Peter van Inwagen - What is the Nature of Personal Identity?

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Look at an old photo. Then look in the mirror. Those two images are of the same person, right? How so? They don’t look the same. Their memories are different. And virtually every atom in their bodies is different. We feel unity across time, but is this solidified sense of self an illusion? If not an illusion, what enables personal identity?
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Peter van Inwagen is an American analytic philosopher and the John Cardinal O’Hara Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. He earned his PhD from the University of Rochester under the direction of Richard Taylor and Keith Lehrer.
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Closer To Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

If I were placed in Inwagon's duplicating machine, then an identical version of "me" would pop out. My clone would contain every thought, experience, and memory that I have right up to the point of the duplication process. However, from that point forward, every "new" thought, experience, and memory we both acquire are unique to both lifeforms. The reason why is because we are all *data acquiring, processing and generating machines.* Each individual human generates, assimilates, and encounters different forms of information as we interact with reality. ... My identical clone and I could end up many years later with completely different perspectives on life, love and Existence, ... _and then I would be forced to reeducate my poor, misguided clone!_

[@grijzekijker]

After the cloning was succesfull, you should have registered him at your local municipality, so he could have obtained his own social security number.

[@catherinemoore9534]

My thought exactly. The environment would be acting on both individuals according to their own particular interactions with it. Since the environment cannot be exactly the same for both individuals, in space or time, they would end up responding to it in different ways. 12:16 Real twins respond to their environment as autonomous individuals and as their environment differ (greatly or not) , their responses differ accordingly. The accumulation of different responses through time adds up to different individuals , however slightly different they may be.

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

@@catherinemoore9534 *Since the environment cannot be exactly the same for both individuals, in space or time, they would end up responding to it in different ways"* ... Exactly! Although it would be interesting meeting someone with 62 years of the exact same memories that I have. Would also be strange when a "wife" is involved. ... Which clone would officially be her husband? Could be a blessing, though! We could be tag-team husbands. _"Hey man, you deal with her this week. I'll deal with her next week."_

[@patientson]

Robert Kuhn, remain reliably and uncommonly favoured in insight, strength, and devotion to all matter related to life.

[@Cr0uch1ng71g3r]

"Now, you believe in god, and..." *Closes the tab*

[@David.C.Velasquez]

Did you re-open the tab to comment?

[@abhishekshah11]

Lmao. Closer to close mindedness

[@bigsmoke4592]

really? i'm also an atheist which is why i find this more interesting. if you knew anything about this guy he's very humble about his philosophical beliefs and will fully admit lack of hard proofs for any of his beliefs, including his belief in god.

[@David.C.Velasquez]

@@bigsmoke4592 Yes exactly, to do otherwise is just stubborn closed-mindedness. I spent most of my life as an atheist, but after 45 years of reading, research, and deep contemplation... I finally discovered that my views are in line with pantheism. Even if it leads to a sort of paradoxical 'god' in a superposition of existence/non-existence. Brute fact is rarely, if ever satisfying.

[@njeyasreedharan]

The continuity of the person is via his individual soul, not as his mind nor as his body. The bodymind complex is temporal. The soul is eternal.

[@dongshengdi773]

True

[@quentinkumba6746]

That’s right, just make it up!

[@sentientflower7891]

There is no such entity as a soul and even if souls existed it couldn't be "you".

[@DuaneCowell]

Great name

[@Resmith18SR]

Our personal identity and concept of self are physical, psychological, and social simultaneously. No life experienced by a person on Earth is identical to any other. Our lives truly are random, unique, and unrepeatable. The Self wants to continue indefinitely and constructs belief systems of Science, Religion, and Philosophy to attempt to become Immortal. Ernest Becker's book Denial of Death is a good read on this subject.

[@longcastle4863]

What does Becker say the solution to a denial of death is?

[@Resmith18SR]

@@longcastle4863 I wouldn't want to sum his entire book up in one sentence. It's really a good read. I would say I found it made a lot of sense to me. Becker believed we develop strategies to fend off our awareness of our mortality and vulnerability and to escape into the feeling that we are immortal.

