent on the US to share knowledge, research, and evidence of war crimes.
The self-destruct feature is not a part of the machine, as Con correctly points out. We could instill a bomb close to it if enemies decide to invade.
In regards to regulations, we can use the following.
- Charge expensively for the use.
- Require licensing that will take years to obtain.
- Require consent from higher authorities like the Judicial Branch.
All in all. For every potential risk, there is an ultimate solution or mitigator.
Thanks again, Sir.Lancelot.
This round will break up into two parts. First, I’ll list what Pro has to accomplish in order to use the SCM to achieve his impacts, covering the general problems (GP) and the specific failures of his workarounds (SP). Second, I’ll cover the most important impact in this debate: the existential threat of using other universes as a means to an end.
I) Pro's Solvency and Impacts
1) The SCM must be developed and usable for multiversal replacement
Conceded for the purposes of this debate.
2) The SCM must be able to send us to identical universes
GP: In an infinite multiverse, there are an infinite number of universes where a given victim or set of victims are currently 8 minutes from death. Just because the victim or victims are the same in each universe doesn’t mean the cause of death is the same. One could be a terrorist. One could be an entirely different terrorist. One could be a giraffe with a vengeance. One could be a penny on the railroad tracks. One could be Superman fighting General Zod. The very nature of the infinite multiverse thwarts any attempts to narrow down causes.
SP: Creating a timeline of events, accessing “the perspective of all of the victims”, and experimenting “as many times as they like” don’t solve for an infinite multiverse. At best, these narrow the list of suspects within another universe. In any other universe, that information is useless.
3) Trustworthy people must be willing to use the SCM
GP: Pro concedes that the best-case scenario is people entering into a “live, die, repeat” cycle. This isn’t Groundhog Day – these people will endure death and its accompanying physical pain every time they use the SCM. They will also experience the psychological trauma of being subjected to death multiple times and being exposed to all manner of potential realities that may be beyond their capacity to comprehend.
SP1: Being able to limit the number of visits to “as many times as they choose” only limits the trauma. Moreover, as someone else controls the SCM (the person inside of it does not - their consciousness is confined between uses), this control is illusory. Particularly since Pro requires licensing and “consent from higher authorities like the Judicial Branch”, the choice is out of their hands.
SP2: Accessing “the perspective of all of the victims” makes the experience far worse. Individuals will experience a range of victim’s deaths, either consecutively or all at once (Pro doesn’t specify which), likely including many that are slow and excruciating.
SP3: I would sincerely love to see the risk disclosure for these clinical trials. “Side effects will include imminent death, including all the physical sensation that comes with it. This will repeat every time you use the SCM. Side effects may also include having your consciousness lost in another universe, death of your physical body, extensive psychological trauma, and the worst kind of pain imaginable. Consult your doctor if you can no longer process the concepts of time and space, or if you cannot recognize your own physical form.” Quite the sales pitch. Where do I sign up!?
SP4: Pro admits that authorities would have to “disabandon [sic] the project” since it’s impossible to fix a problem that is integral to the technology.
4) The US must have a monopoly on this technology
GP: The US will absolutely misuse this technology if given the opportunity to do so. Having a monopoly on the technology not only facilitates the assassination attempts, false flag operations, initiating bloody coups, installing dictators, and facilitation of drug lords and terrorists I mentioned earlier, but it practically guarantees they will occur, since the US won’t squander that kind of edge over the competition.
SP1: None of Pro’s regulations prevent bad actors within the US government (or the government itself) from using the machine for these purposes. Any regulation can be circumvented or ignored.
SP2: Limiting funds used to develop the SCM, extending licensing periods to years, and requiring consent from judicial branches all have the same consequence: they extend the period of time required to use the device. In those many years before use, how does Pro ensure that this knowledge remains secret, especially after establishing a public tax fund to develop it? Pro cannot both claim a slow timetable for development and use while simultaneously claiming that the US will still be faster than other countries.
SP3: Even if the US is faster, this does not change anything: other countries will still develop and use it. All my harms of misuse still apply.
II) The Problem of Multiversal Nihilism
Pro repeatedly mischaracterizes what the multiverse is in this argument. He says we should treat it with indifference because:
“these people are both in the past and figments of the imagination, and of no real importance anyway… Killing them is like running over NPC’s in a video game…”
So, to establish why we should care, three responses.
