John Locke's Concept of a Persistant Self Essay

371). This responds to the objections raised by Thomas Reid in the 18th century (Shoemaker, 2008, p. 340), however, the Memory Theory did require a modification to include the possibility of temporarily forgetting the experiences of an earlier person-stage, “as long as one has the potentiality of remembering it” (Shoemaker, 2008, p. 340). In the conversations held by Gretchen Weirob, Sam Miller and Dave Cohen in Perry’s ‘Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality’ (Perry, 1977), this concept is addressed in depth. Miller relays a chapter written by Locke – “the relation between two person-stages or stretches of consciousness that makes them stages of a single person is just that the later one contains memories of an earlier one...I can remember only my past thoughts and feelings, and you only yours...take this relation as the source of identity” (Perry, 1977, p. 343). These concepts are logical possibilities in my opinion, and are far less unstable than those presented within the Body/Soul Theory, as these concepts do not require the senses of others, but the individual’s first person perception of their personal identity.

In John Locke’s argument for personal identity, he believes that we are not substances or mere souls. In his argument, Locke stresses to convey that there is a crucial difference between distinguishing a “man” and a “person” (Locke 221). According to Locke’s definition, a man is a living body which is homogenous to an animal’s body. Therefore, any living body of a particular shapes refers to a “man.” Locke emphasizes that a “person” is a sensible being that is aware of its own

A simple example of this is: The person is the same person as someone in the past if the person has the consciousness of the experience that the someone in the past did. Thus, the identity of a person is limited to how much the conscious of later person remembers their earlier conscious memories. Only then he is truly the same person or himself. But then this bring few questions: Can there be a the same thinking substance in different people or different thinking substance in the same person and how do we punish people? To answer the first question he believes that the issue lies whether a immaterial being with consciousness could have its consciousness of its past actions be completely removed then begin a life with new consciousness. Nonetheless if it was possible then Locke argues that there is no reason to say that the person who’s soul and conscious lived before the removal is the same person whose new consciousness took over. To answer the second part, Locke says that the answer depends on whether the conscious of the past actions can be transferred to another person who did not experience it. Locke believes this phenomenon is possible and if it was, would this person be the same person he was before? Yes. Using Locke’s theory where

The psychological linkage view provided by Locke states that personal identity is based on a direct memory account. In other words, if at any point in time a person loses their direct memory of the past they cease to have the same personal identity. This view can be exhibited by the following example. Consider the case of a person who is involved in a car accident and suffers a concussion. After the accident, the person cannot remember any of the events that transpired contiguous to the accident and resulting

Derik Parfit corrected this error in Locke’s theory by creating psychological continuity theory. With this improved theory on the original memory criterion , as stated by Parfit:

In this essay, I will be explaining John Locke’s case of the prince and the cobbler and Bernard Williams’s second description of the A-body person and the B-body person. Bernard Williams has the correct analysis of the situation where the body is part of self-identity since it is inevitable for us to fear future pain.

Furthermore, Locke’s profound analysis on sources of knowledge contributed to today’s psychological analysis of the unsolved dilemma of nature versus nurture while significantly shaping the foundation of modern psychology. As Locke introduced empiricism in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, he was an important figure of Enlightenment to foster and alternate the schools of thinking in many spheres including here philosophy and psychology among many others.

Personal identity, in a philosophical point of view, is the problem of explaining what makes a person numerically the same over a period of time, despite the change in qualities. The major questions answered by Locke were questions concerning the nature of identity, persons, and immorality (Jacobsen, 2016). This essay will discuss the three themes John Locke presents in his argument regarding personal identity, which are, the concept of categories, substance vs. man vs. person, and the continuity of consciousness.

     Hume on the other hand, took a different approach to the idea of self. He believed that there in fact was no such thing as selfhood. Instead he asserts that “it must be some one impression, that gives rise to every real idea. But self…is not any one impression, but that to which our several impressions and ideas are supposed to have a reference…” (597). By this he implies that in order to form concrete ideas, ones impressions of pain, pleasure, joy, etc. must be invariable throughout time. This, Hume states, we know without a doubt to be impossible. Passions succeed each other over time and give rise to new passions, therefore “…it cannot be from any of these impressions…that the idea of self is derived, and consequently there is no such idea” (597).

Locke's view on personal identity has strengths but it also has several weaknesses or limitations. One important strength is when Locke states that a person should be held responsible for his/her actions if he/she recalls doing those actions. In this case, the person

John Locke believed, the enduring self is defined by a person’s memory. With memory there is an enduring self, and without it there is no self at all. I believe there is an enduring self, but it is a little more complicated than that. Even if a person encounters a dramatic change to his/her life, they are still the same self, the same person. I believe memory is not the only factor that defines the self. Many things form this enduring self, and these things work together to form an identity, to form who you are now. These things are your memories, your experiences and your personality. You may change and grow over time as you are exposed to new experiences, but under it all you are still ....you. But is a

I will argue that Locke believed that if you remain the same person, there are various entities contained in my body and soul composite that do not remain the same over time, or that we can conceive them changing. These entities are matter, organism (human), person (rational consciousness and memory), and the soul (immaterial thinking substance). This is a intuitive interpretation that creates many questions and problems. I will evaluate Locke's view by explaining what is and what forms personal identity, and then explaining how these changes do conceivably occur while a human remains the same person.

Hume believed that the self was essentially a bundle of perceptions. Hume would claim that a unique identity that exists unchanged and gives the moments, which compose an individual’s life, continuity. Hume would say that when we make a claim such as “I experience a sunset” all we actually can claim, is that all the perceptions expected of a sunset are present and my mind has made relations among these perceptions. The next day “I” looks at the sunset there is no actual component, self, soul, or personal identity that is common to both experiences. Hume thinks that the idea of the

The question on personal identity has been a philosophical debate for a long time. Philosophers over time have tried to argue what being a person that one is, from one day to the necessarily contains. In their endless search for philosophical bases on the same, multiple questions on the issues of life and death arise such that the correct answers to personal identity determine the changes that one person undergoes, or may undergo without being extinct but rather continuing to exist. Personal identity philosophical theory confronts the most ultimate questions on our existence as well as who we are and if by any chance there is a possibility of life after death. In attempts to distinguish change in a person in survival and after death, a criterion of personal identity over time is given. Such criterion specifies all the necessary and sufficient conditions that must prevail for a person to continue to exist (Perry et al,103)

Many people question themselves, what is it exactly that makes them unique? What is it that defines them as a unique person that no one in the world possesses? In philosophy, these questions do not have just one answer, and all answers are correct depending on which theory appeals most and makes sense to you. In general, there are two ways people approach this question, some say that a person’s identity is the “self” that carries all of their experiences, thoughts, memories, and consciousness (ego theorists), and some say that a person’s identity is just a bundle of experiences and events that a person has been through in their life, these people deny that the “self” exists (bundle theorists). In this paper, I will be arguing that a person’s identity is just a bundle of experiences, denying the self and the memory criterion.