Personal Identity Concept

Human beings, as individuals, place a substantial amount of importance on and extensively value the consideration that we are unique. This is foundational aspect of human nature, interaction, and being. But what does this uniqueness mean, and what does it mean to us? The concept of the self or having a personal identity leads to questions of what one is really addressing when making statements about the self; such as, how is the concept of the self created or formed? Does the self persist through time, and how can we know that this identity is the same as we flow through time?
When attempting to address and describe what the self actually is, what it is comprised of, and what it is in control of, the task, seemingly simple at first, becomes …show more content…
We will start with a description of the disorder from a diagnostic standpoint. Following from this, a psychological explanation will be provided as well as a biological description of what may be potential factors in causing dissociative identity disorder. With this basis explained, a review of relevant philosophical theories can be provided for understanding the traditional concept of personal identity and how it may be applied to explain multiple selves contained in one individual. Included in this will be a discussion on free will and theories on the fictive …show more content…
An example of this is having no memory of being asleep while not dreaming, or being completely unconscious. It can be argued that even under these conditions personal identity can be preserved. So, even after this period of unconsciousness, a relation still remains among the mental contents of past and present persons. An individual has the capacity to preserve memories from the earlier experiences of the past individual; thus, even without having absolute clarity of recalling preceding events, the mental contents of the present individual are continuous of that of the past person.
However, other theories come into play and reject the psychological approach to explaining personal identity and it’s persistence over time; claims that continuity of the brain and memory are not enough to explain and confirm personal identity are made. These theories include the biological approach, the dualist theory, and the materialist theory. Through the review of these theories respectively, a clearer understanding of personal identity can be developed and argued for. Following this, we can begin to see how cases of multiples personalities or identities can be argued to exist as