What is personal identity? This question has been asked and debated by philosophers for centuries. The problem of personal identity is determining what conditions and qualities are necessary and sufficient for a person to exist as the same being at one time as another. Some think personal identity is physical, taking a materialistic perspective believing that bodily continuity or physicality is what makes a person a person with the view that even mental things are caused by some kind of physical occurrence. Others take a more idealist approach with the belief that mental continuity is the sole factor in establishing personal identity holding that physical things are just reflections of the mind. One more perspective on personal identity …show more content…
Consciousness is the heart of free will and intent, it is responsible for the ability of a person to choose. With that said, it is my belief that defining personal identity relies on both bodily and mental continuity.
No doubt this position leaves plenty of room for criticism, which I will attempt to address now beginning with bodily continuity. The body is in a constant state of transition, cells replacing cells by the thousands at any given time; how then can bodily continuity even be if the body is in a perpetual state of change? How could one be considered the same person if the parts are constantly being replaced? For that matter, what if a person loses a limb and receives a prosthetic, would they be the same person then?
Bodily continuity as I understand it is the organization or pattern of parts that make up the whole, not the parts themselves. The parts may replace themselves over time, but it does not disrupt continuity or identity since the purpose of the ‘new’ parts is to maintain the function of the original structure. Futurist Raymond Kurzweil further explains the replacement of body parts as it affects the identity of the person implying that “prosthetics are put in place to simulate the missing part using non-biological means, but the synthetic part is still serving the same purpose as the original as far as it’s contribution to the structure therefore not violating it’s identity” (Kurzweil). I know what you’re thinking,
Working in conjunction with memory is consciousness, consciousness is the definition of the self; it is the mind’s capacity to point beyond itself, differentiating between itself and an object creating awareness of “I” throughout bodily and memory changes. Consciousness is the heart of free will and intent, it is responsible for the ability of a person to choose. With that said, it is my belief that defining personal identity relies on both bodily and mental continuity.
Weirob was given the chance to do body transplant; however, she rejected because to her, identity of herself is her body and without her own identity is not survival. On “The Third Night” Weirob argued that she agree the survivor of the operation involving Julia’s brain was Mary, and the survivor of her brain is the other patient not her. Her arguments are right because even though the court says the person that’s living is Julia, it doesn’t mean it is Julia from the way identity is identified. Survival isn’t just based on words from the jury. She continues to support this with her the aspirin example. It shouldn’t concern Weirob if aspirin upset the other person’s stomach since the jury say the survivor is the other person. Two, Mary or Julia
Identity is a group of characteristics, data or information that belongs exactly to one person or a group of people and that make it possible to establish differences between them. The consciousness that people have about themselves is part of their identity as well as what makes them unique. According to psychologists, identity is a consistent definition of one’s self as a unique individual, in terms of role, attitudes, beliefs and aspirations. Identity tries to define who people are, what they are, where they go or what they want to be or to do. Identity could depend on self-knowledge, self-esteem, or the ability of individuals to achieve their goals. Through self-analysis people can define who they are and who the people around them
In, “A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality,” the author, John Perry, proposes three totally different ways of thinking about personal identity. The first theory is presented by a character named Gretchen Weirob, she believes that a person is their body. By this she means that a person’s identity is intertwined with the DNA and molecules of their body. Their personality as well as their personal identity can’t be separated from their body, and they cannot exist without it. The second theory was presented by a character named Sam Miller, he believes that a person is their immaterial soul. So in general, Sam thinks that the soul is this invisible, immaterial substance that is able to exist from the body. The third and final theory was presented by a character named Dave Cohen. Cohen believes that a person has continuity of memory, and/or psychology. So in general Cohen’s theory is that personal identity is a set of correlating experiences and/or memories enclosed in the brain. All three of the personal identity theories state some very valid points, but they also have some inconsistencies, some more than others. But there is one theory that seems to be the most credible, and creates a very compelling argument while also having a little science to back up some of its points.
This paper is about organ transplantation; the surgical removal of an organ from one person, which is then transplanted into a recipient with organ failure. (The Organ Transplant Process | organdonor.gov, 2017). The donor can be alive, but in the case of unpaired vital organs the donor must be dead. In this paper I will propose three questions in relation to organ transplantation. The main concepts underlying these questions will be cartesian dualism, which is a philosophy that argues that the humans consists of a palpable body and intangible mind. (Scheper-Hughes and Lock, 1987). Do we merely have bodies or are our bodies part of us?
