Personal Identity Essay

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Recommended: Locke’s theory of personal identity

In philosophy, the matter of personal identity comprises the related subjects of contiguity, change, sameness, and time. Conceptually, personal identity is the distinct personality of a man or woman, and concerns the persisting entity particular to him or her. As such, the personal identity structure remains the same, as the previous version of the individual characteristics that arise from personality, by which a person is known to other people.
Generally, personal identity is the unique numerical identity of a person in the course of time. That is, the necessary and sufficient conditions under which a person at one time and a person at another time can be said to be the same person, persisting through time;
In contemporary philosophy of mind, …show more content…

Book II Chapter XXVII entitled "On Identity and Diversity" in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding has been said to be one of the first modern conceptualizations of consciousness as the repeated self-identification of oneself. Through this identification, moral responsibility could be attributed to the subject and punishment and guilt could be justified, as critics such as Nietzsche would point out.
According to Locke, personal identity "depends on consciousness, not on substance" nor on the soul. We are the same person to the extent that we are conscious of the past and future thoughts and actions in the same way as we are conscious of present thoughts and actions. If consciousness is this "thought" which "goes along with the substance ... which makes the same person", then personal identity is only founded on the repeated act of consciousness: "This may show us wherein personal identity consists: not in the identity of substance, but... in the identity of consciousness". For example, one may claim to be a reincarnation of Plato, therefore having the same soul substance. However, one would be the same person as Plato only if one had the same consciousness of Plato 's thoughts and actions that he himself did. Therefore, self-identity is not based on the soul. One soul may have various …show more content…

In other words, Locke argues that may be judged only for the acts of the body, as this is what is apparent to all but God; however, are in truth only responsible for the acts for which are conscious. This forms the basis of the insanity defense: one cannot be held accountable for acts from which one was unconscious – and therefore leads to interesting philosophical questions:
Henceforth, Locke 's conception of personal identity founds it not on the substance or the body, but in the "same continued consciousness", which is also distinct from the soul since the soul may have no consciousness of itself . He creates a third term between the soul and the body - and Locke 's thought may certainly be meditated by those who, following a scientist ideology, would identify too quickly the brain to consciousness. For the brain, as the body and as any substance, may change, while consciousness remains the same. Therefore, personal identity is not in the brain, but in

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