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[Tiberious Thessalonia]

Well true, Tib tends to consider that more of a momentary hiccup rather than a discontinuation.

[BloodBird]

Oh no, I mean I imagine all capsuleers keep quite up to date backups, but that doesn't change the fact that the backup is not -you. If you are killed out of pod your life, and consciousness are over, and a backup clone awakens, unlike pod-death, where the information is transmitted and there is no break in consciousness.

I'm not sure that this can be argued as fact, Silas. It's your opinion, yes - but a recognized fact?

When that clone wakes up, there will be a gap in the person's memory as wide as the time that has passed from the last up-date. It's similar to any loss of memory IRL - You are arguably still you, but you can't remember what took place the last two days or whatever.

If a person suffers brain-damage or any other memory-harming trauma from an accident or anything, and loses a week's worth of memory, never to get it back, is that person just a fresh continuation of the person that 'died' when the impact came, or a different person entirely?

After all, memories, personality and all other mental factors that constructs the 'soul' is simply information, info that can in the case of EVE be copied and stored. Thus, similar to the soft-cloned capsuleer the injured person has a hole in his/her memory, but otherwise they are entirely identical in all ways to their 'progenitor' - by your argument a person waking from a memory-loss will be a new person, freshly born with the memories and personality of the person that was in an accident days before.

Hmm, interesting topic. If this strays to far off topic a new tread may be needed.

[Esna Pitoojee]

Arguments about cloning and consciousness aside - how do we think station authorities in various sec statuses would react if capsuleer A came in and went "right, person B is docked in your station or comes here regularly. I think they're a serious threat to your safety, and they shouldn't be let out of the capsuleer-designated areas. Here's X, Y, and Z evidence why." [Insert half-decent evidence here.]


Nullsec aside - which I've always imagined to be highly dependent on the management styles of whoever was running the station at the time - do capsuleers have that kind of influence? Would faction allegiance matter (either of person A or B)? Would it depend on the station managers?

[Silas Vitalia]

I'm not denying the soft clone is identical to you in every conceivable and possible way, right down to every brain cell, save for the gap in memory. 

What I'm saying is that it is the instance of the clone that dies, does die.  You die, and the clone wakes up. You could wake up ten of them at the same time and they all have individual consciousness. There is no shared memory and they each have their own experiences, ie they are separate people starting with the same recipe. If you kill one the other's don't feel it, and the one you killed, is dead.

[BloodBird]

Arguments about cloning and consciousness aside - how do we think station authorities in various sec statuses would react if capsuleer A came in and went "right, person B is docked in your station or comes here regularly. I think they're a serious threat to your safety, and they shouldn't be let out of the capsuleer-designated areas. Here's X, Y, and Z evidence why." [Insert half-decent evidence here.]


Nullsec aside - which I've always imagined to be highly dependent on the management styles of whoever was running the station at the time - do capsuleers have that kind of influence? Would faction allegiance matter (either of person A or B)? Would it depend on the station managers?

Given what we got to know in "The elite" and "Jita 4-4" it's likely that any evidence of a capsuleer's status regarding their faction is irrelevant to them; they have their orders, and will follow them.

In the case of the State, it don't matter if someone came over to them and said "Verone is here on the station [It's likely they already know] and here's the evidence of his ebil miss-conduct and whatever" and even handed over any evidence, legit or no; they would have to follow orders. In the State this likely means to let through Dex Netherland if/when he wants in and follow him around when he uses the official channels to baseline, if his standings and/or status is good enough. Alternatively, shoot him. As for Verone, who knows? Shoot on sight, perhaps.

The idea that you can influence the actions of the guards outside the capsuleer district(s) is likely a viable route in RP - perhaps a bribed-guard-kills-your-worst-enemy-dead kind of scheme in order to slow down an enemy or foul a trade-deal or whatever. But this relies on the consent of the other etc. and for extra realism likely knowledge of how the local guards operate, and possibly agreement/knowledge between all parties on how CONCORD's rules regarding capsuleers work, and how this influences the local faction's security. If at all.

I'm assuming the high-sec station's guards would be very hard, if not impossible to bribe. Low-sec might have far less oversight and more corrupt members willing to take the pay and do the deed. Null-sec stations are likely the sway of whatever force is there and however they view the capsuleers who visit. Ultimately I'm not sure capsuleer-allegiance or standings matter to much, least of all enough to influence the standard order for any capsuleer leaving the safe-zone, unless perhaps a special deal was made and these guards had been informed to let you go past with no problem...

Ending the slight rant here, I think...

[Matariki Rain]

Silas, I'd suggest that even with an instantaneous "transfer" the old "person" dies and a new one wakes up.

[Aria Jenneth]

I'm not sure that this can be argued as fact, Silas. It's your opinion, yes - but a recognized fact?

....

If a person suffers brain-damage or any other memory-harming trauma from an accident or anything, and loses a week's worth of memory, never to get it back, is that person just a fresh continuation of the person that 'died' when the impact came, or a different person entirely?