To start with, the body theory is not mysterious like the soul theory. If I believed in souls, and favored the soul theory, how could I prove that I did not get a new soul every five hours or three days? I would not be able to. The body theory means having the same body. This also means having most of your same body. For example, in Star Wars when Luke Skywalker got his hand cut off, he still had most of his body; therefore, he is the same person.
4.2:7), we should abandon the language of identity. Therefore, for cases in which we are unable to speak of identity (because the psychological continuity relation is not one-one), psychological continuity will be just as important as identity.
In philosophy, the issue of personal identity concerns the conditions under which a person at one time is the same person at another time. An analysis of personal identity
There are those who feel as both scenarios mean certain death of the self. These views are a result of feelings, such as the uneasiness of being recreated with different materials than those biologically and naturally created without human intervention. Others argue that there cannot be a continuation of consciousness when being transported, and therefore, there cannot be a continuation of the self. These two arguments are attacking from different sides of the self-debate. Those worried about the specific materials used to recreate the biological body are focusing sentimentally on the human body carrying their consciousness. The human body is continuously regeneration cells, and therefore has a complete set of new cells, or materials, every seven years . Therefore, there should not be any ill felling when regarding to an instantaneous exchanging of cells. On the other side, those worried about the continuous of consciousness, rightfully see that the contents of consciousness are the necessary aspects of the self. Stephen King answers this point in his short story, The Juant. When forcing passengers to sleep, an unconscious state, before scanning the body and mental state, passengers will be transported while in a less conscious, or unconscious state. This should be seen as falling asleep in a car parked in the driveway and waking up when you reach the destination. However, there is a weaker case that allows the
Identity is defined as “the fact of being who or what a person or thing is” (Oxford University Press). Personal identity deals with questions that arise about ourselves by virtue of our being people. Some of these questions are familiar that happen to all of us every once in a while: What am I? When did I begin? What will happen to me when I die? There are many different categories that define us as people (Olson). Our Race, Class, and Culture define who we are so much that it affects how we should live our life.
Identity. What is identity? One will say that it is the distinct personality of an individual. Others will say that identity is the behavior of a person in response to their surrounding environment. At certain points of time, some people search for their identity in order to understand their existence in life. In regards, identity is shaped into an individual through the social trials of life that involve family and peers, the religious beliefs by the practice of certain faiths, and cultural awareness through family history and traditions. These are what shape the identity of an individual.
The question on personal identity has been a philosophical debate for a long time. Philosophers over time have tried to argue what being a person that one is, from one day to the necessarily contains. In their endless search for philosophical bases on the same, multiple questions on the issues of life and death arise such that the correct answers to personal identity determine the changes that one person undergoes, or may undergo without being extinct but rather continuing to exist. Personal identity philosophical theory confronts the most ultimate questions on our existence as well as who we are and if by any chance there is a possibility of life after death. In attempts to distinguish change in a person in survival and after death, a criterion of personal identity over time is given. Such criterion specifies all the necessary and sufficient conditions that must prevail for a person to continue to exist (Perry et al,103)
In his Ted Talk “Is there a real you?”, Julian Baggini compares identity to a waterfall, which made me realize that since we are in constant sate of change there is not such a thing as a permanent version of me. Clearly there is an essence that prevails. Even though my core values and ideals have changed slightly through out the years, I have mostly been following the same moral guidelines my whole life. It is inevitable now to see that many of the characteristics I thought defined me are not even a part of me anymore, and to my surprise are completely invisible to those around me.
The body, as a whole, is always a body composed of many bodies.There is a plurality of bodies in our body just as there are many lives in our life which is why in order for things to make sense they have to make sense as a whole in our lives and why you have to affirm the soul just as you affirm life itself. One must come up with an idea of soul that does not create an intrinsic hierarchy considering we are not on any other level separate from the souls of plants and animals, we
371). This responds to the objections raised by Thomas Reid in the 18th century (Shoemaker, 2008, p. 340), however, the Memory Theory did require a modification to include the possibility of temporarily forgetting the experiences of an earlier person-stage, “as long as one has the potentiality of remembering it” (Shoemaker, 2008, p. 340). In the conversations held by Gretchen Weirob, Sam Miller and Dave Cohen in Perry’s ‘Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality’ (Perry, 1977), this concept is addressed in depth. Miller relays a chapter written by Locke – “the relation between two person-stages or stretches of consciousness that makes them stages of a single person is just that the later one contains memories of an earlier one...I can remember only my past thoughts and feelings, and you only yours...take this relation as the source of identity” (Perry, 1977, p. 343). These concepts are logical possibilities in my opinion, and are far less unstable than those presented within the Body/Soul Theory, as these concepts do not require the senses of others, but the individual’s first person perception of their personal identity.