My House

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Our.
You speak as though there is possession, as though there is personality.

Purportedly.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
So, assuming the generalities are true--- the human body turns the cells of most of the body over several times prior to expiring--- am I at 50 the same person I was at 17?

What of 'me' was brought forward and what was lost?

As I already said, its entirely a matter of choice. We could say you are a whole new person, or we could say you are the same person. The reality remains the same whatever we choose to call you.

Originally posted by twhitehead
As I already said, its entirely a matter of choice. We could say you are a whole new person, or we could say you are the same person. The reality remains the same whatever we choose to call you.

Does one scenario more readily support the concept of identity, however?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
And what of persistence?

What of it? I was addressing persistence, and it is addressed in the link I provided. The question of persistence is a question of numerical identity.

Originally posted by LemonJello
What of it? I was addressing persistence, and it is addressed in the link I provided. The question of persistence is a question of numerical identity.

"Under what possible circumstances is a person who exists at one time identical with something that exists at another time (whether or not it is a person then)?"
I assume you are referring to the above question posed?
This one helps to clarify the concepts somewhat, but I have to admit the question or concept of numerical identity is a bit difficult to parse out with any real sense of resolve.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
"Under what possible circumstances is a person who exists at one time identical with something that exists at another time (whether or not it is a person then)?"
I assume you are referring to the above question posed?
This one helps to clarify the concepts somewhat, but I have to admit the question or concept of numerical identity is a bit difficult to parse out with any real sense of resolve.

I assume you are referring to the above question posed?

Yes, that is a general statement of the question of persistence.

This one helps to clarify the concepts somewhat, but I have to admit the question or concept of numerical identity is a bit difficult to parse out with any real sense of resolve.

Not sure what you mean. In the question of persistence you quoted, the sense of "identical" at issue is one of numerical identity (as in one and the same), not one of qualitative identity (as in exactly similar). The 50 year old Freaky will not be exactly similar to, or qualitatively identical to, the 17 year old Freaky because you have undergone changes and acquired different qualities or properties along the way. But the two are numerically identical, as in one and the same person. The question of persistence generally deals with explanation of facts like this.

Originally posted by LemonJello

I assume you are referring to the above question posed?

Yes, that is a general statement of the question of persistence.

This one helps to clarify the concepts somewhat, but I have to admit the question or concept of numerical identity is a bit difficult to parse out with any real sense of resolve.

Not sure what you ...[text shortened]... e same person. The question of persistence generally deals with explanation of facts like this.

Not trying to be overly dense, but I just don't get the phrase itself "numerical identity."
To what does the 'numerical' part refer?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Does one scenario more readily support the concept of identity, however?

Well obviously if you say you are the same person then you would feel more like you have an identity. But I am not certain what you are asking.

Do you think Jupiter's Red spot is the same Red spot it had 10 years ago?
Was Katrina the same storm when it dissipated over the US as it was when it started in the Atlantic?
Storms change their constituent atoms continuously, yet they still have enough identity for us to give them names.
I guess this is similar to the river example given earlier, but a storm doesn't even need a fixed location and container like a river does.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Well obviously if you say you are the same person then you would feel more like you have an identity. But I am not certain what you are asking.

Do you think Jupiter's Red spot is the same Red spot it had 10 years ago?
Was Katrina the same storm when it dissipated over the US as it was when it started in the Atlantic?
Storms change their constituent a ...[text shortened]... e given earlier, but a storm doesn't even need a fixed location and container like a river does.

Also, doesn't a human being change almost their entire body cells over a period of 10 years or so (not sure if this correct). Certainly as we grow from childhood through adolescence to adulthood we are different physically, emotionally and possible spiritually from what we were, and yet we remain the same person.

Originally posted by divegeester
Also, doesn't a human being change almost their entire body cells over a period of 10 years or so (not sure if this correct).

Yes, he did mention this earlier in the thread.

Certainly as we grow from childhood through adolescence to adulthood we are different physically, emotionally and possible spiritually from what we were, and yet we remain the same person.
The question of the thread is whether or not you do remain the same person, and what it actually means to say that you are the same person.

