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Single Idea 5517

[filed under theme 16. Persons / E. Rejecting the Self / 4. Denial of the Self ]

Full Idea

There exists no individual, it is only a conventional name given to a set of elements.

Gist of Idea

Individuals don't exist, but are conventional names for sets of elements

Source

Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) (reports [c.540 BCE]), quoted by Derek Parfit - The Unimportance of Identity p.295

Book Ref

'Personal Identity', ed/tr. Martin,R /Barresi,J [Blackwells 2003], p.295


A Reaction

I take this to arise from an excessively spiritual concept of a human being, which faces Descartes' problem of how to individuate non-physical minds, when they have no clear boundaries. Combine dualism with a bundle theory, and you have Buddhism.