[@longcastle4863]

@@Resmith18SR My personal belief or idea is that by accepting that death is death and that this is our one and only life, that only then can we begin living for the betterment and longevity of our species.

[@Resmith18SR]

@@longcastle4863 I don't think either believing that our life somehow continues after death or not will affect how humanity treats one another. Our egocentrism, violent nature, and tendency for aggression is more genetic than we believe.

[@GarryBurgess]

Is a computer the same thing as the software that it runs?

[@heresa_notion_6831]

No. I can imagine a super-duper computer at two different times; one time with all the information -- and information relations -- of John Lennon, 5 years before his death, and another time with Vladimir Lenin, 5 years before his death. Same computer, two-different people. Spoiler alert: the computer just is the universe, and Lennon/Lenin are just two different partitions of the computer's memory (running two different programs) at two different times. I don't think Inwagen quite sees it that way, but a large part of science fiction does see it that way. That is to say, identity is an information-processing construct, in interaction with other information-processing constructs (i.e., other people and the rest of the local world). So, for instance, the science-fiction of Greg Egan, has a lot of fun with the idea that two-different PHYSICAL systems can be FUNCTIONALLY identical, with respect to personhood and/or "existence". The Exegesis of Philip K Dick may be interpreted this way, imo (by which I mean, I interpret Phil's thinking as people are "programs" running in the "mind" of God, so an "after-life" can be trivially easy, as with God re-running a program, and, "imo", means I'm not sure everybody would have that interpretation). So dualism can be fully materialistic, it seems, if software and hardware are distinct ontological categories.

[@wordzfailmebro]

I REALLY STRUGGLE WITH THIS PARTICULAR TOPIC...👽👍

[@jhunt5578]

The Buddhists could just be right on this one. It feels like I exist overtime, but that could simply be an illusion. When you consider how essentially all atoms in our bodies will be swapped out in 10 years, we cannot persist in the hardware. Perhaps we could survive in the software aka the mind that the brain creates. Then we have the issue of the duplicator thought experiments. The two versions of us would not contain one consciousness, it would just feel to each version that consciousness persists over time for each. It reminds me of Schopenhauer "Each day is a little life: every waking and rising a little birth, every fresh morning a little youth, every going to rest and sleep a little death." Right now as we see from behind our eyes, hear from behind our ears, think from behind our skulls, this present version of us could be gone from the next moment to be replaced by another, perhaps its the next day, the next week, the next year, the next decade. Can we really say we are the same person as when we were 5 years old. That we were there thinking, feeling, experiencing or are we just accessing the memories of a version of us, soon to be memories ourselves? Memories of memories feeling we persist, when all we can truly know is that we exist now.

[@patientson]

I still believe it can be achieved. I have yet to see a country and county build the biggest super parks, at least 40 miles away from each other all over the country. At the moment, only countries in the east have managed to see very little of why I think super parks will bring form out of creation from human organisms. Humans are too useful for me not to say a thing, whether right or otherwise. There are many things I would like the unborn children of this era to know because they will be the one to bring out the best in their parents, guardians, grandparents, great grandparents, and many more. When and if many folks start understanding today's discussion between Mr. Robert and guest, the will be the best thing that has ever happened in the West and in the world. Right now, Russia is the senior brother every younger brother and sister everyone wants to dislike and not support in Europe. In time, the West will be the ones to repent and show patience and kindness that wont be rivalled but embraced by those whom they have hurt. The West will help and support build "living bridges" amongst the righteous and also root out corrupts minds that has never known truth and righteous to heal themselves of depriving their temple of their mind and personal love for their organism. These are my sons for whom I am well pleased.

[@BugRib]

What do you mean?

[@genghisthegreat2034]

Be yourself, everyone else is taken.

[@micronda]

There is one thing that makes you YOU. You are time-stamped in Absolute Time. Only you have that stamp. If you are cloned later exact to every particle, the time stamp will be different. Why?... ...because the arrangement put together was at a different Absolute Time.