First, this is not “the past.” This is another universe where the past is playing out in their present. They are also not figments of anyone’s imagination. They are thinking, feeling people just like anyone in our world (though perhaps subject to different physical laws). Actions someone takes in their universe is important for them, and Pro’s apparent willingness to literally throw them under a car as though they are unthinking, unfeeling NPCs is abjectly horrifying and an application of nihilism on a scale that would make the worst killers in history blush.
Second, everything Pro is willing to do to other universes, he justifies other universes doing to us. In an infinite number of other universes, someone is way ahead of us. Every universe they travel to, including our own, will become the NPCs Pro is so willing to mow down, and setting the standard that that's how we should perceive other universes is an explicit endorsement of that behavior.
Third, Pro looks at the infinite multiverse and his response is to declare that any and all actions taken within other universes don’t matter. He does not support this argument; he just asserts it. I don’t know how Pro justifies any actions as meaningful within our own universe while arguing that they simultaneously have no meaning in other universes (he’s essentially arguing that, among universes, infinity minus one doesn’t matter), but this argument is akin to saying that nothing matters because the multiverse represents a set of unimportant alternatives. He’s the Jobu Tupaki of this debate, just one step away from making his “everything bagel”(Everything Everywhere All At Once spoiler) that represents despair and the pointlessness of existence itself. So, let me argue the reverse: because everything can and does happen, everything matters. In the face of the absolute chaos of everything, our smallest actions and motives matter most of all, and therefore our kindness and empathy are essential. Both Kurt Vonnegut's writing in Sirens of Titan and Waymond's speech in Everything Everywhere All At Once said it best:
Pro can have his bagel. I choose to be kind as we all should, not just as a quid pro quo, but by recognizing common our common humanity, its inherent value, and the value of connection in the face of the unknowable.
Back to you, Sir.Lancelot.
Round 4
Thank you, mr. Whiteflame. Couldn’t have said it better. The reference of Jobu is a perfect analogy btw. 😂
Tighter Defense & Regulations
- Precautions can be taken by measuring the potential of possible invasions and reacting accordingly.
- Tighter security can prevent research from being leaked and guard technology.
- Using the Secret Service’s techniques for safe-guarding top secret information can also be applied to protect the Source Code.
Just imagine how many strategies and secret attacks we can anticipate by using the Source Code to prevent assassinations or terrorist attacks. From identifying the intruder to how the device was made.
The Likelihood of Limitless Universes
- Although, I understand and relate to Con’s worries about these other universes having different rules.
- The likelihood of this is very low. It is more probable that the fabrication of events projected by the victims’ mind will be an accurate portrayal of reality.
Presume a flight mysteriously exploded and the theory was of a hijacking incident gone wrong. The goal is for me to identify the criminal.
Even if there were infinite scenarios, all these various multiverses are still subject to the laws of physics. So even something as seemingly insignificant of identitying the size of the terrorist device or learning the name lf the perpetrator would assist in the OG universe in uncovering the methods or names of terrorist organization.
Errors in Clinical Testing
- Realistically, the disclosure of said risks may be enough to discourage your average person, but there are people bold enough more than willing to go through anyway.
- Harmful risks, exist as they may, are necessary for the greater good. What’s one life compared to the new order they could create and the deaths they could prevent?
If we can sacrifice one life (That volunteers willingly, they’re not being forced.) to possibly save millions in the future. Do the ends justify the means?
Nihilism & Indifference
Speaking for myself, I’m opposed to killing NPC’s in video games. If I were playing Assassin’s Creed, I intervene when civilians are about to be slain by street thugs. But if they end up dying anyway, it is what it is.
- Since Pro’s philosophy is actually logical and we need to show consistency. I don’t propose resorting to sadism or unnecessary brutality, but the priority is the mission in the default universe. The fates of these NPC’s are sealed either way, so valuing their lives for the sake of morality makes no difference and will not stop anything in the OG universe.
Conclusion
The risks may or may not outweigh the pros, but the actual risks are statistically unlikely.
While the pros are nearly a guarantee and the ability to revert potential risks do exist.
Thank you once again Sir.Lancelot. I had a great time writing for this debate.
I’m going to break down the major arguments in this debate. I’ll note that Pro dropped the vast majority of his “fixes” this round, so I won’t cover anything he doesn’t care to mention. The one exception is his “Tighter Defense & Regulations” point, which he has continued adding to progressively over the course of this debate. None of this prevents bad actors within the government or the government itself from ignoring them and proceeding to use the SCM as they please; it doesn’t prevent other countries from independently developing this technology; it doesn’t prevent other universes from developing and using this technology as they please.
