Locke, John (1690). " Of Identity and Diversity, opens in a new window". In An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Vol.1, Book II, Chap. xxvii. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg.
Locke’s question: What is the criterion of numerical identity for a given kind of thing? For Locke, the answer differs depending on the kind of thing.
General Lockean points about identity
- judgements about numerical identity typically involve comparing a thing with itself at different stages of its existence.
- a consequence of this = a thing’s origin forms a standard for judging of identity and diversity.
“That, therefore, that had one beginning, is the [numerically] same thing [over time]; and that which had a different beginning in time and place from that, is not the same, but diverse.”
IN OTHER WORDS, same origin = identical ; different origin = diverse
- judgements about identity of objects are relative to categories of things. Someategories that Locke references to:
- Bodies
- Plants
- Animals
- Man
Identity of Substance (origin criterion)
For Locke, substance = most general categories of entities believed to exist
Three kinds of substances:
- Finite spirits (souls/minds) = non-material aspects of our existence
- Bodies = material or physical objects
- divine substance = God
any soul (mind), and any body (specifically any atom) must have had a distinct time and place of origin, so
“the relation to that time and place will always determine each of them to that identity.”
According to Locke, God didn’t have a time of origin since God is in fact eternal, but God is also “unalterable”, “unchanging”, and, as Locke puts it, “everywhere”. So, there can be no serious questions as to God’s numerical identity over time.
The identity of complex bodies
most physical objects we perceive are not simple bodies, but they’re massive collections of atoms that are constantly changing over time.
“…if two or more atoms be joined together into the same mass, every one of those atoms will be the same, by the foregoing rule (by the origin standard, that is): and whilst they exist united together the mass, consisting of the same atoms, must be the same mass, or the same body, let the parts be ever so differently jumbled. But if one of these atoms be taken away, or one new one added, it is no longer the same mass or the same body”
This implies that one must have a different body than it was yesterday, since it is a different mass of atoms = implies that there is many me’s. This is not the case as according to Locke, human beings are not the same as bodies.
The identity of vegetables (plants)
“That being then one plant which has such an organization of parts in one coherent body, partaking of one common life, it continues to be the same plant as long as it partakes of the same life, [even if] that life be communicated to new particles of matter…”
Unlike bodies, the identity of plants is defined not in terms of the atoms they comprise, but in terms of the organization of physical parts in sustaining a single physical life.
The identity of animals
Animals are treated similarly to the identity of plants i.e. they are tied to sustaining a single life. The difference is that in animals, the kind of life being preserved also has sensation and motion (not just growth).
In his description of the identity of animals, Locke compares animals with a watch (a machine): replacing the physical parts doesn’t change the fact that it is still a watch as the part continue to sustain the original function.
The identity of Man
Locke is considering human beings in strictly biological terms and so for Locke, the man is just “an animal of a certain form”.
“…the identity of the same MAN consists … in nothing but a participation of the same continued life, by constantly fleeting particles of matter, in succession vitally united to the same organized body.”
Locke, however, distinguishes between the category of “man” and “person”. To be a person is not the same as to be a body, nor is being a person the same as being an animal, even a human animal.
The identity of a Person (Memory criterion)
“to find wherein personal identity consists, we must consider what PERSON stands for [what it means to be a person, in other words]; — which, I think, is a thinking intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing, in different times and places; which it does only by that consciousness which is inseparable from thinking, and, as it seems to me, essential to it…”
To put it simply, Locke defines a person as a being that can consider itself as itself in different times and places. You can retrieve your past experiences, your past thoughts, you past actions, through a certain kind of consciousness.
Locke considers consciousness as inseparable from thinking (for people at least), and the term consciousness for Locke means awareness of our own thoughts and perceptions. It is this kind of consciousness that Locke associates with personhood.
“As far as this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person; it is the same self now as it was then.”
As Locke puts it, it is BECAUSE of the reach of consciousness in memory that makes me the same person as I was at some point in the past. I am the same me as yesterday because I am aware of the experiences and thoughts of past me.
So, to summarize: Memory Criterion = Personhood is constituted by reflective consciousness. And the numerical identity of a person over time is established by memory
Consequences of the Memory Criterion
Neither sameness of body (sameness of material substance) nor sameness of soul (sameness of finite spirit) is required for personal identity. Locke thinks that consciousness alone is what accounts for personal identity. From this, it follows logically that at different times the same person could inhabit two different bodies or two different souls.
According to Locke’s criterion, experiences that have escaped your memory irretrievably are not in fact your experiences. They must be the experiences of another person.
- E.g. Drunken actions you cannot remember implies that you cannot be the same person that under went them
- Locke doesn’t see a problem with this as even though you are no longer the same person, you still fulfill the criteria of identity of being the same “human being”
Locke describes personhood as a forensic concept, meaning that it is tied to practices of moral and legal responsibility. Because of this, personhood is bound up with accountability. So, it provides a straightforward explanation of how we can be true owners of our past actions AND you’re only responsible for what you can remember as your own actions, because memory links past choices to your present self.
Both Locke and Taylor here are concerned with what makes actions genuinely ours in a way that grounds moral responsibility. Locke focuses on who the responsibility attaches to (ownership of actions requires memory), while Taylor focuses on whether such responsibility is possible in a determined world (ownership of actions requires freedom = agency-theory).
Soul of Nestor analogy (p. )
This showcases Locke’s idea that having the same soul (finite spirit) does not gurantees that you’re the same person, and he links it as meaningless for personal identity as “same atoms” if there is no consciousness.
Modern paraphrasing =
Suppose the same soul that once animated Nestor or Thersites at Troy in now in a man today. Souls, as far as we know, aren’t tied to any particular bit of matter, so it is not absurd to imagine the same soul moving from one body to another.
But if this man has no consciousness of what Nestor or Thersites did, can he really consider himself to be the same person as either of them? Can he take responsibility for their actions, or claim them as his own, any more than he could claim the actions of any other person who lived in the past?
If his consciousness doesn’t extend back to those actions, then he is no more the same self as Nestor or Thersites than if his soul had only just been created when it began animating his current body. Even if it’s true that the very same immaterial soul once animated Nestor’s body and now animates his, that alone doesn’t make him the same person.
It would be no different than if some particles of matter that once made up Nestor’s body were now part of his. Having the same soul without the same consciousness no more makes him the same person than having the same particles of matter without consciousness would.
Prince and Cobbler analogy (p. 9)
This showcases Locke’s idea that consciousness constitutes personal identity and makes the distinction between man and person.
Modern paraphrasing =
imagine, a Cobbler who has died, and therefore the Cobbler’s consciousness has departed from him, and his body comes to be inhabited now by the consciousness of a prince. Everyone would agree that this new being is the same person as the prince, since he remembers and is conscious of the prince’s life, and so he would be accountable for the prince’s actions.
But no one would say he is the same man. Being a “man” includes the body too, and in this case the body is still that of the cobbler. So, even though the consciousness is princely, to everyone else he would still appear to be the cobbler, not the prince.
Locke acknowledges that in ordinary way of speaking, same person = same man (the two are used interchangeably), but Locke makes the argument that this is not the case.
Problems with Locke’s view
- Reid-on-personal-identity criticism is that is contradictory
- Locke’s view of personal identity relies on memory when in reality, our capacity of conscious memory is not all that powerful. There’s plenty of stuff from our past that we’re not able to bring to memory, but we still consider it part of our past, part of our own personal selves.
So it is important to see how we can preserve Locke’s insight that memory connects us with our past experiences to form a continuous person, without being forced into his strict dependence?