I concur, though (IC) from the opposite perspective. Aria has historically argued that any use of cloning constitutes a discontinuity in identity-- the "old you" is dead. (She'd have argued that the "brain damage" question is different in kind because it does not come accompanied by a full trade of one body for a copy of the same.) Consequently, she would have had little more trouble with "soft" cloning than the normal sort.

What is "the same person" and what constitutes "death" is a matter of philosophy. Some capsuleers might rather die permanently than soft-clone, but I suspect it's fewer than you might believe, Silas. Certainly, few enough that the authorities are unlikely to take the chance....


Esna:

I think it's a big universe, and I think the local authorities, wherever they are, are human-- ergo, prone to all sorts of reactions. There are some Evelopedia resources on B-lining, I seem to remember. Let me see if I can find them....

Ah. Here it is....

http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Baselining

Hrm. Seems a few of my conclusions as to how capsuleers would be handled are contradicted herein. Reluctance to imprison capsuleers seems to stem more from fear of the capsuleer's contacts than fear of the capsuleer. That likely varies, however, and "Jita 4-4" does seem to suggest otherwise. Then again, that narrator may be unreliable.

Time to do some more reading....

[Silas Vitalia]

This continuity of consciousness idea absolutely needs to be explored.  I think it would have a profound impact on how capsuleers act. 

The difference between having a copy of myself take over after I die, vs myself in a new body, has profound implications either way!

[Ulphus]

Ulf's toyed with the idea that for his clan, he's an ancestor ghost.

He's died, but hangs around looking out for them when he can.

In his occasional musings, he's not sure he still counts as a real person as far as the clan.

This, of course, makes Ghost Hunters name even more threatening...

[lallara zhuul]

As long as you do not deduct ISKies for your godmoding shenannigans, it did not happen.

Therefore bribery and extensive interaction with authorities to handwave baselining into your story becomes very hard thing to do. (Not sure that can you give iskies to npc corps anymore.)

I would gather that CONCORD and the factions would encourage the capsuleers to stay in their areas with positive stuff.

By eliminating the need to baseline at all.

Replacing human interaction as much as possible with virtual interfaces, when such interaction would not suffice then the capsuleers themselves would have liaison officers that would be trained to work with these brainwashed mass murderers without undue friction that would come from interaction between untrained individuals.

Smother the capsuleers with luxury and technology that is only accessible to the highest tiers of the society.

Make them uncorruptible by giving them so much that getting more would be meaningless.
(Been re-reading Gravity Dreams by L.E.Modesitt Jr.)

When it comes to apprehending a capsuleer, always get them alive and keep them alive as long as you can, in tubes if you have to.
The secondary clones usually would have no legal status before the primary one is dead.
Otherwise people could just clone people willy-nilly and get access to their property.

Being apprehended will not be a problem if you let the capsuleer die.
Capture the bugger, torture him for a good few weeks and then let him go.
After getting him to the subsidiary of the company that has his cloning contract where you will have him soft-scanned.

[Aria Jenneth]

Silas:

Well-- then there's also the doctrine of sacred flesh taken to its extreme: "Die once, and your soul is with God."

I'm not actually sure that philosophy is held dear to most capsuleer hearts on this score, Silas. A careful read of the literature on cloning reveals that even an extremely high-grade clone is only held to be a "true doppelganger" of the original, implying that (1) lower-grade clones aren't, and (2) even a high-grade one is a near-perfect copy-- NOT the original. See "Clone quality," http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Cloning, s. 6.

Yet most capsuleers do not seem to give a damn. From their perspectives, it's a contract for immortality, and, if there's a difference from Generic_Capsuleer v. 1.0 to v. 1.1, and a larger one stepping up to v. 1.6, they generally don't notice it, so it can't be all that important. Taking that as a starting point, being able to "back up" your life seems like the next best thing to having a "quicksave" function, which my admittedly atheist housemate cites as the super power he would choose over all others.

With a backup, the effects of taking a knife between the ribs while out doing some ill-advised carousing are little worse than the alcohol-induced blackout you'd have suffered if you hadn't gotten yourself shanked. Maybe better, even: you don't even wake up with a hangover.

[Aria Jenneth]

As long as you do not deduct ISKies for your godmoding shenannigans, it did not happen.

This sounds almost, I say, ALMOST reasonable (b-lining is part of the canon. http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Baselining. No amount of calling it godmoding will make it so), until you get to your next line.

Therefore bribery and extensive interaction with authorities to handwave baselining into your story becomes very hard thing to do. (Not sure that can you give iskies to npc corps anymore.)

Confining IC action on the basis of the deficiencies of the game as a full society-simulator strikes me as its own species of godmoding.

Smother the capsuleers with luxury and technology that is only accessible to the highest tiers of the society.

Make them uncorruptible by giving them so much that getting more would be meaningless.
(Been re-reading Gravity Dreams by L.E.Modesitt Jr.)

