@cryptogee,

Christ, I hate to even give this to you:

.
If Tegmark's hypothesis is true, then sentient AI would be a possibility (still probably very distant given today's technology ... but, who knows, all it might take is a single "breakthrough in understanding" about the necessary matter arrangements of consciousness) as would your "mind" living forever in some virtual reality machine.

As you know, I consider both options bloody existential nightmares but as soon as I started watching this I thought myself, "I'll bet Cryptogee would pee in his pants. Cambridge no less."

The whole idea of consciousness as an emergence property of the arrangement of matter, like his example of wetness, is actually a very respectable scientific conception.

Of course, the other possibility that such a hypothesis opens the door for is the existence of "God."

If consciousness, indeed life, is naught but a special arrangement of particles, then you could not preclude a "God-consciousness" based upon the same principle.

99.999999999% of an atom is empty space. Hence, most of "you" is a void. And yet, the protons, neutrons and electrons that comprise an atom, and by extension all the atoms that comprise Cryptogee, manage to cohere into a single unified entity that loves the Queen.

Why could that same principle not apply throughout the vastness of space? Could the universe be one entity, just massively scaled up?

I threw in that last part in pre-venge for all the posts about becoming cyborgs that this enables, and is likely to entail. Saving your dream to become immortal through motor oil will mean opening the door to every swami on Steemit. How bad to want it Cryptogee? How bad do you want it? :-)

Quill