This has colloquially been defined as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Here, it’s the opposite: doing something inherently inconsistent (traveling to infinitely varied universes) and expecting a consistent result (the same cause for a given incident across all of them). Pro keeps claiming this, arguing that we can throw other universes at problems until we come up with solutions, dismissing the realities inherent to a Level 4 multiverse.
Recall: a Level 4 multiverse necessarily subsumes a Level 3 multiverse, and that Pro’s very aim - the ability to alter reality in another universe using the SCM – necessarily opens the door for any number of other factors (i.e. alternate realities) in other universes to affect what will happen. Pro drops all this, and, yes, since those universes represent different realities, they can defy what are basic physical laws in our universe, including twisting concepts of time and space.
Any route to Pro’s goal is similarly twisted as repeatedly delving into other universes for information that is applicable in ours is a fool’s errand. Pro is creating a set of circumstances that will result in a never-ending variety of suspects, yet he will pursue them all anyway, invariably reducing the effectiveness of any search for the person who committed the crime and ruining the lives of countless innocent people in our universe. And he’ll do it again. And again. And again.
…did I ever tell you what the definition of insanity is?
There is no scenario where people sign onto using the SCM after being told the likely harms. Pro’s disclosure would read like the worst list of side effects possible, including guarantees that the user will experience death, physical injury and psychological trauma. Pro thinks there will be people “bold enough more than willing to go through anyway,” but provides no way to test it. So, I’ll focus on similar scenarios in media.
In Portal 2, it’s revealed that Aperture Sciences, which performed extremely dangerous human experiments, was required to recruit homeless vagrants with promises of pay. Even that eventually failed and they made “test participation mandatory for all employees,” leading to a mass exodus of employees. At best, Pro can claim some up-front interest, but he cannot claim that anyone will use the SCM multiple times, which is what is required to achieve any of his aims.
Pro mentioned Groundhog Day, which didn’t result in the lead losing his life every time the cycle repeated. Still, he became suicidal, ending several of his cycles by offing himself. This is called Time Loop Fatigue, and considering how Pro thinks the SCM must work, the person’s perception of it would be functionally the same as a time loop. And that’s how many of these go (spoilers all around, and yep, it's anime):
- In Re:Zero, the protagonist’s ability is “Return from Death.” He becomes suicidal and nearly loses his mind at least two times.
- In Steins;Gate, the protagonist uses Mental Time Travel to try to prevent a friend’s death. The experience nearly destroys him.
- In Puella Magi Madoka Magica, the deuteragonist Homura psychologically unravels over the course of a long series of time resets, eventually resulting in her transformation into a mindless, soulless witch and breaking basic laws of reality to get her way.
And, most pertinent of all,
- In Source Code, the protagonist becomes progressively more exhausted and traumatized reliving these events over and over, seeking death after the mission ends.
So, Pro’s best-case scenario is that people are “bold enough” to join despite his disclosure, and then do one of the following: leave with trauma or commit suicide, a process he actively speeds up by having them experience the deaths of multiple people simultaneously. Not only does that ensure that Pro fails to achieve his aims, but it also puts all these people through useless suffering and puts those in other universes in jeopardy as users of the SCM become progressively more unhinged, since anyone willing to do repeat trips will psychologically degrade as the value of human life becomes progressively more meaningless to them.
Pro endorses nihilism and indifference in our perception of other universes, going so far as to declare their fates already sealed. So, Pro isn’t trying to end it all like Jobu Tupaki; he’s Rick Sanchez, justifying both general callousness and any outright atrocities that occur on the basis that they’re happening to someone else for our benefit, and even that character knows that his perspective is nothing but destructive. The only difference between Pro’s perspective and Rick’s is that Pro is trying to simultaneously establish that nothing outside our universe matters while saying everything inside of it does, an argument he in no way justifies. If none of the countless other iterations of our universe matter, why is this one special?
Even from his supposedly “logical” philosophy and assuming a Level 3 multiverse, Pro’s argument doesn’t make sense. By his logic, we are part of an infinite set of nearly identical universes, all of which deviate (at least without any external intervention) solely in their position in time relative to the others. That means there are other universes set forward in time from where we are, all of which have developed the SCM as we will. So, if their fates are sealed (as Pro claims the fates of universes that are playing out in our past are sealed), so is ours, making us all NPCs. No universe can be the default because they’re all tied to the same timeline, the same string of fate. Every universe is as dispensable as the next, so Pro’s entire case falls away. There’s no point in pursuing any of that for our universe because somewhere, in some other universe, they’ve already achieved it and did so by using and abusing countless other universes to reach that end goal, perhaps including our own.
