Novy Metaphysics SP08

Locke: An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

Notes for Chapter XXVII : Of Identity and Diversity

 

Consciousness, as far as ever it can be extended – should it be to ages past – unites existences and actions of the immediately preceding moment: so that whatever has the consciousness of present or past actions, is the same person to whom they both belong.

 

Summation:

  1. The “person” in personal identity is fundamentally a concept associated with moral agency (§18)
  2. Man ≠ person
  3. Soul ≠ Consciousness
  4. Person = consciousness
    1. Connects past and future in legal/ moral sense of responsibility
    2. Connects current concern and care for future states of self

 

What is not the bearer of personal identity

  1. The Soul Criterion (§ 14)
  2. The Bodily Criterion. (§17)
  3. Rational Discourse Criterion (§9)

 

Personal Identity is a matter of Memory / Consciousness

  1. The General Memory Criterion:

X at t1 is the same person as Y at t2 IFF X and Y have continuity of memories

 

  1. The First Revised Memory Criterion:

X at t1 is the same person as Y at t2 IFF Mem (X, t1) = Mem (Y, t2)

 

J.       The Second Revised Memory Criterion:

X at t0 is the same person as Y at tm IFF there exist X1 at t1, X2 at t2, …, Xn at tn such that Mem (X, t0) = Mem (X1, t1), Mem (X1, t1) = Mem (X2, t2), … and Mem (Xn, tn) = Mem (Y, tm)

 

  1. The Third Revised Memory Criterion:

 

X at t0 is the same person as Y at tm IFF there exist X1 at t1, X2 at t2, …, Xn at tn such that Mem (X, t0) and Mem (X1, t1) have, say, 29 members in common, Mem (X1, t1) and Mem (X2, t2) have 29 members in common, … and Mem (Xn, tn) and Mem (Y, tm) have 29 members in common.

 

Problems with the Revised Memory Criterion. 

L.       Cases of Amnesia (§20) 

M.     Genuine and Apparent Memories

 

Why “consciousness” rather than “soul”?

  1. Concern regarding Biblical resurrection (§15)
    1. Soul ≈ substance in which our capacity to think resides; consciousness ≈ use of that capacity
    2. Soul is neither necessary nor sufficient for personal identity over time

                                                             a.      Consciousness can be transferred from one soul to another (§12)

                                                             b.      Consciousness can be lost without change in soul (sleeping)

                                                             c.      Soul can be changed without change in consciousness (cobbler/ prince)

    1. Cannibal problem
  1. Judgment Day (or any future punishments/ rewards)
    1. Skepticism regarding ability to re-identify the same soul through time
    2. We can never be sure one soul hasn’t been switched for another when unconscious
    3. Without such a mechanism for re-identifying souls over time, we will be unjust
    4. \Consciousness is the bearer of identity