structure for 'Persons'    |     alphabetical list of themes    |     unexpand these ideas

16. Persons / D. Continuity of the Self / 1. Identity and the Self

[deciding when two selves are actually identical]

4 ideas
364 One soul can't be more or less of a soul than another [Plato]
     Full Idea: Is one soul, even minutely, more or less of a soul than another? Not in the least.
     From: Plato (Phaedo [c.382 BCE], 093b)
     A reaction: This idea is attractive because unconsciousness and death seem to be abrupt procedures, and so appear to be all-or-nothing, but I would personally view extreme Alzheimer's as an erasing of the soul, though a minimum level of it seems all-or-nothing.
571 Is Socrates the same person when standing and when seated? [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: Who, except the philosopher, is going to ask whether Socrates and Socrates seated is the same thing?
     From: Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 1004b01)
5514 Psychologists are interested in identity as a type of person, but philosophers study numerical identity [Parfit]
     Full Idea: When psychologists discuss identity, they are typically concerned with the kind of person someone is, or wants to be (as in an 'identity crisis'). But when philosophers discuss identity, it is numerical identity they mean.
     From: Derek Parfit (The Unimportance of Identity [1995], p.293)
     A reaction: I think it is important to note that the philosophical problem breaks down into two areas: whether I have numerical identity with myself over time, and whether other people have it. It may be that two different sets of criteria will emerge.
7714 Personal identity is a problem across time (diachronic) and at an instant (synchronic) [Lowe]
     Full Idea: There is the question of the identity of a person over or across time ('diachronic' personal identity), and there is also the question of what makes for personal identity at a time ('synchronic' personal identity).
     From: E.J. Lowe (Locke on Human Understanding [1995], Ch.5)
     A reaction: This seems to me to be the first and most important distinction in the philosophy of personal identity, and they regularly get run together. Locke, for example, has an account of synchronic identity, which is often ignored. It applies to objects too.