I raised a similar objection to the GP comment many years ago, and someone made the same response to me. I wonder if I'm alone in that instead of making me feel more optimistic about mind transfer, it just made me slightly afraid to go to sleep.
Same actually, if I follow the logic the conclusion is pretty grim. I've come up with silver lining to embrace the change. All life must change to survive and thrive. To wake up the same every time, to never change no matter what, to never learn - that is true horror to me.
You're absolutely not. There's two big differences as I see it - firstly, it's not clearly impossible for the instance to survive sleep. The brain exists continuously throughout. There is constant electrical activity. We don't know for sure that our awareness is "transmitted through" to when we wake up, but we can imagine ways it's possible.
In contrast, of course, transporters and mind uploads obviously kill us.
Secondly, we can't do anything about sleep. No matter how worrying it is. There's just no choice other than to accept it.
The first argument is nicer than the second, but, frankly, if I could avoid sleep I would and I really hope I never need general anesthesia.
