The story of the ship of Theseus could be used, I suppose, to argue against identity through time. That is, just as we can't resolve the question of whether a ship whose parts have been replaced bit by bit is really the same ship, so too we can't tell whether we are the same self we used to be, as our parts are being replaced without our even noticing it. So the argument would go.
Although I would not recommend this sort of argument I'm throwing it out there because I want to pair it with the following counter-argument that could be given via a thought experiment that I would title "The Sentence of Theseus." It would start by pointing to a sentence, suggesting that we replace one-at-a-time, as many of the words as we can, with a near-synonym. It would then follow by suggesting that something like that is going on all the time without our intending to change any words at all, so that the sentence expressed by Theseus undergoes significant change with each utterance without his even noticing it. In such a case, it is hard to claim that he or we continue to have the same sentence. If one runs with this thought with the same sort of thoroughness that Forest Gump displayed in running with the ball (i.e., after being told to run with the ball during a football game, he not only crossed into the end zone but continued running until he was outside the football stadium), then we will end up with the claim that there is no continuity in speech whatsoever. But that very suggestion involves a kind of contradiction, for one would not be able to propose for more than a moment the notion that sentences have no stability if that proposal were true. The same goes for thought. So our reflection on this proposal give us a kind of reductio ad absurdam.
Something that led to this conclusion needs to be denied. And whatever that is that is to be denied will have an analog in the statement denying the persistence of personal identity.
Although I would not recommend this sort of argument I'm throwing it out there because I want to pair it with the following counter-argument that could be given via a thought experiment that I would title "The Sentence of Theseus." It would start by pointing to a sentence, suggesting that we replace one-at-a-time, as many of the words as we can, with a near-synonym. It would then follow by suggesting that something like that is going on all the time without our intending to change any words at all, so that the sentence expressed by Theseus undergoes significant change with each utterance without his even noticing it. In such a case, it is hard to claim that he or we continue to have the same sentence. If one runs with this thought with the same sort of thoroughness that Forest Gump displayed in running with the ball (i.e., after being told to run with the ball during a football game, he not only crossed into the end zone but continued running until he was outside the football stadium), then we will end up with the claim that there is no continuity in speech whatsoever. But that very suggestion involves a kind of contradiction, for one would not be able to propose for more than a moment the notion that sentences have no stability if that proposal were true. The same goes for thought. So our reflection on this proposal give us a kind of reductio ad absurdam.
Something that led to this conclusion needs to be denied. And whatever that is that is to be denied will have an analog in the statement denying the persistence of personal identity.
Comments