[@sentientflower7891]

Absolute time does not exist - Einstein.

[@micronda]

@sentientflower7891 It doesn't within space-time but it does exist outside

[@sentientflower7891]

@@micronda that's a bizarre idea right there. But whatever you want to believe.

[@longcastle4863]

Time stamped in absolute time. 👍

[@bretnetherton9273]

Awareness is known by awareness alone.

[@vishnukarthik8351]

Circular reasoning don't you think?

[@k-3402]

@@vishnukarthik8351 It rhymes, so it must be true. xD

[@keithraney2546]

Inheritance? Consumerism?

[@robertjoyce5629]

The answer to all these problems of duality of the soul and the supernatural is simple mathematics. I can't believe that people even go on discussing it over and over and never seem to see the reality of it. The answer was explained in simple form by Abbott in his brilliant book Flatland. There simply are dimensions higher than the one that we think we live in. Since we live in a multi-dimensional universe, and our bodies exist at one level, the higher dimensions we are insensible to. That includes the bits of our own beings that exist in the higher dimensions. Even if you make a duplicate of my body why do we think that the higher dimensional part of me would connect with the new lower dimensional part? If it actually became associated with a soul, it would be someone else's soul.

[@bozo5632]

There's no proof or strong reason to suspect that additional dimensions exist. Maybe they do, but you can't use that untested hypothesis to confirm your other untested hypothesis (about souls). There's even some reason to think those dimensions DON'T exist. Math and stuff. If there were large extra dimensions, lots of our equations wouldn't work. Personally I think about extra dimensions all the time, partly because Flatland made a big impression on me. Maybe for instance quantum mechanics would look "normal" in 4D. But there's no good reason to believe it.

[@longcastle4863]

Imo, you make an interesting thoughtful argument. 👍

[@bozo5632]

@@longcastle4863 It wasn't an argument, it's a god-of-the-gaps fallacy.

[@longcastle4863]

@@bozo5632 I didn’t see any mention of God, but regardless, it didn’t impress me that way. Rather, just as a possible way of thinking about why there seem to be things that seem completely beyond our logic, mathematics, reason and/or sciences to explain and understand. Like, for example, why it is not possible for us to grasp why there is something instead of nothing or how it is that something either arose out of nothing or always existed. The tools we have at our disposal do not seem equipped to tackle such questions. But I certainly don’t think, therefore God.

[@bozo5632]

@@longcastle4863 I just meant it was (sort of) the same fallacy. Actually there aren't too many things that we are aware of which we don't basically understand, or which don't fit into our general understanding. Physics is everything lol. Note that I said "aware of." There are many things too complex to understand thoroughly. Practically all of biology is beyond our observational abilities. But it's not deeply mysterious, just not fully known. We'll never know much history either, since 99.99999% of things are not noticed at all, not witnessed, not recorded, not kept. But that doesn't make what somebody ate for lunch in 1492 a mystery. There are a few known unknowns, like dark matter, dark energy, quantum gravity, what the QM wave function actually represents... and maybe a few more things that are not understood. But I should add "yet," since it seems likely that we will understand them better in the future. (They're relatively new questions.) Questions like "why is there something rather than nothing" (and many like it) might not be valid questions, in some cases, or might be beyond our ability to ever address. Like, what existed "before" the big bang? It's possible that we won't ever be able to guess at that, or ever confirm our guesses.

[@kennethmalafy503]

You don't actually have an identity. It is a clever trick your mind plays, an hallucination. What you have is a prism of experience (past experience and information you have gained) that "colors" the world around you. That prism is what you conceive of as an identity. That is how the brain insures that you are you using your past experiences to govern your current experience. Unless you want to live your life essentially in the past, I would drop that prism fast and see the world as it truly is. You don't need it and are just holding unto it out of fear. It's a primitive tool, not useful for making meaning, more useful for threat avoidance (which is why so many humans struggle with higher order thinking and making connections- they are too busy looking through their prism and trying to make that work.

