In John Perry’s A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality, Perry discusses both the possibility of immortality (the ability to survive after death) and the question of personal identity. In the process, he proposes three theories as to what could account for personal identity: soul theory, memory theory, and body theory. First, however, it is necessary to discuss what the question of personal identity is. Personal identity refers to a human being’s numerical identity over time. Thus, the question of personal identity essentially asks what must be preserved in order for a person to be considered the same, or continuous, over time. Thus, theories of personal identity attempt to answer the question of personal identity by giving examples
…show more content…
He further states that the soul accounts for personal identity and that it is the sameness of the soul that preserves personal identity. That is, as long as a person has the same soul, then that person will be considered the same over time. In Perry’s memory theory, a person is a unified stream of consciousness, which is comprised of successive person stages. A person stage is essentially a person at a certain instant and what links a later person stage to an earlier person stage is memory. That is, as long as a later person stage is able to remember the memories held by the previous person stage, then the stream of consciousness is unbroken and therefore, the person at those two person stages are the same. Finally, there is Perry’s body theory, which is also referred to as the brain theory. This theory claims that a person can only be considered the same over time only if that person possesses the same …show more content…
Perry, through the character Weirob, claims that “it seems clear as anything in philosophy that from A is B and C is B where by ‘is’ we mean identity, we can infer, A is C” (A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality, page 32). Thus, if we were to duplicate Person B twice, resulting in Persons A and C, both Persons A and C would be Person B. Thus, both Persons A and C would have the same memories as Person B, which would mean they both have the same identity. However, personal identity is supposed to be unique. That is, only Person B is supposed to have Person B’s identity. Thus, it seems illogical that Persons A and C would share Person B’s identity, because then Person B’s identity would no longer be unique, and therefore, no longer an identity, thus showing why the duplication problem makes memory theory appear false. However, on page 31 of Perry’s book, Perry, through the character Cohen, claims that “We can say that the rememberer is the one of the two whose memories were caused in the right way by earlier experiences”. Essentially, this means that in order for a memory to be considered a real memory, and not an apparent memory, the memory must have been created as a result of something experienced by the rememberer. Thus, there is a connection between an agent performing an action and a memory being formed as a result of that action. Where I find fault in the objection to memory theory is that
He further states that the soul accounts for personal identity and that it is the sameness of the soul that preserves personal identity. That is, as long as a person has the same soul, then that person will be considered the same over time. In Perry’s memory theory, a person is a unified stream of consciousness, which is comprised of successive person stages. A person stage is essentially a person at a certain instant and what links a later person stage to an earlier person stage is memory. That is, as long as a later person stage is able to remember the memories held by the previous person stage, then the stream of consciousness is unbroken and therefore, the person at those two person stages are the same. Finally, there is Perry’s body theory, which is also referred to as the brain theory. This theory claims that a person can only be considered the same over time only if that person possesses the same …show more content…
Perry, through the character Weirob, claims that “it seems clear as anything in philosophy that from A is B and C is B where by ‘is’ we mean identity, we can infer, A is C” (A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality, page 32). Thus, if we were to duplicate Person B twice, resulting in Persons A and C, both Persons A and C would be Person B. Thus, both Persons A and C would have the same memories as Person B, which would mean they both have the same identity. However, personal identity is supposed to be unique. That is, only Person B is supposed to have Person B’s identity. Thus, it seems illogical that Persons A and C would share Person B’s identity, because then Person B’s identity would no longer be unique, and therefore, no longer an identity, thus showing why the duplication problem makes memory theory appear false. However, on page 31 of Perry’s book, Perry, through the character Cohen, claims that “We can say that the rememberer is the one of the two whose memories were caused in the right way by earlier experiences”. Essentially, this means that in order for a memory to be considered a real memory, and not an apparent memory, the memory must have been created as a result of something experienced by the rememberer. Thus, there is a connection between an agent performing an action and a memory being formed as a result of that action. Where I find fault in the objection to memory theory is that