Personal Identity

Personal identity The problem concerns the concept of persons at one time and over a period of time A search for the essence of personhood – the basic necessary elements without which a person would not be

What is the problem? Personal identity: Who am I? Different approaches to the question: What is that stays the same through all the changes I go through? What links my present self with my past selves? How am I distinguishable from other selves? How do others identify me as me? Is it different from the way I identify myself as me?

What is the problem? Personal identity: What am I? Different approaches to the question: Do I have something (a soul maybe) that is not physical? If yes is it connected to my body? Is it possible that I don’t have a body – just something immaterial?

Complex and Simple Accounts Complex account (e.g. Locke): the person is made up of a number of parts to which their identity can be reduced. The term ‘person’ stands for something that is composite and made up of more fundamental things Simple account (Cartesian and dualist philosophy): it denies that the essence of person lies in something like properties. The term ‘person’ stands for something that is composite and made up of more fundamental things: its identity over time will be ensured if those things persis in some defined manner. Such parts can be classed as properties or qualities – the particular criteria necessary to the person varies from theory to theory, but it is the same that properties of some sort cinstitute the essence of personhood. Simple account: properties are not essentail to the person. The identity lies in something else. The person is a basic term that cannot be reduced further.

Descartes Identity must be found in whatever remains identical to itself over time The material body is ever changing The immaterial soul remains the same throughout time The material body cannot be what identifies us Conclusion: The immaterial soul is the source of our identity Is our uimmaterial soul the same over time?

Locke Consciousness is key to identity Identity must be found in how we identify ourself to ourself – that is the consciousness of self I identify myself as the same self through memories of prior events Conclusion: memory is the source of self identity If I don’t remember some prior event then it wasn’t me? If I misremember then I am somebody who never existed?

Descartes vs. Locke Consciousness is key – it is the conscious substance – the mind – that gives us identity Our identity is conscious, never changes and never really dies Consciousness is key – it’s consciousness of one’s experiences brought forward to the present moment as a memory that gives us identity with our prior self Memories are made all the time and we don’t always remember the same things – therefore our identity is fluid, discontinuous and can die (complete amnesia) Descartes Locke

Hume If we are or have a self then it must be an object of perception The self cannot be perceived: „For my part, when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or cold, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a perception and never can observe any thing but the perception” Conclusion: we cannot claim to have or be a self „the identity […] is a fictitious one.”

Kant Consciousness is key to identity and the body is not part of personal identity Kant disagrees with Descartes: the soul cannot be proven, therefore cannot be used to posit identity Kant disagrees with Locke and Hume – for him the self is not something we have but something we do

Kant There are two senses of identity: Empirical ego: how others identify us (what we look like, how we sound, etc.) - this is the self that makes us an individual Transcendental ego: how we identify ourselves – an activity of consciousness (constant updating and organization of individual experiences)

2 puzzling cases Wanda/Schwanda Wanda is hit by a steamroller – her body is destroyed but her brain and memories are intact You have a massive stroke, leaving your body intact but your brain fatally destroyed Wanda’s memories are implanted into your body Who is Schwanda? Dememorizer/rememori zer Tomorrow at 4:57 pm you will be dememorized At 4:58 pm someone else’s memories will be placed in your body At 5:00 pm your body suffers a terrible accident Who will be in the accident?