[@longcastle4863]

Would you say that having learned not to stick your hand in the fire is living in the past?

[@infinitygame18]

Radhe Radhe🙏 Please Come For Truth Together And Understand Love Ra Only Entertain True Mind In All , Here & Now Receive New Thought with Hospitality. Let We Advance in Reality

[@CrowMagnum]

Interesting thought experiment to shake out all the preconceptions and biased thinking, but not very helpful to those who already have an open mind.

[@peweegangloku6428]

Robert's opening question unavoidably points to the fact that atoms do not account for our individual identities. Our individual identities are the result of the branching of what the Bible describes as "the breath of life," the immaterial constituent of a person or organism. For the human family, this was first implanted into Adam, the first man created by God. That was after God had assembled the physical constituents of Adam's body. The implementation is described in the Bible as God blowing "the breath of life" into Adam. Read the biblical account below: "And Jehovah God went on to form the man out of dust from the ground and to blow into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living person." (Genesis 2:7) Even though God had initially assembled the atoms that formed the chemical structures of Adam's body, something else was still needed for him to become a living organism or person - and that is the immaterial "breath of life." From then on this "breath of life" began a branching process resulting into the bringing about of the human family. If you take a virus and place it into the field of "the breath of life," the former is acted on by the latter and the latter behaves like a living organism. When removed from this field, the virus becomes nothing but a clump of dead chemical compounds. If the virus is kept inside the living organism and the "breath of life" is snuffed out of the organism by the death of the host organism, the virus stops functioning as a living organism. In conclusion, there is something about the "breath of life" that accounts for a person's identity. Of course biblically, there is nothing like an immaterial soul. On the other hand, if a person's identity was determined by the atoms that make up his body, that identity could get lost 100% after a certain time. No one would remember their childhood.

[@longcastle4863]

Personal identity seems to me to be the conscious part of the animal that is aware of itself and cares about itself. Does it have to be more complicated than that?

[@grijzekijker]

Yes, it is much more complicated than that. Because part of your personal identity is where you were born and as a consequence of which, a municipality and a country keep data of your existence. You must have had some medical issues which leave traces in the administrations of medical institutians. Throughout your life you persisted in eating a certain diet which became manifest in your body. In education and work you had countless interactions with other creatures who remember you, who recollect small parts of your personal identity. And for believers there is the notion that none of your actions go unnoticed to the host of heaven.

[@longcastle4863]

@@NelsonnPinheiro-el8sz I like what your grandmother said. A large part of my personal ethic is that we need to remember that we are part of a larger community. That goes from family to friends to the various communities we are part of to the species as a whole to the whole of the Planet. Our senses of self and personal identities should include the awareness and recognition that we are deeply connected to our fellow human beings.

[@brothermine2292]

It's not just about the self, except for narcissists.

[@nicolai_gamulea-schwartz]

He talks about "plan" and "form" being applied to matter to become an animal, and then he reduces a person to the human animal as if no other plan / form was necessary for the animal to become a person. That's logically inconsistent.

[@jamesconner8275]

This interview did fly very high...if it took off at all. But, I find this the case of all interviews of people of religious faith.

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

*"This interview did fly very high...if it took off at all. But, I find this the case of all interviews of people of religious faith."* ... So, if Richard Dawkins brought up the "identical clone machine" scenario, you would have then considered this a "flying high" interview?

[@robertst.charles265]

So, I am the robot.

[@Arunava_Gupta]

Some materialist thinkers seem to believe that although we are made out of matter, we are somehow blessed with the properties of an immutable soul!!

[@kennethmalafy503]

That wouldn't be the materialist viewpoint. The materialists believe that all things come from matter (or material, hence the name). They would believe that some sort of matter (they say the brain) generates the soul. They wouldn't really even consider it a soul. They would consider it a phenomena generated by the brain. Not sure how that is possible but the materialists swear by it.

