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Full Idea
A strong intuition shared by many philosophers is that some things that are in fact identical might not have been identical.
Gist of Idea
Is it possible for two things that are identical to become two separate things?
Source
Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], IV)
Book Ref
-: 'Journal of Philosophy' [-], p.611
A Reaction
This flies in the face of the Kripkean view that if Hesperus=Phosphorus then the identity is necessary. I don't think I have an intuition that some given thing might have been two things - indeed the thought seems totally weird. Amoeba? Statue/clay?
| 16076 | Constitution is not identity, as consideration of essential predicates shows [Rudder Baker] |
| 16078 | Clay is intrinsically and atomically the same as statue (and that lacks 'modal properties') [Rudder Baker] |
| 16080 | Is it possible for two things that are identical to become two separate things? [Rudder Baker] |
| 16081 | The constitution view gives a unified account of the relation of persons/bodies, statues/bronze etc [Rudder Baker] |
| 16077 | The clay is not a statue - it borrows that property from the statue it constitutes [Rudder Baker] |
| 16082 | Statues essentially have relational properties lacked by lumps [Rudder Baker] |