In this paper, I will look at and criticize John Locke’s account of Personal Identity as well as put forward arguments of my own of what I consider to be the unreliability of that which Locke terms as consciousness in relation to and as a composition of ‘Personal Identity’. Before we can arrive at a discussion of consciousness it is essential to follow Locke’s thought process and see how he arrived at a differentiation between substance, person, self (an alternate term for person used in the latter half of the chapter) and consciousness. It is essential to realize that for Locke personal identity consists in the identity of consciousness. We know this because he says as much in the following passage: “[T]he same consciousness being preserv’d…the …show more content…
I would even go so far as to say that memory and the ability to recall accurately past actions is a key condition for personal identity. Once again, the unreliability exposed as such an accurate recollection of every detail is simply impossible. By basing our consciousness on something that is subject to several forces of change means that Locke claims that our consciousness is in itself unstable and constantly undergoing change. While this may be true, this means that we will have no stable personal identity thereby making consciousness unreliable.
Early on in the chapter, Locke says that if you add or remove a particle from a whole the whole is no longer the same. (xxvii.¶3) I argue, why should memories be treated any differently? Can it not be said with utmost certainty that a person acquires new memories over time and thus the set of memories we have is constantly undergoing change? How can the memories be the basis for this notion of consciousness and by extension, for personal identity if the set of memories do not remain the same through time? Looking at the
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Accordingly, we should say that the substance plays an important role in personal identity, but this is something that Locke does not do. Since consciousness plays the most important role in our being punished or rewarded at the final judgment for what we have done, and consciousness can be transferred from one soul to another, and we have no ability to re-identify the nature of souls over time, it becomes clear why consciousness despite its unreliability is Locke 's choice for the bearer of personal identity, and why he makes the hazy differentiation between the substance which thinks in us and consciousness. I think Locke is somewhat restrained in his thought by his religious perspective and therefore creates this reliance on consciousness in order to justify the notion of moral responsibility, punishment and reward and judgment. On his account, for example, memory must be completely accurate
— at least in the respects relevant for divine judicial purposes. This is an idealistic expression of what personal identity ought to be here is where consciousness is most unreliable because aside from questions regarding its very existence and even if we were to accept the notion that it exists it is contingent on memory which is as I have demonstrated earlier, itself
Philosophical ideas impacted human history, particularly in government. Niccolo Machiavelli and John Locke ideation molded human history on how power should be divided equally amongst the people and the ruler. Their theories began the steps to construction of the U.S government. Machiavelli ideas migrated the power in monarchies away form the power of the church to the King/Queen. Particularly starting in Florence during the renaissance and political enlightenment.
One of his arguments is that how can something exist from nothing; something must have always existed. Locke knows he exist since he is able to think, also he points out the fact that other things exist they must have come from another thinking thing. So, in his defense he has an idea based on the things he experiences with his senses. In the second paragraph Locke states that how can a person be happy doubting their own existence.
However, based on Locke’s direct memory view of personal identity, the general is not the same person as the boy, because the general cannot remember himself as the boy. Therefore, the general is and is not the same person as the boy at the same time. This is a manifest contradiction that results from Locke’s direct memory view of personal identity. I will present an indirect memory view of personal identity that is more align with our intuitions that does not result in a
There are three main factions within the psychological continuity theory, the first is that self is determined by memories and the continuity of self is determined by the fact that most memories are retained through a person 's life. The second is that a continuous stream of consciousness is the determining factor of self. However, both of these have flaws: memories can be forgotten and false memories are not a uncommon occurrence, and the stream of consciousness is broken during sleep. The last theory, and the one that Hot Fuzz advocates for, is that self-identity is determined by “long-standing psychological characteristics (e.g., personality, dispositions, worldview [as well as value system and long term desires])” (Litch 82).
The Common Sense pamphlet was written by Thomas Paine he was an editor for the Pennsylvanian magazine. The Declaration of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson. These two authors, Paine and Jefferson got their ideas from the Enlightenment philosophers Voltaire, Locke, Rousseau, and Montesquieu. One philosopher’s ideas that was found in both documents was Voltaire.
