Calling out galveston75

In another thread I posed the following question to you. You exhibited some concern that it would be taking the thread off-course, so I started a new thread.

According to your beliefs, person S1 dies at natural death and nothing of S1 survives this. Then, sometime later, God creates a "resurrected" person S2 that based on His memory is supposed to bear some intimate relation to S1. But, I am asking what reasons you have for thinking that S2 is numerically identical to S1; rather than thinking that S2 is simply a new person distinct from S1. This question deals with the subject of personal identity and what exactly makes some person one and the same person over time.

Basically, why are the persons who supposedly get created and set up down the road in earthly paradise simply not new distinct persons?

I am asking because I am interested in discussion related to the subject of personal identity and the question of what exactly makes some person one and the same person over time. Honestly, I don't understand what you think makes S2 numerically identical to S1.

Originally posted by LemonJello
In another thread I posed the following question to you. You exhibited some concern that it would be taking the thread off-course, so I started a new thread.

[quote]According to your beliefs, person S1 dies at natural death and nothing of S1 survives this. Then, sometime later, God creates a "resurrected" person S2 that based on His memory is supposed ...[text shortened]... over time. Honestly, I don't understand what you think makes S2 numerically identical to S1.

Because for one, we will have memory. How do I know this? Because of this verse.
Rev 21:3-4
"Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."
NIV

Why would God have to wipe every tear from their eyes?

Originally posted by checkbaiter
Because for one, we will have memory. How do I know this? Because of this verse.
Rev 21:3-4
"Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."
NIV

Why would God have to wipe every tear from their eyes?

How does that show that S2 shares memories with S1?

By the way, I'm not sure you and galvo are on the same page. According to galvo, there is no soul (or anything for that matter regarding the constitutional makeup of S1) that survives natural death. So, according to his beliefs, there is nothing about S1 (the person that is S1) that survives natural death. Then, sometime later, God creates S2, who is supposedly numerically identical to S1 (though I am not sure how). So his views are not consistent with any view that holds there is some irreducible soul that survives natural death.

What is your view? Do you hold that there is some soul that constitutes the person S1 and that this soul survives natural death in some disembodied state. And then God bodily resurrects this soul sometime later? If so, that is a fundamentally different view from galvo's view. In that case, my problem would not be in understanding how S1 and S2 are numerically identical, but rather in understanding how a person could be constituted by such a soul, given that the properties we attach to personhood (psychological capacities) seem to require a body.

Originally posted by LemonJello
How does that show that S2 shares memories with S1?

By the way, I'm not sure you and galvo are on the same page. According to galvo, there is no soul (or anything for that matter regarding the constitutional makeup of S1) that survives natural death. So, according to his beliefs, there is nothing about S1 (the person that is S1) that survives natural ...[text shortened]... that the properties we attach to personhood (psychological capacities) seem to require a body.

How does that show that S2 shares memories with S1?

Because of the obvious. What are the tears from? Without getting into a lot of bible verses, this verse is right after people, etc., are tossed in the Lake of fire. I believe there are people we knew, never getting born again, being tossed in. I can imagine a co-worker, a friend, or family member being tossed in the fire. I would certainly be grieved and thus the tears. That is why I think we will remember. So the same memories in your analogy with S1, S2 would have the same. In other words, it will be me, same memories, new glorified body.
If we die, the holy spirit “returns” to God (Eccles. 12:7). Since God is everywhere, that most likely means that He remembers us and will re-energize our bodies with spirit at the Rapture. Another possibility is that God simply reclaims the spiritual life force He put in us. In any case, the holy spirit God gave us did not have a mind or memory before it was given to us, and it does not have one after we die. It is spiritual life, spiritual power, that we have from God. My “spirit” is not rejoicing with God after “I” die. A person is alive only as an integrated whole before he dies, and only as an integrated whole will he live again, when God raises him from the dead.
But I am only speculating because I am not certain of any of it.
As far as G75, we disagree on many things, since I am not a JW.

Originally posted by checkbaiter
[b]How does that show that S2 shares memories with S1?

Because of the obvious. What are the tears from? Without getting into a lot of bible verses, this verse is right after people, etc., are tossed in the Lake of fire. I believe there are people we knew, never getting born again, being tossed in. I can imagine a co-worker, a friend, or family mem ...[text shortened]... I am not certain of any of it.
As far as G75, we disagree on many things, since I am not a JW.[/b]

I still don't really see how that verse shows that S1 and S2 have the same memories. Wouldn't it be traumatic enough to elicit tears from S2 if S2 sees persons getting tortured, set afire and whatnot, regardless of whether S2 knows or has memories of these persons? I mean, I doubt S2 is going to cry if S2 sees his/her mother getting tossed in and yet not cry if he/she sees only random women getting tossed in. What justifies your inference that the tears imply that S2 knows persons getting tossed in and, further, that the associated memories match those of some S1?

At any rate, let's suppose you were correct that the verse shows that S2's memories match those of S1 (insofar as it concerns memories of friends, familiy, coworkers, and whatnot). How does it follow that S1 and S2 are one and the same person? Wouldn't it be possible, hypothetically, for two entities to share the same memories in such respect and yet differ radically in other psychological aspects?

Anyway, thanks for your considered reply. I am interested in more details, but I understand if you are short on them since you are, as you forthrightly suggested, only speculating.