What makes you a person and what is maintained during your life time, is a recognizable pattern of physical structures. The atoms those structures are made of, may change, but the pattern remains. But we should not get over enthusiastic and draw too many conclusions from this. We must not forget that there will be gray areas or blurry edges to the pattern where it is entirely a matter of choice as to whether or not to call something part of that pattern.
So for example if a hurricane split into two vortices, would we give them different names?
If a foetus splits into two creating twins, are they the same person?
If I clone one of your cells, are you the same person?
If I cut your brain down the middle, do we have two people or one?
If you loose all your limbs, are you half a person?
If you die, at what point do you cease to be you?
Very few of these questions can be answered with logic. The answers you give may not be true or false, they may be entirely a matter of convention or choice.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Not trying to be overly dense, but I just don't get the phrase itself "numerical identity."
To what does the 'numerical' part refer?

The "numerical" part of 'numerical identity' refers to the putative fact that it is the only sort of identity relation by which one can properly count things. That is, 'a' and 'b' are to be properly counted as one thing, just in case they are numerically identical. Again, if 'a' and 'b' are numerically identical, then they refer to the selfsame thing; both have the same referent.

Perhaps an example would help further. Suppose you have a maker of watches, who produces some batch of watches, all with the same properties. With respect to one another, these watches may be qualitatively identical because they all share the same properties. However, there could be any number of such watches, all sharing this identity relation. You could label them each in order watch1, watch2, etc. They would all be qualitatively identical but the number of watches could be whatever. However, each watch is numerically identical with itself only, and it is in virtue of this relation that these watches are properly countable. For one particular watch in the set, you could label it with various labels, such as watchx, or LemonJello's watch, or whatever-else-have-you. However, all such labels have exactly the same referent and refer to one and the same thing. This is not true of 'watch1' and 'watch2' because they have distinct, albeit qualitatively identical, referents.

The issue with persistence has to do with numerical identity applied over time. What makes watchx the same watch now as it was, say, 4 minutes ago? Likewise, if the "17-year old Freaky" and the "50-year old Freaky" can be properly counted as one and the same person, it would only be in virtue of the fact that these have the selfsame referent, they refer to the same person; they are numerically identical.

Originally posted by LemonJello
Likewise, if the "17-year old Freaky" and the "50-year old Freaky" can be properly counted as one and the same person, it would only be in virtue of the fact that these have the selfsame referent, they refer to the same person; they are numerically identical.

The question of the thread is 'what is this person that is being referred to?' Clearly not the atoms in his body, and possibly not particular individual parts (as with the house example). And if you discovered his mummified body 1000 years after his death, would it still be the same person?
Is the mummified body of Ramesses II numerically identical to the living Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses II? It all depends on what you are counting.

Originally posted by twhitehead
The question of the thread is 'what is this person that is being referred to?' Clearly not the atoms in his body, and possibly not particular individual parts (as with the house example). And if you discovered his mummified body 1000 years after his death, would it still be the same person?
Is the mummified body of Ramesses II numerically identical to the living Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses II? It all depends on what you are counting.

Right, what actually constitutes a person is an initial question that Freaky posed (through analogue of a house), which I haven't addresed. But Freaky also is asking questions about persistence, which is what I partially addressed.

As for the question you highlight, I think probably any sane view of what constitutes a person will have to reference psychological properties or capacities. This may or may not have to do fundamentally with "physical structures" as you mentioned before, since there are many views of personal constitution and many of these do not simply reduce to talk of physical structures. Some believe in an irreducible soul, as one example.

Originally posted by LemonJello
The "numerical" part of 'numerical identity' refers to the putative fact that it is the only sort of identity relation by which one can properly count things. That is, 'a' and 'b' are to be properly counted as one thing, just in case they are numerically identical. Again, if 'a' and 'b' are numerically identical, then they refer to the selfsame thing; b ...[text shortened]... these have the selfsame referent, they refer to the same person; they are numerically identical.

If I'm reading you right (and the supplied link from Stanford), it comes down to a type of personality memory.
I don't mean memory itself--- we know how faulty that can be, as well as it fails to explain what occurs when memory is killed or severed completely.
I do mean personality transfer: think (if it were possible) of a guy who is a caterpillar, goes into an ooze-dominated existence and then becomes a butterfly; it's all the same guy, um, somehow.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
If I'm reading you right (and the supplied link from Stanford), it comes down to a type of personality memory.
I don't mean memory itself--- we know how faulty that can be, as well as it fails to explain what occurs when memory is killed or severed completely.
I do mean personality transfer: think (if it were possible) of a guy who is a caterpillar, goes ...[text shortened]... to an ooze-dominated existence and then becomes a butterfly; it's all the same guy, um, somehow.

?

At first glance, that looks like a fairly atrocious synopsis.