[@brothermine2292]

What do you mean by "immutable" in this context? If Socrates' soul is an emergent property of the activity & arrangement of the atoms of his brain, then would you say his soul "mutated" between the ages of 60 and 70, or not? The guest in this video thinks continuity is important, but doesn't seem to believe in immutability.

[@stellarwind1946]

It’s true that some materialists refuse or are reluctant to admit that a computer could ever be as conscious as a person.

[@brothermine2292]

@@stellarwind1946 : Are you equating consciousness and soul?

[@Arunava_Gupta]

I mean to say you can't have it both ways, right? If, say you believe that our selves are material, an assemblage of particles, then you can never subscribe to identity and persistence of the self across time. Why? Because the collations and configurations of matter will not remain constant. In fact a dynamically changing configuration of particles is the very opposite of constancy! A person who holds that the self is material, therefore, _must_ believe in an ever-changing identity, a concept diametrically opposite to the one associated with an immaterial, impartite soul.

[@kallianpublico7517]

As long as death is a mystery identity, being and existence will ever be anecdotes of ignorance. Rafts of meaning with no solid ground in sight.

[@bozo5632]

If you ever had a goldfish, death isn't so mysterious.

[@kallianpublico7517]

@@bozo5632 To the goldfish it is not. To its owner, what is beyond the senses is beyond the senses.

[@bozo5632]

@@kallianpublico7517 You're assuming something about after-death. The silence after a song ends isn't so mysterious.

[@kallianpublico7517]

@@bozo5632 After a leaf falls gravity vanishes? You assume nothing about the beginning and end of motion.

[@bozo5632]

@@kallianpublico7517 That's not a good analogy. After the goldfish dies, it still floats for a while.

[@sentientflower7891]

Not even God could resurrect the dead.

[@treasurepoem]

God will give us spiritual bodies (Philippians 3:21 and 1 Corinthians 15:35-58 below) but still He can do anything including creating a son or daughter with the same DNA of a certain parent from mere stones (Matthew 3:9 below). Philippians 3:21 King James Version 21 Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself. 1 Corinthians 15:35-58 King James Version 35 But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come? 36 Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die: 37 And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain: 38 But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body. 39 All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds. 40 There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. 41 There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory. 42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: 43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: 44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. 45 And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. 46 Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. 47 The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven. 48 As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. 49 And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. 50 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. 51 Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. 53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 54 So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. 55 O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? 56 The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. Matthew 3:9 King James Version 9 And think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.

[@drawn2myattention641]

A brilliant mind, derailed by faith.

[@irfanmehmud63]

How is personal identity a problem? Our body cells do change over time but there are not exactly "new" cells but exact "copies" of previous cells and all the genetic information is transferred during the cell division in the body. The brain cells don't even change during a lifetime. So personal identity continues without any break.

[@sentientflower7891]

Personal identity is an illusion which is not continuous as you can confirm by direct observation of anyone.

[@joeharmon3301]

Why the Hell would we listen to a Christian on this topic?? He, as a matter of core stances, denies reality as a governor in his life. Geesch.

[@evaadam3635]

"What is the Nature of Personal Identity?" is NOT the appropriate question to ask because part of your being a person is your free immortal non-physical soul that is not part of Nature.... ... in other words, your personal identity is a combination of your natural physical body and your non-physical spiritual being, or your free immortal soul that plays a humongous part in determining your personal identity because of the free choices that only your free soul can make.... ...and if your physical body dies, your personal identity also dies where your Spiritual Immortal Identity would only be the one left that survives forever to, either, return to Heaven or end in hell depending on what you had chosen to believe.. Have faith to ensure the security of your soul's eternal fate... do it and you won't regret.. Choosing to have faith is free... it won't cost you a penny to have it but would put your soul at humongous risk if you choose not to...

[@tomjackson7755]

Thank you for proving that you have no idea what you are talking about yet again.

[@Maxwell-mv9rx]

Rambling gibberich. If he doesnt knows himself How he figure out others People? Guys It isnt philosophy proceendings. It isnt philosophy but abstract rethoric.

