more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
We retain identity not by staying the same (the preserve of gods) but by replacing losses with new similar acquisitions.
Gist of Idea
Only the gods stay unchanged; we replace our losses with similar acquisitions
Source
Plato (The Symposium [c.384 BCE], 208b)
Book Ref
Plato: 'The Symposium', ed/tr. Hamilton,W [Penguin 1951], p.89
A Reaction
Any modern student of personal identity should be intrigued by this remark! It appears to take a rather physical view of the matter, and to be aware of human biology as a process. Are my continuing desires token-identical, or just 'similar'?
180 | We call a person the same throughout life, but all their attributes change [Plato] |
181 | Only the gods stay unchanged; we replace our losses with similar acquisitions [Plato] |
12809 | Nothing about me is essential [Locke] |
24139 | A 'person' is just one possible abstraction from a bundle of qualities [Nietzsche] |
15803 | Bad theories of the self see it as abstract, or as a bundle, or as a process [Chisholm] |
21843 | People consist of many undetermined lines, some rigid, some supple, some 'lines of flight' [Deleuze] |