Posted by alexandra_k on August 21, 2005, at 16:43:26
In reply to Re: I » alexandra_k, posted by Dinah on August 21, 2005, at 9:25:07
Personal identity was a hot topic in the 60's. That means that the current academics (generally speaking) are sick to death of it because they were made to study it... They don't inflict it on us and so it is a topic that is currently being rediscovered by students...
Because it was the 60's philosophers were particularly hung up on necessary and sufficient conditions. What are the necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for personal identity over time?
There are two criterion that people have varying degrees of alliance to.
- bodily criterion. This is about the physical body. Here we want to talk about the same body persisting through time. So the Lewis stuff comes in with respect to time slices and relations between time slices. You can trace the bodys course through space/time.
- psychological criterion. This is about psychological factors such as memory, beliefs, desires, goals, preferences, etc. Here we want to talk about the same mind persisting through time. So the Lewis stuff comes in with respect to time slices and relations between time slices. You can trace the minds course through space/time.
Typically the psychological and bodily criterions are correlated. Philosophers thus devise all kinds of thought experiments so as to tease them apart and see which intuitively seems to take precedence for personal identity.
Thus if your body woke up tomorrow with my memories and my body woke up tomorrow with your memories we have to choose... 1) Dinah and a_k swapped bodies. 2) Dinah and a_k swapped minds. Which seems more intuitively correct?? Most want to say that it is better to say that we swapped bodies thus personal identity follows the psychological criterion of personal identity.
Then you can consider cases of amnesia. Suppose there was a radical break in psychological continuity and no break in bodily continuity. Same person or not? Here most want to say that the person has changed. But they remain the same person. What hangs it together is the bodily criterion of personal identity.
With respect to sameness over time...
There are problems with both the psychological and bodily criterions. Every cell in your body is replaced every 7 years or so. So we do not have the same body (when considered from the level of physics). Likewise beliefs, desires, preferences etc evolve over time.> Although I must confess that I don't think of Dinah 2 or Dinah 3 as being psychological entities. *That* I reserve for emotional and intellectual me. I guess it's because the mood states lack the thing that I consider to separate psychological entities, the sense of being an entity. The "I think, therefore I am."
Okay. Though I think 'mood states' is more psychological than bodily (with respect to the criterions)
> And the "patterns of beliefs / desires / preferences / emotions / memories" are not as distinct.Yeah. Thats okay. I guess in some people the Dinah1 Dinah2 bits can be quite distinct. In other people the Dinah1 Dinah2 bits can be less distinct. In some people it may be pointless to make the distinction. Or perhaps the distinction can be reserved for different contexts. Dinah at church, Dinah on the boards, Dinah with her family etc.
>For example, feelings about the people in my immediate life. Emotional me always feels attached to my therapist and likes him. Rational me thinks he's a shallow moneyhungry boob. (Hmmm... maybe all of me thinks he's a boob, but in different senses of the word.) There are similar splits about other people in my life. And goals and priorities are fundamentally different. Ways of presenting myself are different. Views of the world are different.
So feelings. And beliefs. 'I believe that he's a boob'. And desires. I guess you have different action urges when the different feelings / beliefs are at hand.
> The mood state differences are not as profound. But there is a bit of that, and I should consider the possibility of a lesser degree of dissociation. I know that everyone has mood states, and different states based on who you're with, and things like that...Yeah. Context dependent. Thats important. And mood dependent too...
> To me, it seems like the disconnect between those states is a bit more profound for me. Not enough to impair my ability to function,
Actually, if you didn't exhibit a degree of flexability / change in role in different contexts then you would be dysfunctional. The person who can't distinguish between pub behaviour and church behaviour may have problems in life...
> I wonder how much of it is perception. Although perhaps a lot of this whole topic is based on perception.
Sure. Perception. Beliefs about the world / oneself. Feelings about the world / oneself.
I'm really interested in Perception, thinking (beliefs) emotions, sensations, desires, goals, preferences, and the way in which they all combine so as to produce behaviour...
Then interesting issues about how the distinction between those terms is / is not mirrored in the brain. AKA: whether there really are (in the brain) such things as perceptions, beliefs etc.
Hoping to do my PhD on that actually...
:-)
poster:alexandra_k
thread:543244
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050813/msgs/544878.html