This might be a good approach-- if it ever, ever worked. Every study I'm aware of on the subject of the reactions of the wealthy and powerful to the prospect of further wealth and power has suggested that the reaction is to desire more no matter how much is already held. It doesn't matter that it's meaningless: your base of comparison isn't what's meaningful; it's what your peers have. If you have no peers, your base of comparison becomes not what is meaningful or what others have, but what you have already.

Human greed is functionally self-intensifying and bottomless.

When it comes to apprehending a capsuleer, always get them alive and keep them alive as long as you can, in tubes if you have to.
The secondary clones usually would have no legal status before the primary one is dead.
Otherwise people could just clone people willy-nilly and get access to their property.

Being apprehended will not be a problem if you let the capsuleer die.
Capture the bugger, torture him for a good few weeks and then let him go.
After getting him to the subsidiary of the company that has his cloning contract where you will have him soft-scanned.

See comments above about suicide devices, and the fun variations thereof. Even if they're not in wide use already, you can bet that a market for them will develop if the authorities take up this kind of game.

[BloodBird]

I'm not denying the soft clone is identical to you in every conceivable and possible way, right down to every brain cell, save for the gap in memory. 

What I'm saying is that it is the instance of the clone that dies, does die.  You die, and the clone wakes up. You could wake up ten of them at the same time and they all have individual consciousness. There is no shared memory and they each have their own experiences, ie they are separate people starting with the same recipe. If you kill one the other's don't feel it, and the one you killed, is dead.

The idea of self and identity is fragile like this. If I had a soft-clone backed up a week ago and got shot today, only to wake up tomorrow missing a week and a day and being told what happened, I would likely have problems thinking that this is what happened to "me".

"Pictures of GTFO" can be the same as "I can't remember, so it did not happen to me." A falasity, sure, but one that seems logical from that point of view. The guy who got shot yesterday was not me. I would have done all these things all week but got myself offed. Now I got to find the guy who wanted me dead, deal with him, and do what I was supposed to do this week. This set-back is annoying; I have better things to do.

So long as only ONE instance of you are active at a time, it's "you". There are no other entities like you. Plenty of other humans yeah, but none of them are "you". This is easy to see in your unique physical traits (though these can be copied) and your unique "soul" (all the info pertained within can be copied as well; it is - your clones and their back-ups.)

The very instant more than one instance of this back-up goes live you have a major issue and likely a freak-out crisis-of-personality-and-identity moment coming up. Your not unique anymore. Arguably if someone simply took samples of your DNA and managed to grow a physical clone of your flesh, things would still be ok - they would not have your mentality nor your memories, and are thus only a collection of look-alike copies, in the literal sense. The moment a complete copy, with your exact physical and mental traits hammered down to the last nail arrives, however?

Both of you will either think your the original and the opposite is the needless extra, or both of you will come to think and really take-in the idea that the person you USED to be is dead, and your both copies of the same person. Both can't have the assets, both can't have the name and ID-card or the originals social connections, so this alone will warrant issues. This is exactly why CONCORD forbids multi-clone activities for capsuleers - not becasue it can't be done, but for the shit-storm of social and legal issues that would ensue.

So long as it's one active, and in worst cases, only one spare that's activated most capsuleers are likely to have no problems with this arrangement. So they got shot in a station, big deal. Minor set-back equal to whatever time passed from last back-up to now. They pick up where they left off, likely update themselves in whatever manner they wish and move on with their lives as of nothing happened.

If the soft-clone's pile of meat that resumes after the original's clinical death is a fresh person or effectively the original person who has 'slept' since the last backup is likely an unsolvable question of ethics, physics and psychology as far as RL arguments are concerned.

And this should likely be split to a new topic, I'd do it but I'm positive I don't have the needed permissions to do that, etc.

[Vieve]

I don't think many capsuleers would be interested in 'soft clone' backups, as there is no transfer of consciousness. You die, and someone else with your memories wakes up.  It's still death.

This would cut down on out of pod shenanigans.

Soft clones do certainly complicate matters. Ahem.

[Matariki Rain]

Yet most capsuleers do not seem to give a damn. From their perspectives, it's a contract for immortality, and, if there's a difference from Generic_Capsuleer v. 1.0 to v. 1.1, and a larger one stepping up to v. 1.6, they generally don't notice it, so it can't be all that important.

I feel like a broken record here but, "Hello there: I play that it matters. There's not necessarily a lot you can do about it, given that our reason-for-being involves this sacrifice, but it can lead to some fascinating mental gymnastics, internal inconsistencies and social consequences."

One of the members of EM--from the old training regime where you weren't euthanised, never jumpcloned, never been podded--seems to think romances with pilots are icky because they're dead people.

With a backup, the effects of taking a knife between the ribs while out doing some ill-advised carousing are little worse than the alcohol-induced blackout you'd have suffered if you hadn't gotten yourself shanked. Maybe better, even: you don't even wake up with a hangover.

The ache when you find that a friend died--felt honoured to ask his CEO to pod him, even--to avoid a long and annoying journey out of hostile territory....