[@billgould950]

If the original human goes into the duplication machine and sits in chair A, then the duplicate appears in Chair B, the duplicate would remember sitting in chair A, then observe they were in chair B looking back at themself in chair A. It might take long at all for the original and the duplicate to deduce their independent identities.

[@BugRib]

Haha, you're so right!

[@robertbeniston]

As a person you are not composed of just atoms. Quite the contrary, life is spirit and the mind is spirit. You body is you-without it you would be unconscious but your life essence is spirit which functions through the matter of your body. In order to see we need eyes that work properly and so the spirit needs a working body to function. Spirit is the life. The body without life is dead and the spirit needs the body to function.

[@PuBearsticks]

The difference between materialism and idealism is just the sound of the word. If reality can be reduced to one thing/no-thing then it is all that, regardless what name we give it.

[@infinitygame18]

Nature of Personal Identity is very vast than all understand, In true Reality there is only collective Identity, Know disconnection from truth & Laws, When Identity get Narrow & cause of all Suffering, Humanity need Solution to Ignorance & Desires Creating out of Fear,

[@ElkoJohn]

A materialist who believes in God. Interesting. Thought experiment: if the entirety of all matter, energy, dark matter, dark energy, all of whatever exits, is the anatomy of a material God, then , , ,

[@longcastle4863]

The pantheists are correct?

[@gettaasteroid4650]

It's another Quinean "Epistemology Naturalized" where Physicalism distinguishes a conceptual reduction from a doctrinal reduction; and psychology is the limit of empirical science.

[@robotaholic]

I really took him seriously until he started quoting the bible and believing in souls pfft no one starts quoting the bible and scriptures on my tv and my youtube. ✋️😒 by Peter van Inwagen

[@CUXOB2]

If you put a human in a perfect duplicator i expect the conciousness will (if it wants to) connect to both of them and they both will be the same person, like having two eyes but now controlling two bodies. He would need to get used to it, but shouldn't be a problem with two brains. Ant colonies do it all the time, controlling thousands of ants with one mind.

[@grybnyx]

"Now you believe in God" (6:19) Was not expecting that, was wrenched out of a warm materialist state of contentment by everything he said before...

[@Samsara_is_dukkha]

Theism is essentially materialistic since it is based on the notion of a supreme conscious power that plans, designs and assembles machine-like-organisms out of the matter that it created out of nothing.

[@grybnyx]

@@Samsara_is_dukkha The "supreme consciiousness" acts on the material world, allegedely, while doing so from a position outside of space and time.... doesn't sound very materialist to me.

[@Samsara_is_dukkha]

@@grybnyx According to Theism, matter and space-time are the necessary playground of the "supreme consciousness". I.E.: it proposes a version of the Universe as an artefact. Such a worldview is essentially materialist and mechanical as evidenced by the way people living in such a worldview objectify everything including themselves. That worldview is so strongly ingrained in Western thinking that atheist Darwinists strongly cling to the notion of organisms as mechanisms I.E.: artefacts assembled from materials according to some plan conceived of by an intelligent designer-assembler, which is totally incoherent since, by definition, atheism cannot support a version of the Universe as an artefact.

[@ingenuity296]

Are you still you if you have someone else's arms , legs , heart, kidney, eyes and face?

[@dongshengdi773]

Yes, because they have no mind or self awareness on their own. . More than half of your body is not human, say scientists. Human cells make up only 43% of the body's total cell count. The rest are microscopic colonists. Prof Rob Knight, from University of California San Diego, told the BBC: "You're more microbe than you are human." Originally it was thought our cells were outnumbered 10 to one. "That's been refined much closer to one-to-one, so the current estimate is you're about 43% human if you're counting up all the cells," he says. "What makes us human is, in my opinion, the combination of our own DNA, plus the DNA of our gut microbes." But genetically we're even more outgunned. The human genome - the full set of genetic instructions for a human being - is made up of 20,000 instructions called genes. But add all the genes in our microbiome together and the figure comes out between two and 20 million microbial genes.