Originally posted by LemonJello
I still don't really see how that verse shows that S1 and S2 have the same memories. Wouldn't it be traumatic enough to elicit tears from S2 if S2 sees persons getting tortured, set afire and whatnot, regardless of whether S2 knows or has memories of these persons? I mean, I doubt S2 is going to cry if S2 sees his/her mother getting tossed in and ...[text shortened]... nd if you are short on them since you are, as you forthrightly suggested, only speculating.

Sorry, I am still looking into this and have nothing definitive or concrete as yet.

Originally posted by LemonJello
At any rate, let's suppose you were correct that the verse shows that S2's memories match those of S1 (insofar as it concerns memories of friends, familiy, coworkers, and whatnot). How does it follow that S1 and S2 are one and the same person? Wouldn't it be possible, hypothetically, for two entities to share the same memories in such respect and yet differ radically in other psychological aspects?

The question I usually pose is what happens to someone with alzheimer's or some other disease that causes them to loose their memories? If checkbaiter scenario plays out then the memories must be manufactured from some earlier point in your life, and difficult questions must be answered. For example, would you care if your 6 year old self went to heaven, or was tortured in hell?

Originally posted by checkbaiter
Sorry, I am still looking into this and have nothing definitive or concrete as yet.

You don't have anything concrete, full stop.

Originally posted by johnnylongwoody
You don't have anything concrete, full stop.

Here is where you are wrong, I do know that the heathen of the world will be cast in the Lake of Fire. The bible is more reliable than your belief in Plato or Aristotle.

Originally posted by twhitehead
The question I usually pose is what happens to someone with alzheimer's or some other disease that causes them to loose their memories? If checkbaiter scenario plays out then the memories must be manufactured from some earlier point in your life, and difficult questions must be answered. For example, would you care if your 6 year old self went to heaven, or was tortured in hell?

Yeah, that is a good thought experiment.

Another thing that confuses me here is the following. Many Christians believe that even if S1 has, say, a nefarious character or is disposed toward wrong behaviors or has some other serious character failing, S1 will still go to heaven if S1 professes belief in God, or some such. (In fact, many Christians hold that every S1 will have some serious failings of character putatively because of a lowborn nature.) But, of course, none of these Christians believe that S2 will have nefarious character or other serious character failings, or that heaven generally is run amok with persons who have serious character failings. But, then, this signals a major disconnect between S1 and S2 regarding their dispositional sets, which surely is relevant to personhood. So, again, even if checkbaiter were correct that S1 and S2 share some memories, what actual reason do we have to think S1 and S2 are one and the same person, especially if they differ in potentially radical ways with respect to their dispositional sets?

Originally posted by checkbaiter
Here is where you are wrong, I do know that the heathen of the world will be cast in the Lake of Fire. The bible is more reliable than your belief in Plato or Aristotle.

Here is a question I have for you. Suppose some "heathen" S1 who is strongly disposed toward heathen ways accepts Christ as his savior on his deathbed right before he croaks. According to you, this person will end up in heaven as S2, right? But will S2 be disposed toward heathen ways? If not, why the disconnect in disposition if, according to you, S1 and S2 are one and the same person? If God somehow eradicated or omitted such disposition upon creating S2, then why isn't S2 simply a new person, distinct from any S1?

Originally posted by LemonJello
Here is a question I have for you. Suppose some "heathen" S1 who is strongly disposed toward heathen ways accepts Christ as his savior on his deathbed right before he croaks. According to you, this person will end up in heaven as S2, right? But will S2 be disposed toward heathen ways? If not, why the disconnect in disposition if, according to you, S1 ...[text shortened]... ch disposition upon creating S2, then why isn't S2 simply a new person, distinct from any S1?

The following is part of what the apostle Paul wrote to the Corintihian Church about salvation.

For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.

Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.

(2 Corinthians 5:1-10 NKJV)

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

(2 Corinthians 5:17-19 NKJV)

It seems to me that everyone that accepts Christ as Savior, will be with Christ in paradise, just like Jesus told the thief on the cross. However, he may find himself naked with little reward for what he has done here on earth.

Originally posted by twhitehead
The question I usually pose is what happens to someone with alzheimer's or some other disease that causes them to loose their memories? If checkbaiter scenario plays out then the memories must be manufactured from some earlier point in your life, and difficult questions must be answered. For example, would you care if your 6 year old self went to heaven, or was tortured in hell?

And yet another flaw is uncovered. What do they do with someone who is deaf, dumb, and blind from birth ? They must get some super duper magic pass given out by Jesus himself. 🙄🙄🙄🙄

Originally posted by caissad4
And yet another flaw is uncovered. What do they do with someone who is deaf, dumb, and blind from birth ? They must get some super duper magic pass given out by Jesus himself. 🙄🙄🙄🙄

There are also day old babies, aborted fetus', who simply haven't had time to build up memories or much cognitive function.
For those that believe a soul is imparted at conception, the question then is whether identical twins share a soul.
Then there is multiple personalities, major brain injuries resulting in personality change, various forms of mental illness etc.

Originally posted by caissad4
And yet another flaw is uncovered. What do they do with someone who is deaf, dumb, and blind from birth ? They must get some super duper magic pass given out by Jesus himself. 🙄🙄🙄🙄

If any person is considered mentally insane at the time he commits a crime, our justice system considers that person not guilty because that person is not capable of knowing what he/she did is a crime. So I am sure the Triune God will be able to judge fairly the ability of a deaf, dumb, and blind person to understand the committing of sins.