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Full Idea
A Humean theory, in which a person's identity is made to depend upon relations between experiences ..is not tenable unless the experiences themselves can be identified, and that is only possible through their association with the body.
Gist of Idea
Personal identity can't just be relations of experiences, because the body is needed to identify them
Source
A.J. Ayer (The Concept of a Person [1963], §IV)
Book Ref
Ayer,A.J.: 'The Concept of a Person etc' [Macmillan 1973], p.128
A Reaction
This seems to me a very fruitful response to difficulties with the 'bundle' view of a person - a better response than the a priori claims of Butler and Reid, or the transcendental argument of Kant. Only a philosopher could ignore the body.
| 5662 | Maybe induction could never prove the existence of something unobservable [Ayer] |
| 5661 | We identify experiences by their owners, so we can't define owners by their experiences [Ayer] |
| 5669 | Personal identity can't just be relations of experiences, because the body is needed to identify them [Ayer] |
| 5664 | Consciousness must involve a subject, and only bodies identify subjects [Ayer] |
| 5668 | People own conscious states because they are causally related to the identifying body [Ayer] |
| 5666 | Not all exerience can be remembered, as this would produce an infinite regress [Ayer] |
| 5665 | Memory is the best proposal as what unites bundles of experiences [Ayer] |