The only way that doesn’t happen in any multiverse (particularly Pro’s claimed Level 3 multiverse) is to be kind. If Pro’s right, then doing so means we were always fated to be kind. If he’s wrong, then treating others with kindness is a net positive in and of itself and breeds kindness in return. Kindness means refusing to use other universes as means to an end. It means refusing to commit terrible acts in other universes for our own benefit to set the standard that doing so must never happen. And that’s true whether you buy Pro’s view of the multiverse or mine: it’s a recognition of common humanity, independent of any perceptions of fate or destiny.
Once again, Vonnegut said it best: “Hello babies, Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you’ve got a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies – God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.” We gain nothing from following Pro’s nihilism and indifference. Kindness is and will remain the only path forward.
Vote Con.
- https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/the-definition-of-insanity-did-i-ever-tell-you-the-definition-of-insanity
- https://theportalwiki.com/wiki/Cave_Johnson_voice_lines
- https://half-life.fandom.com/wiki/Test_Shaft_09
- https://youtu.be/M628DuIEZ_o
- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TimeLoopFatigue
- https://www.cbr.com/rezero-subaru-deaths-chronological-order/
- https://youtu.be/0GCe1LAuSRk
- https://youtu.be/t-mz7XmqC8I
- https://youtu.be/BCf80uxBG8A
- https://youtu.be/lf_X-NLUDbY
- https://youtu.be/ufpmAQ7rtC8
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source_Code#:~:text=On%20his%20next,Stevens%20eventually%20accepts
- https://www.polygon.com/23589732/multiverse-movie-villain-kang-everything-everywhere-batman-rick-morty
- https://redtreetimes.com/2020/05/22/welcome-to-earth/
Can’t tell if it’s a reference to the MCU or the Simpsons, but I’m going with the latter.
https://youtu.be/zRdNOQcfp-8
This was a pretty good line.:
“President Kang would disagree but he’s not the one casting a vote in this universe.”
Thanks for voting! I’ll add it to the pile of shows I plan to watch.
I need to google whether or not they made a video game version of the movie.
You two need to watch Person of Interest!
Point taken, though there's the question of whether this evidence comes from police directly or from a less reliable source and simply being presented by police. Didn't end up taking that point very far anyway, but I appreciate the insight.
Police testimony is treated like evidence in the court of law. Me personally I was a juror and viewed them as skeptically as anyone else, particularly since they held the interrogation in a room without cameras and refused to do any gun powder residue testing, but I think most jurors are not like me and will actually obey jury instructions
I think that the realistic offers more questions about what could happen, i.e. the mechanics of how the technology performs, whereas the theoretical offers more discussion about whether it should happen, since we can better define what the technology is and how it works as a baseline. I think both have their benefits. I don’t mind doing either one, but this is what we went with and this is what we are debating.
If you want to discuss the limits of existing tech, that might be a good basis for a debate, but I’m not sure how you’d define the parameters for it.
you would rather debate a theoretical rather than the realistic?
the description says "as like" so i understood that as any machine that could collect 8 minutes of thought before death.
be it on a quantum computer to a 2023 macbook.
heck the chip has analog to digital converter using binary code. scrap the 2023 macbook we could watch it on tv or a windows xp. the hardest part is converting the info to video.
The literal title of this debate and the description involves technology from the movie, so that’s the focus of our discussion. It might be interesting to explore the ideas you’re discussing based on existing tech, but that’s not what we’re doing in this debate.
i would hesitate before saying its not possible. musk has been working hard on technology that transmits thoughts.
he already has animals playing pong with their brain and is doing human testing.
https://youtu.be/L3XxbxfgzoQ
why is this debate turned into multiverse theory and quantum mechanics? there is no need to have theoretical arguements about something that is possible without applying these ideas.
the chip put in a human mind can transmit thoughts, the data processed from the brain to the chip can be stored and transmitted to a database. as long as there is an electrical impulse.
or it can be retrieved from the corpse and recompile the thoughts during/preceding its death. this will not negate or dismiss criminal investigation but rather make it more cohesive on depositions.
forget the movie. focus on the benefits/failings of recompiling last thoughts of someone who died.
I've seen the movie, just didn't realize that's what it was until I read the description.
It’s like one of those movies or stories where a person’s consciousness is transferred into the main character of a video game and interacts with the NPC’s, except based in time simulation.
This does look interesting. When I first read the title, I thought this was in reference to open-source codes and I got excited for serious policy debates, though this seems just as interesting.
You guys will enjoy this one.
This looks like a fun read unless whiteflame takes it too seriously.