[@grijzekijker]

There must be a tipping point somewhere. 🧟‍♂️

[@longcastle4863]

Yes, but if they exchanged your frontal lobe and some other components of your brain (especially those associated with memory) problems might arise. Why do people always leave out the brain out when bringing up this hypothetical?

[@ingenuity296]

@@grijzekijker I agree.

[@ingenuity296]

@longcastle4863 Because as of now we haven't heard of brain transplants. With someone else's brain, we definitely won't be who we were. memories are integral to who we are and the brain holds memories.

[@DuaneCowell]

Narc maze with dots Listen to your gut

[@DuaneCowell]

Flat or starwars

[@David.C.Velasquez]

If 'you' were subjected to an strong rotating magnetic field capable of rotating the atoms of your body synchronously, but individually... would 'you' be rotating?

[@longcastle4863]

Do you rotate when you turn the ring on your finger? Or am I not understanding your point?

[@David.C.Velasquez]

@@longcastle4863 Try to think of it this way... If you spin in your chair 360 degrees, we can agree that you rotated once in that axis. Now, suppose with a hypothetical device, presumably similar in function to an MRI, every atom in your body is rotated once along it's corresponding axis. In the second case, did 'you' rotate?... I would argue no, even though physically the final outcomes are identical.

[@TactileTherapy]

@@David.C.Velasquez "You rotating" in that scenario would have to be confined to the definition of your body spinning. If 25% of the atoms spun, then you did not rotate. If 50%, still no. If 100% did, and at the same time, then 'you' did rotate.

[@David.C.Velasquez]

@@TactileTherapy Thanks for your view on this thought experiment. At what percentage do you draw the line? What if 99% were rotated? In this example though, 100% are rotated. If I observed this process take place on you, I would not see any difference. I think this scenario highlights the role of form over material in defining ourselves. Somehow, the media is mistaken for the message encoded within.

[@vishnukarthik8351]

​​@@David.C.VelasquezThe outcome wouldn't be the same physically. My rotation is a revolution of all the atoms in my body along a central axis. The only atoms that rotate are the ones along the axis itself. If a strong force forced every atom to revolve around my central axis then I would in fact be rotating. If every atom rotated, about their own axis that would be a distinctly different outcome than rotating. That would not be comparable because for me to rotate my atoms have to travel a certain distance along a circular path but for all my atoms to rotate, none of them have to travel any distance at all. So they will necessarily be quite different. You're quite right. But what's the point you're making?

[@infinitygame18]

Nature of Personal Identity is very vast than all understand , In true Reality there is only collective Identity , more disconnection from truth & Laws Identity get Narrow that the cause of all Suffering , humanity suffering is due to Ignorance & Desires Creating out of Fear , Understanding is True Liberation

[@grybnyx]

Look at what faith does to the thinking of an otherwise smart man...

[@S3RAVA3LM]

You are free to share what you mean. Never make a comment without any substance or without backing it up - this is the rule I follow. One things for certain: this man here doesn't compare to the giants.

[@darkknightsds]

Inwagen here provides a logically coherent and consistent approach to faith. I like it

[@mohitsoodbadlapur]

😊

[@JAYMOAP]

Theological science fictions are cute 👌

[@Samsara_is_dukkha]

His argument is consistent with theism since he believes that animals (including human beings) maintain physical identity due to *an inherent plan* that is impressed on the matter that forms them. He later provides a similar argument when he claims that "bacterium are complicated biochemical machines". Both arguments require a belief in the existence of a designer-assembler without whom the entire line of thought collapses. On the other hand, all the atheist-Darwinist arguments have proposed so far is to get rid of the Lawmaker all the while preserving the notion of machine-like-organisms designed according to an inherent plan coded in genes (that are essentially "selfish" according to his Holiness Richard Dawkins) without ever providing any explanation as to how and even less why such a plan came into existence in the first place. Both propositions are unsatisfactory since the first worldview requires a leap of faith while the second requires a fair amount of cognitive dissonance to reconcile its incoherence.