Q14. The memory criterion mentioned that A is B if A can remember B's experiences or thoughts. For instance, I can remember being 9, so I'm the exact same person I was when I was nine. But, actually, you can find problems with this memory criterion: it's unlike the transitivity of identity and don't include forward looking psychological connections, such as that between present intention and future action, as determinants of personal identity. Using example to spell out, the charge that the memory criterion conflicts with the transitivity of identity was illustrated by the famous case of the schoolboy, the young lieutenant and seniors general (Reid 1975).
Persistence is the view that persons have psychological continuity, thus, a person is the future being that inherits the mental features from that person. A person is also the past being whose mental features they have inherited. Olson refers to this question of persistence as the “traditional problem” of personal identity. The question of persistence asks what is essential and adequate for a person existing at one time to be identical with something present at another time. Therefore, Olson believes that contemporary philosophers think an answer to this question would resolve all there is to know about the metaphysics of personal identity (“An Argument for Animalism”, 613).
In “A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality”, Gretchen Weirob and Sam Miller conduct a philosophical debate about the possibility of a continued existence after death. Weirob argues that she herself cannot exist after death because her identity is composed of her body, rationality, and consciousness. In Derek Parfit’s “Personal Identity” he ponders how the concept of identity works, and how the true nature of our identity affects some of the most important questions we have about our existence. I believe that Velleman did a better job of exploring the idea of identity than Weirob did.
In John Locke’s, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke develops an argument for the existence of God. In the the following paper, I shall first reconstruct Lockes’ argument for his claim of God’s existence. I shall then identify what I take to be the weakest premise of the argument and explain why I find it in need of justification. The following is a reconstruction of Lockes’ argument: 1) Man has a clear perception of his own being 2)
In “Divided Minds and the Nature of Persons,” Derek Parfit purposes that we as humans should separate what we consider identity and survival. Parfit’s strongest argument towards his claims is that there is no continual existence of the definite ego or personal identity. He supports some of his beliefs by contrasting Egos Theory to the Bundle Theory, a theory suggesting that our minds are a collection of none cohesive properties, related only by our consciousness and resemblance, with the studies of imaginary patients who may suffer from disorders known as split-brain cases. In this paper, I will argue that Derek Parfit’s validations for the support of the Bundle Theory should be questioned by their theoretical nature with no possible way to
Locke’s philosophical project consisted of discovering where our ideas come from, what an idea is, and to examine issues of faith
Derek Parfit is a British philosopher who specialises in problems of personal identity and he proposes that we separate the notions of identity and survival. He is one of the most prominent philosophers in the struggle to define the self. Parfit’s 1971 essay “Personal Identity” targets two common beliefs which are central to the earliest conversations about personal identity. The first belief is about the nature of personal identity; all questions regarding this must have an answer. Between now and any future time, it is either the case that “I shall exist or I shall not”.
The argument of whether or not a human has a soul has been argued throughout centuries. Derek Parfit discusses two separate theories of personal identity, Ego Theory and Bundle Theory. The argument of which present a more accurate account of personhood is very hard to determine. The Ego Theory has some flaws such the soul is separate from the body and is a immaterialist object within us. Bundle Theory is reinforced and proven by the split-brain case, however it can lead to the argument that there is no self.
According to John Locke, it is not the Will of a human being that makes him or her free. The Will is simply a faculty of freedom, insofar as a person who expresses Free Will is simply acting freely in accordance with his or her desires. For Locke, It is the person who is free; he proclaims that “free will” is a misleading phrase, whereby “freedom” and the human “will” are two separate categories which must be clearly defined in order to be properly accounted for. A Person who is free may do what he or she wills. Freedom, for Locke, consists in a person’s power or ability to act or not act on his or her will.
Identity is social construct that many have mistaken for something an individual is born with. There are many aspects of identity that one can inherit like genes that can drive a certain type of character and certain aspects of identity a person can adopt and build for themselves. However the most part of one’s identity is consistent of what the person wants and adopts for themselves and what the society/the people around him/her choose to give him/her. Identity is a said to not remain unchanged once established.