[@longcastle4863]

Hume is one of my favorite philosophical thinkers, but I never could understand when he said that when he looks inside, he can never find a self. That is not my experience. I seem to find what seems to be myself quite readily. Anyone understand Hume’s meaning here?

[@truefact844]

What did he even mean by self?

[@Andrew-jj6er]

His theory is that what we call a "self" is actually just a series of perceptions over time, a "bundle of different perceptions" as he called it, and so there is no permanent self to be found. I think this is very similar to the way Buddhists view the self.

[@longcastle4863]

Hume suggests that our awareness of perceptions and experiences do not form any connected whole. But it seems to me that our awareness of ourselves is a sense of self and personal identity and is the part of ourselves that, for example, sets goals for ourselves and therefore also feels proud or guilty as we choose to behave in ways consistent or inconsistent with those goals. A person goes a week keeping to his or her diet in order to lose weight, they feels good about themselves. They have a moment of weakness and binge on a whole bag of potato chips while watching Monty Python reruns (not that this has ever happened to me😊), they end up judging themselves and feeling guilty.

[@longcastle4863]

@@Andrew-jj6er I would agree that one’s personal identity and sense of self is not a finished whole or static unchanging thing, but something that grows and matures over time. Certainly our sense of self as a child, with our child concerns and vulnerabilities is not the same sense of self we have as adults, with our history of experiences behind us and our now more grown up adult concerns before us. The trouble, perhaps, is when people hope that this sense of self is something separate from the body that will then continue on without the body. As opposed to seeing it as just a part or component of the body that dies with the body.

[@longcastle4863]

@@NelsonnPinheiro-el8sz No scientist, philosopher, theologian, artist, writer of literature, etc ever finds the whole truth and nothing but the truth. My favorite thinkers that I have come upon in my life are Plato/Socrates and Nietzsche. Such utter brilliance and intelligence that just sparkles off the page. Can almost leave me breathless and in tears for the sheer beauty of their words. And yet I often violently disagree with both of them. In a perfect world I would get a chance to thank all three personally and challenge them to a debate. And probably enjoy being obliterated by them. The _Gorgias_ especially, I think, is a book for our time. Second only to Karl Popper’s, _An Open Society and Its Enemies,_ the second volume of which, beginning with the chapter on Marx, I wish all the World would read. We’d be a better Planet and a better species for it.

[@r2c3]

can identify exist without structure/form/shape/qualia 🤔

[@S3RAVA3LM]

Good day, sir. I like vedanta, and Greek monistic metaphysics. In India metaphysics Maya is the creative faculty of Brahman, and this 'I am' or self or awareness, that is God, because of condition, do we identify this 'I am' with the body or condition - i am this body or that body. We are the Principle, the Atman. I understand God to be equal everywhere. And depending on the condition or body with its functions does one think: 'I am' such and such a body. Identity or the sense of, is due to Maya. The objective - the illusion, or mirage of the desert. The Principle that we are is the Subject - Atman. Regarding your statement: I don't believe so. One my favorite teachers, Theoria Apophasis here on youtube states: what makes you think you are that which dies? Death of body may be like a snake shedding it's old skin. Foolish to identify with that which is transitory, while forgetting That which always was, is and will be. I've dedicated years of study and research, this is what I understand currently.

[@r2c3]

@@S3RAVA3LM hello S3R... my knowledge of Indian philosophy is very shallow and only recently I've been introduced to the Brahman and Atman concepts of the Supreme eternity... when considering our limited capacities, it seems to me that I cannot possibly claim or aim a complete understanding of eternity or the Divine, especially when our knowledge only spans back to a few millennia... therefore my focus is the understanding of only smaller units of existence that directly affect our journey and hopefully find its purpose along the way... always a pleasure S3R...

[@ravenragnar]

I am unsubbing. Why? Content overload.

[@wordzfailmebro]

I'm not replying to only one comment...I'm not subbing. 🐨👍